Description: You are invited to join The New York Baroque Dance Company in a presentation of works the dancers have created in the Baroque style or reconstructed from period dance notation. This will be an exclusive look at the inner talent of the company, the personalities shaping the future of Baroque dance and the intriguing process of exploration behind our work.
7:30-8:30 Our evening begins with an optional Baroque Dance instruction for the beginner. We would like to “reconstruct the 18th century audience” by familiarizing our attendees with social dance and etiquette from the European courts of Louis XIV of France and Queen Anne of England. Whether you participate in dancing or watch from a chair, this event will be informative and entertaining as Catherine Turocy takes you from bows to bourrées. Class instruction will be slanted towards the evening’s dances by the general assembly at 9:30pm.
8:30-9:30 The NYBDC is perhaps the only professional dance company where all its members read and use a dance notation system. Some dancers are more accomplished than others, but all are trained in the notation system and encouraged to do their own reconstructions. This tool empowers our performers, helps us mount dances quickly and contributes to the spontaneity and discussion crucial to the creation of art. We are happy to share this process with you as members of the company perform dances being reconstructed for performance. Company member Rachel List will also bring her student dancers from Hofstra University to give a preview of Rachel’s period choreography to be premiered at the university the following week.
9:30-10:30 The performance will be followed by optional general dancing (a ballroom duet and Contredanse) with members of the NYBDC joining the audience in the pleasure of the dance. Specific works will be announced on the website with links to the notation for those members of our audience who read the notation. The 7:30 class instruction will be slanted toward the evening’s dances.
Please join us at the Baroque Ball and tell your friends about this most unusual event! We anticipate a large crowd so please purchase your tickets in advance .
Tickets: $20 at the door
$15 when purchased in advance
Link to Buying Tickets online http://www.92y.org/Uptown/Event/Baroque-Ball.aspx
From Dancer Carly Fox speaking of her work on the Passacaille
“ I am creating a Passacaille for four, taking my inspiration and much of the footwork from the notated “Passacaille pour un homme et une femme” by Guillaume Louis Pécour, and sprinkling in some solo work from the “Chaconne de Phaeton pour un homme” (also choreographed byPécour). The challenge and the joy of working with this material is both adapting the choreography to four dancers and to different music, a beautiful Passacaille composed by Francois Couperin. The music is twice as long as that of the original music for the notated Passacaille, so there is plenty of room for exploration. Up to now, we have been working entirely on learning the footwork and experimenting with the spatial patterns that I have been imagining. The dancers are patient with me as we try different approaches to the same figure and find out what is possible with four bodies instead of two. Next we will be taking inspiration from paintings, sketches, and figurines to explore the use of our upper bodies, our arm movements, and possibly some props. There is so much to discover, I only wish we had more time!”
Additional comments will be posted on this blog by the other dancers presenting : Matthew Buffalo, Sarah Edgar, Carly Fox Horton, Olsi Gjeci, Rachel List, Alexis Silver, Ani Udovicki, Gregory Youdan
