The New York Baroque Dance Co.

Caroline Copeland backstage at Drottningholm

The New York Baroque Dance Company provides an important entry into the world of Baroque dance and music for its company dancers. Trained by Catherine Turocy, Artistic Director and Associate Directors Caroline Copeland and Sarah Edgar in period performance technique, the dancers are also encouraged to be involved in projects outside the company.  Reading the dance notation, developing their research skills and expanding their knowledge of the general culture from the period are skills the dancers must pursue on their own. These skills are not learned in a dance rehearsal. However, dancers do gain insight into these skills through their NYBDC performances. Being a good dancer does not automatically mean one is equipped to stage direct or choreograph…but it is a start!

This past summer Alexis Silver was the choreographer for the new Aquilon Music Festival in Oregon.  She worked on the fully-staged opera premiere of La Chûte de Phaëton, a commedie en musique, from 1694. For a fuller account of the festival and its activities Click here.

Olsi Gjeci taught his first Baroque dance intensive in Lisbon, Portugal on July 30th. Currently he is expanding his research into dance notation, often involving his wife, dancer Diana Seabra as his partner. Olsi is a true “citizen of the world” and is having an incredible impact on dance through his web platform UMUV.  An experienced modern dancer (formerly with Trisha Brown) as well as an accomplished modern dance choreographer himself, we are looking forward to Olsi’s deeper journey into the Baroque!

Last April Brynt Beitman choreographed a solo and performed for the City Choir of Washington in their tribute to Maestro Shafer’s fiftieth anniversary as a conductor in Washington, DC.  Already a contemporary choreographer, it is exciting to see Brynt’s interest in combining the new with the old.

Looking back, I first met Sarah Edgar as a scholarship student at our summer workshop in Napa in 1998. She has accomplished so much since then. Be sure to catch her work as stage director at the end of September for Handel’s Serse at Haymarket Opera in Chicago.

Louis XIV as Jupiter from a ballet

BALLET OF THE SEVEN PLANETS WORKSHOP

Taught by Catherine Turocy

Where: New Mexico Ballet 10410 Comanche Rd NE
Albuquerque, NM 87111

When: July 23-27, 9:30am-12:30pm

Cost: $150.00

Hosted by New Mexico Ballet and funded in part by the Dance Preservation Fund of The Ohio State University

Register Now for the Workshop Online

505-292-4245

for more information call Mariel McEwan 323-578-0846

Dance as Science: In the magnificent and opulent court entertainments of Louis XIV, early ballet was considered both an art and a science. The body was trained as a highly functioning instrument of artistic expression revealing the movements of the soul within the dancer. Through both the lines of motion felt within the body and outside the body… whether executing a dance phrase or in creating spatial geometrical patterns of choreography on the stage, through thiese lines, the dancer spins the story of the ballet.  These lines of geometry were part of a larger aesthetic ruled by measurements believed to be at the heart of universal harmony and joining the earth with the heavens.

As a dancer, I have used the philosophical concepts of the  body being the microcosm of the macrocosm of nature and in harmony with the golden ratio. Perhaps the secret behind my performance persona comes from this ability to use the body both physically and dramatically within this structure which is still valid in dance performance today.

The workshop will take students through early ballet concepts of theory, technique and performance practice. The morning session will look at technique and complicated dance phrases. Using a smaller movement range than we do today, students will experience a heightened sense of fine motor skills. They will be able to add this new mastery of the muscles to their modern training thus enhancing their abilities to add a subtle air or color to their own performance practice.

The morning session will use music from the Ballet of the Seven Planets as well as additional music. We will also look at opera text using the aria of Venus to see how expressive movement and pantomime can be combined to enhance the sung text. Ballets in the 17th and 18th cenuries often wove together the sung and danced air to make a suite.

