Dancing with a Vision: Les Ballets de Monte Carlo's Stephan Bourgond
The trailblazing Les Ballets de Monte Carlo performed in the United States last month, stopping at Segerstrom Center for the Arts and New York City Center. The company presented the American premiere of Choré , Artistic Director and choreographer Jean-Christophe Maillot's "discourse on American dance and the political eras that have shaped it," writes Joseph Carman in the LA Times . The World Dances spoke with company member Stephan Bourgond about Les Ballets de Monte Carlo, Choré , his advice for aspiring dancers, and more.
What do you find most challenging and most rewarding about working with Les Ballets de Monte Carlo?
Working daily with a living choreographer is both the most challenging and rewarding thing about being in Les Ballets de Monte Carlo. Even when we repeat some of his great creations, like Cinderella or Lac (after Swan Lake), the work is constantly living and breathing and changing.
I am constantly being challenged to rethink my approach to a role, and just when I think I've got it, and the boss is happy, I know the next time we are in the studio we will dive back into the character and think about how it could be approached differently. I love that I never feel fully settled into a role and am always able to research more into it.
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Segerstrom Center for the Arts - Les Ballets de Monte Carlo
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What are your roles in Choré?
In the first sequence I play a sort of shade of Fred Astaire. It's a sequence that was inspired by how people used to look to these great musical stars as an escape from the reality of their lives. There's a sort of tragedy that hovers around the stage, and Danny Elfman's music has an eerie way of being light and very dark at the same time. I love the masculinity of the role and how, at the time, real men tap danced.
In the second part of the ballet I play a Hollywood Star. In contrast the first sequence, which carries a lot of weight on its shoulders, the second sequence gives an embellished and quite ostentatious perspective of the stars of the silver screen. I play a character like Clark Gable. A well-trimmed mustache, twinkling eyes, and a smile that could melt a woman's heart are my assets in this scene and I milk them and milk them some more.
It was the first time I ever had to play a comedic role, which was a really great challenge for me. Creating this part with Jean Christophe was a really pleasure and full of laughs. It's wonderful to hear the audience reacting to the jokes and how every night someone in this scene will pop out with some new and hilarious reaction that almost makes us break character and laugh onstage ourselves.
What advice would you offer aspiring professionals who would love to follow in your footprints?
Make your own footprints; you are unique.
Read more...
By Tamara Johnson
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Courage and Integrity: An Interview with Charlotta Öfverholm
"I make the audience feel something," says Charlotta Öfverholm. "I think that is what I'm good at, actually." Öfverholm is the Artistic Director of Compagnie Jus de la Vie, based in Stockholm, and the creator of viscerally impactful dance theater. She studied dance at Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater and theater at UCLA before embarking on an ocean-spanning career between Europe and New York. She has danced with DV 8 Physical Theatre, Bill T. Jones, and Complexions (among many other luminaries) and created solo and duet pieces, such as Pas de Deux Sans Toi, that are often described as "raw." "Instead of cooking the carrots and putting butter on top, there are actually more nutrients if you eat it raw," Öfverholm elaborates with characteristic humor. She will be premiering a new work with Peridance Contemporary Dance Company in New York this month as part of PCDC's spring season. Click here for more info. The World Dances spoke with Öfverholm about her new piece, her creative process, artistic integrity, and more.
Can you please tell us about the piece that you're doing with PCDC?
I'm excited to work with the really good dancers. I call it After Lazarus. I always work with a theme. It's not only movements--there's always a concept I try to keep from beginning to end. This one is about, somehow, that we are alone here on earth. Even if we have a lot of people around us who might help you and be your friend, they might also put the knife in your back. You never know, you must always be attentive, both about people around you and about forces of nature. It's like, if you're running on a lake that is cold and icy, you don't know: will you drop down or is it strong enough to hold you? How much do you dare to give yourself to someone else or to take care of someone else? Or are you afraid? At least you have yourself, but then you are alone. I think it has to do with this existential question. I mean, it sounds like my pieces are very heavy, but I think there's a lot of humor in it. We need to have humor and sarcasm and the ability to make fun of difficult things. It's not to throw anything away or to devalue it; it's to say that it's ok and that we can still laugh.
Do you identify with the dance vocabularies from the influences you mentioned, or work in new idioms?
I try to make things new. It's me, my own body and what is natural to me. It's what flows in my body that I try to convey to other people when I choreograph. I was thinking about that the other day, what I do and if it's new. There were years when I felt that my art was so old fashioned. Right now everything is so conceptual and dry in Europe. You should not move, not make people feel anything. It's a strange thing that's "in" right now in Europe. It's like non-dance. You should not dance; you should represent concepts. But now I feel that I am not old fashioned. It's so strange--it goes back and forth. In America I think that I am very new. What we see on stage in American modern dance to me feels a bit stuck, with big companies doing the same things they were doing 40 years ago. If you take class, the people who are teaching do a lot of innovative things. There's a lot there, but in the theaters you don't see it so much. Sometimes I feel like I'm very conventional, and sometimes I feel like I could teach people something new.
