You can always expect the unexpected from a Danceworks Performance Company event. The group is diverse and egalitarian, and DPC’s concerts often feature an eclectic assortment of dances that reflect the personalities of the members—playful, dramatic, gleefully inventive, quietly introspective.
But Breathe is not an ordinary Danceworks repertory concert. Anchored by Janet Lilly’s “Requiem,” it represents a variety of tributes to the continuing spirit of Ed Burgess, a UWM professor and revered figure of the Milwaukee dance community, who passed away suddenly in 2011. No one needs to argue for Burgess’s importance to Milwaukee dance. And this program makes the case beautifully—it’s some of Danceworks’ finest work in years.
While Lilly’s “Requiem” is the main attraction, Dani Kuepper’s sublimely beautiful “Slowly and Always” sets the appropriately introspective tone. Set to lush traditional Estonian choral music, it features seven dancers in flowing saffron-toned robes, appropriate to the meditative mood. Much of the vocabulary draws Eastern practices—yoga, tai chi—but it also includes gestures of compassion, a dancer cradled in another’s arms or lifted vertically. The ensemble is fluid and amorphous, but it builds to a few moments of unity, all seven dancers reaching skyward with one hand, a potent sign of a yearning for transcendence. It’s a work of breathtaking tenderness.
Lilly’s “Requiem” closed the concert, celebratory rather than introspective. She fills the Next Act stage with 15 dancers, scattered randomly, and sets them in motion gradually. Single dancers cross with traditional jetés, one at a time, sharing the simple joy of moving, before the ensemble swings into action. In one section, there’s an evocation of Burgess the teacher, with Joe Fransee leading a “class” of students. The vocabulary is both sweeping and romantic, and quirky—dancers on all fours first tap their fingers impatiently, then rumble their feet in place as if they are executing football drills. The music—a slightly overblown classical choral arrangement of Joy Divisions “The Eternal”—builds ominously, but the movement remains full of very human detail—the everyday endures even the most cosmic events. As the song says:
“No words could explain, no actions determine,
Just watching the trees and the leaves as they fall.”
Gina Laurenzi’s “Winter Becomes You,” a duet set on Alberto Cambra and Andrew Zanoni, suggests two beings in uneasy hibernation, each one looking for company in sleep or wakefulness. It was witty and physically demanding, and superbly danced.
Christal Wagner’s “Tidal” was created for a spin-off ensemble, Cadance Collective, which is dedicated to music-dance collaborations. Flutist Emma Koi and cellist Alicia Storen played an abstract, evocative score as a trio of dancers suggested the ebb and flow of the ocean.
Joëlle Worm’s “Pilgrimage” used the metaphor of a subway ride to explore the “in-between” region of faith and non-belief. As Worm talks about her experiences with religion, subway riders remain detached and absorbed in the minutia of the day-to-day. Eventually, the ensemble shifts into a frantic run-around that settles into a single collective, suggesting the elusive task of bringing people together when beliefs remain fragmented.
Filmmaker Kym McDaniel and dancer Kim Johnson offered another touching tribute. McDaniel’s Rituals is a lush of quotidian pleasures: dazzling white bedsheets in a simply furnished room, flowers, landscapes, a woman (Johnson) waiting by the window. Preceeding it, Johnson’s “Without Word or Sound” was a harrowing evocation of deep, overpowering grief. Sitting on a chair, alone in a spotlight, Johnson quaked with emotion. Then, as we all must do, left it behind and went back to the routines of her life. Like the rest of the work on this inspired program, it evoked the only available response to the tragedy of losing someone dear: “I can’t go on; I’ll go on.”
“Breathe” repeats Friday and Saturday nights. Thursday’s performance was sold out, so don’t wait to reserve tickets.