The 9:30-12:30am sessions will be my chance as a choreographer to experiment with phrases and to begin to set the Ballet of the Seven Planets as I would like to use it in the planetary dome show. After breaking for lunch, from 1-2pm  I would like to train specific dancers on how to coach the period dance style with the notion that they could eventually use material learned in the workshop to enhance an educational outreach class touching upon the origins of ballet. This afternoon session is a separate class from the workshop.   Poster at right can be downloaded: 

The Ostrich (Glenda Norcross) makes her debut with the Dallas Bach Society in Fairy Queen. Her trainer is the Fire Salamander (Matthew John Ting) and choreographer, Catherine Turocy (The New York Baroque Dance Company. Jane Stein created the ostrich and the salamander. This is a phone video from May 12, 2018 in Dallas at the Northaven United Methodist Church to whom we are so grateful!

One of the advantages to being stage director and choreographer for Fairy Queen is being able to incorporate these magical creations of Jane Stein. Since 1980 she has made masks, crown masks and body puppets for the NYBDC. Come to our performance on May 12 at Northaven United Methodist Church, 7:30pm and bring family and friends! Tickets

Jane’s website

Teseo performed at Drottningholm in Sweden, production of Goettinfen Handel Festival

Rehearsal of Opera Lafayette’s production of Rameau’s Les Fêtes de l’Hymen et de l’Amour

Congratulations to the following dancers who auditioned for the Scholarship Program in our summer workshop supported by friends of The New York Baroque Dance Company and partially by a special grant from San Jose State University, the Artistic Excellence Grant.

Sade Warner “Young Dancer” scholarship

Marisa Castillo: “Shirley Wynne Memorial Teacher” scholarship

Marisa Castillo is a lifelong student of movement and dance. Marisa loves all dance genres and has studied a diverse range of styles including Classical Ballet, Modern, Hip-hop, Contact Improvisation and Salsa to name a few. She has studied at the Ailey School in New York City and holds a B.A. in Dance from San Francisco State University. For the past 13 years she has been honing her skills as a somatic classical ballet

teacher in San Francisco under the mentorship of Augusta Moore. Ms. Castillo has also had the pleasure of studying Experimental Anatomy and the application of it to dance with Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen. She became involved with Historical Dance in 2015 while performing with the San Francisco Renaissance Dancers. Marisa is excited to be a scholarship recipient and is eager to immerse herself into this much-needed look into dance’s past.

 

Why Historical Dance?

I feel that historical dance is a major component for understanding today’s dance, especially classical ballet. Where did the steps come from? How did they develop the ballet technique we employ today? This all stems from Baroque and also Renaissance dances. I feel it is critical as my role as a dance educator to pass this knowledge onto my students. I also see it as a way to help students understand that ballet didn’t just all of a sudden appear but it comes from a history and lineage

worthy of study and examination.

Isabelle Sjahsam : work study / Teacher’s assistant

Ms. Isabelle Sjahsam studied the rigorous Royal Academy of Dance system with Connie Vaughan, and at thirteen, moved to England to continue her training and complete her major examinations in London.   While in the United Kingdom, she competed in the All England Dance Competition, reaching the Quarter Finals with her ballet solo.  At the age of eighteen, she completed her Advanced examination, receiving her certification to teach the Royal Academy of Dance.  She has an International Baccalaureate from the American Community School in Cobham, England. She also graduated from Mills College with a degree in Dance.  

 

Ms. Sjahsam has performed with Bay Area dance companies including SF Renaissance Dancers, Em Space Dance, Jenny McAllister/13th Floor Dance Theater, and Anna Halprin and Dancers. She appeared in the works of Michael Lowe while working with Moving Arts Dance, Black Diamond Ballet Theatre, and Menlowe Ballet, and has toured internationally with Leyya Tawil’s Dance Elixir.