The first thought I had watching your work was that you are courageous. Where does that come from and what have been some of your influences? I think it's everything you go through in life, and in your dance life. If you don't learn from it, it's very easy to try to be like everyone else, to try to fit in. I still work on it everywhere, every day. But when you find your own voice it's much easier to share it, and also to create and be yourself. It somehow makes life easier. In one way it makes life harder not to fit in, but it makes it easier when you want to share and create with other dancers. It's a way of surviving, actually. I went to school in New York. I went to Ailey first and continued to work with a lot of black dancers in the beginning. It was very inspiring and powerful. When I moved to Europe it was more Pina Bausch and tanztheater. That melancholy and humor, it goes straight into your heart. You can joke about things that are very serious and then actually the message becomes very real and raw. So Pina Bausch was very important as an inspiration. Then I was dancing with DV 8, which is something I never thought would happen. Lloyd Newson is someone who takes such risks. Also Batsheva--these kinds of movements, the big and animalistic movements, I like a lot.
By Tamara Johnson
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| Juan Siddi Flamenco Santa Fe
Photo Credit: Rosalie O'Connor |
NYC: Juan Siddi Flamenco Santa Fe at The Joyce March 22-27 For its New York debut, the impassioned Juan Siddi Flamenco Santa Fe brings a rich visual pageant to the Joyce stage, bearing strong traces of the company's Southwestern home base in New Mexico, with a direct cultural lineage to the flamenco enclaves of Europe.
Walnut Creek, CA: Diablo Ballet's 22nd Anniversary Performance and Gala Dinner at Lesher Center for the Arts March 17 Diablo Ballet's one-night-only performance and gala featuring Tears from Above by renowned dance maker Val Caniparoli, the solo from Gary Master's Diablo Opus, Sérénade pour Cordes et Corps by Canadian choreographer Sonya Delwaide, the pas de deux and finale from La Fille mal gardée, and a breathtaking film by Robert Dekkers in collaboration with filmmaker Walter Yamazaki. The evening will also feature Pitch Pause Please, created and danced by Dekkers, marking his return to the stage.
Kalamazoo, MI: The Midwest RAD Fest at the Epic Center March 18 - 20 RAD Fest presents five different live performances (four professional and one youth performance), a Dance for the Camera film series, six master classes and workshops, a discussion panel, and several different networking opportunities for artists.
Washington D.C.: DC Tap Fest March 14 -21 Chloé and Maud Productions, present the Annual DC Tap Festival, featuring the world's premier Tap Dance Artists: Stars of Vaudeville, Broadway, and Emmy and Grammy award winners spanning Four Generations! The DC Tap Festival is an opportunity to share the language of dance through master classes, history talks, jam sessions, student showcase, cutting contest, dance & film competitions, and a concert featuring both world renowned Tap Masters and accomplished young dancers from the DC area and abroad.
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March 3, 2016
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Announcing the Four February Harlequin Floors Scholarship Winners
Congratulations to February Harlequin Floors Scholarship winners Hannah Thomas, Austin Joseph Reynolds, Alana Scheuerer, and Gabrielle Gardner. Did you see the exceptional videos that were entered for the February scholarship contest? Thank you to all of the dancers who continue to share your wonderful talents with us every month! You'll find more than 2,000 dance videos on TheWorldDances.com including more than 150 videos from scholarship winners. Harlequin Floors has been celebrating and supporting dancers for decades--and is proud to award $1,000 in scholarships every month. Post your video now on TheWorldDances.com to enter the March Harlequin Floors Scholarship contest.
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Judges' Choice
Harlequin Scholarship Winner
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Austin Joseph Reynolds
Canto
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Judges' Choice
Harlequin Scholarship Winner
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| Hannah Thomas
Strange Realities |
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Viewers' Choice
Harlequin Scholarship Winner
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Alana Scheuerer
Stand By Me Tap Solo
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Viewers' Choice
Harlequin Scholarship Winner
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Gabrielle Gardner
Requiem
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The World Dances
more inspiring photographs of dance from around the world.
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| | Los Angeles - $175 for $500 Worth of Dance Lessons Dance Masters Events |
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New Career Opportunities in the Arts
Check out more than 50 new job listings. American Dance Festival is looking for a Sound Technician and a Technical Director. Bowen McCauley Dance seeks Teaching Artists and a new Executive Director. Jacob's Pillow has two open positions. Will you be the next Executive Director at Texas Ballet Theater? San Francisco Ballet seeks a Residence Manager and a Resident Assistant. Wilson College in PA has a great opportunity for a Visiting Assistant Professor of Dance. USC Glorya Kaufman School of Dance is looking for the right people to fill four open positions. You'll find these and many other career opportunities now on TheWorldDances.com.
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TheWorldDances E-Newsletter Team
Publisher: Karla Johnson
Editor: Tamara Johnson
Producer: Ester Rodriguez
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