Litefeet is a rising music genre and style of dance that has become increasingly popular within the New York subway scene. The genre is highlighted by 100-BPM tracks as well as an acrobatic take on old school b-boy moves and pop-locking. Due to the energetic nature of the music and the moves, police have begun cracking down on the scene, leaving artists sometimes struggling to cope. Continue reading
In 1972, Alvin Ailey created the elegiac solo Love Songs for dancer Dudley Williams. The sixteen minute solo, composed in three sections includes A Song for You by Donny Hathaway; Poppies by Nina Simone; and He Ain’t Heavy, He’s my Brother by Donny Hathaway. Many thought of the work as the male equivalent of the female solo Cry (1971). Continue reading
Next Level Squad, a Brooklyn-based group of élite dancers who specialize in Bone Breaking. The dance style has roots, as a technique, in flexing; but in recent years it has flourished as its own distinct dance form. Next Level Squad has not only brought Bone Breaking to the attention of the urban public, it has gained an international following. Another art-form “Made In America”. Continue reading
Minnie Riperton, singer-songwriter best known for her 1975 single Lovin’ You. She was one of the first celebrities to go public with her breast cancer diagnosis, but did not disclose she was terminally ill. In 1977, she became a spokesperson for the American Cancer Society. She received the American Cancer Society’s Courage Award in 1978, which was presented to her at the White House by President Jimmy Carter. She was married to songwriter and music producer Richard Rudolph from 1972 until her death in 1979. They had two children: music engineer Marc Rudolph and actress/comedienne Maya Rudolph. She died at age 31 on July 12, 1979. Continue reading
Tchaikovsky Pas de Deux with Patricia McBride and Mikhail Baryshnikov was recorded in 1979. George Balanchine acquired the rights to the music in 1953 and he used it to devise a party piece for a principal couple, amending the choreography each time to suit each pair of dancers. You have to admire Patricia McBride’s diamond-edged footwork including entrechats skimmed millimetres from the floor, or wonder how Baryshnikov’s twelfth consecutive double cabriole can look as easy and elegant as the first. Continue reading
Sophisticated Ladies starring Gregory Hines, Hinton Battle, Phyllis Hyman, Greg Burge and Paula Kelly is a musical revue based on the music of Duke Ellington. The musical opened on Broadway at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre on March 1, 1981 and closed on January 2, 1983 after 767 performances and fifteen previews. Continue reading
Le Jeune Homme et La Mort was choreographed by Roland Petit choreographed in 1946 to Bach’s Passacaglia and Fugue in C Minor, BWV 582, with a one-act libretto by Jean Cocteau. It tells the story of a Young Man driven to suicide by his faithless lover. Sets were by George Wakhevitch and costumes variously reported as being by Karinska or Cocteau. Continue reading
Serenade is a ballet by George Balanchine to Tschaikovsky’s 1880 Serenade for Strings in C, Op. 48. Students of the School of American Ballet gave the first performance on Sunday, 10 June 1934 on the Felix M. Warburg estate in White Plains, N.Y., where Mozartiana had been danced the previous day. This was the first ballet Balanchine choreographed in the United States. Continue reading
Steven Hill, aka Bones The Machine is a Flex dancer, actor and model. He performs jaw-dropping style of dance that originated from Jamaican brukup, and is rooted in the streets of east Brooklyn. The dance, which consists mainly of shapes you form with your arms, is called ‘Bone Breaking’ as it really looks like Steven has traded his skeleton for some sort of elastic gum. Bones has spent several years to develop his unique technique where he mixes contortion and improvisation with other styles from parallel dance movements such as tutting, popping, connecting and waving – and even a bit of ballet. Continue reading
In The Ballerinas, a sumptuously produced two-part ballet drama, Fracci places her rare artistry in the service of dance history as she recreates roles first premiered by such luminous ballerinas as Marie Taglioni, Emma Livry, Carlotta Grisi, Fanny Elssler, Giuseppina Bozzacchi, Carlotta Brianza, Matilde Kschessinska, Anna Pavlova, Tamara Karsavina and Olga Spessitzeva. Continue reading
The Dance of the Village Elders are back ! This time we exercise, dance and just have fun through the zoom platform or in-person at R.A.I.N. Nereid 
The Dance of the Village Elders are back ! This time we exercise, dance and just have fun through the zoom platform or in-person at R.A.I.N. Nereid The Dance of the Village Elders are back ! This time we exercise, dance and just have fun through the zoom platform or in-person at R.A.I.N. Nereid 