 

Her choreography has been presented in venues 
including Counterpulse, Temescal Arts Center, Mission Creek Music and Arts Festival, Cal Arts Electronic Music Festival, and West Wave Dance Festival. From 2005 to 2011 Sjahsam collaborated with actor and director Malinda Trimble to create new works for their dance-theater troupe ArtFace Performance Group. In 2008, she received a new work commission by Middlebury College Dance Company. The work she created
there, Standing Mother, premiered in Vermont and was also performed in Tabor, Czech Republic. In recent years she has collaborated with Saint Helena based Ehlers Art Society, and LA based artist Daniel Leland Crook.

 

Why Historical Dance?

To explore the origins of ballet in order to deepen the practice.

Eva Marie Garrick, dancer and wife of David Garrick, portrait by Boucher

Cost: only $17 per class!

P.S. If you went class in 2017 you will remember that Meggi was expecting her child at the end of the year. She arrived on Thanksgiving Day or should I say night. Sidney is in fine health and we are so happy for the Smith family!

Or catch Catherine Turocy in San Francisco also on January 6th and 7th! 

photo by C. Andrako

Empowering the Performer: 18th century Techniques Lost and Found and Useful to Today’s Dancer
with Catherine Turocy, The New York Baroque Dance Company
Saturday, January 6
3:45-5:15pm
Class Fee: $20.00

ODC Dance Commons
Kimi Okada, School Director
351 Shotwell Street, SF
odc.dance
415.863.6606

Description:  What is our legacy from the 18th century stage which can bring a new depth to the dance of today? This class will look at basic aesthetic principles of the Golden Ratio and the Vitruvian Man and how they influenced the creation of the five positions of the feet in ballet as well as the expressive dance technique common to both ballet and modern dance forms. The class will be a physical, dancing experience using excerpts of published dance notation from the repertoire of the early 18th century including minuets and chaconnes. The theory behind the exercises will be emailed to participants in order to keep the class moving.

Public Workshop Sunday, January 7th: “Bach in Time!” a dance and music Workshop in celebration of the Junior Bach Festival’s 65^th concert season. Catherine Turocy, the nation’s foremost baroque dance expert and founder of New York Baroque Dance Company, will lead the Workshop. Participants will dance to the music of J.S. Bach, accompanied by members of Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, who perform Bach’s music on instruments from his time.

Time and Date: 2:30 to 4:00 pm. on Sunday, January 7, 2018

Venue: The Hofer Auditorium at Crowden Community Music Center, 1475 Rose Street at Sacramento (close to the North Berkeley Bart Station)

Suggested Donation:  $10 for adults. No one will be turned away for lack of funds. Students may attend free of charge.

Description:Families, teachers, performers, and Bach enthusiasts are warmly invited to participate in this  Workshop about dances that inspired Bach’s music, performed on instruments from Bach’s time. No previous dance experience is required. Dancing is not mandatory, but if you would like to dance, please wear comfortable clothing and dancing shoes (if you have them). Powdered wigs are not necessary.

Why dance when the Festival is all about J.S. Bach’s music? In Bach’s time, musicians and their audiences would have been familiar with dances that comprised the 18^th century French dance suite. (Bach himself knew at least three former dance masters of King Louis XIV of France!) Today’s musicians find that the more they learn about baroque dance, the more easily they can interpret music that was based on baroque dance forms —including many of J.S. Bach’s compositions. The meter and quality of a dance can inform the modern player’s decisions about tempo, articulation, phrasing, bowings, and ornamentation.

And for those who studied with Ana Yepes at our summer Spanish Baroque Dance workshop…

Catherine Turocy_2018 Master Class

photo by C. Andrako

Please click the above link for the flyer for the Master Class to be held before the audition on January 6th at ODC in San Francisco

Audition Series_NY Baroque Dance Co 

Please click the link above for the Audition Flyer. The audition will be held directly after the Master Class.

This year’s workshop, Historical Dance at Play at San Jose State University will look at period dance and concepts of creativity, improvisation, “caprice” and the responsibility of the dancer/performer to express their individual style while dancing. Click link below to discover the fun!

Web Page with Information on 2018 Summer Workshop in San Jose