La La La Human Steps
I love dance. I love contemporary dance - and for years have subscribed to UCLA’s Dance Series just to indulge these desires. Of course I have no background, skills, or technical knowledge, but watching a dance performance is like experiencing life before language. It’s primal and yet complete.
In any event We saw La La La Human Steps last night perform Amjad. I had no idea what the performance was about, but having seen the troop before I knew I’d enjoy it.
Amjad is actually a reworking of the classical Swan Lake and Sleeping Beauty. The score itself is a mash up of Tchaikovsky and rhythms of Phillip Glass, performed live with piano and a string trio on stage with the dances. The choreography itself was an amazing deconstruction and exaggeration of classic ballet, which for once made me wish I had a little more grounding in classic ballet to really appreciate what was going on, on a more intellectual level. For me it seemed that from the waist down, the dancers were performing classical ballet, but above the waist, their arms and torso executed frantic, precision movements - staccato and superhuman.
None-the-less, the dancers were fascinating. One thing I always like is when a troop employs dancers of various body types and builds. This performance included one very tall female dancer, who when on point, seemed almost supernatural in her towering over the other dancers, including the men - until they too went on point.
The production also used some extreme lighting, illuminating the dances mostly from the side, which seemed to extenuate their musculature as deep shadows were cast by every contour. The effect was simply mesmerizing, I watched the dancers the same way I watch planes take flight - you see it with your own eyes and still can’t believe it’s possible - flight, the movement of the human body - and yet there it is, right in front of me. It puts me in awe and makes me wish I could be one of them.
In any event We saw La La La Human Steps last night perform Amjad. I had no idea what the performance was about, but having seen the troop before I knew I’d enjoy it.
Amjad is actually a reworking of the classical Swan Lake and Sleeping Beauty. The score itself is a mash up of Tchaikovsky and rhythms of Phillip Glass, performed live with piano and a string trio on stage with the dances. The choreography itself was an amazing deconstruction and exaggeration of classic ballet, which for once made me wish I had a little more grounding in classic ballet to really appreciate what was going on, on a more intellectual level. For me it seemed that from the waist down, the dancers were performing classical ballet, but above the waist, their arms and torso executed frantic, precision movements - staccato and superhuman.
None-the-less, the dancers were fascinating. One thing I always like is when a troop employs dancers of various body types and builds. This performance included one very tall female dancer, who when on point, seemed almost supernatural in her towering over the other dancers, including the men - until they too went on point.
The production also used some extreme lighting, illuminating the dances mostly from the side, which seemed to extenuate their musculature as deep shadows were cast by every contour. The effect was simply mesmerizing, I watched the dancers the same way I watch planes take flight - you see it with your own eyes and still can’t believe it’s possible - flight, the movement of the human body - and yet there it is, right in front of me. It puts me in awe and makes me wish I could be one of them.