The American Dance Festival is June 14 to July 21 in Durham and Raleigh and will feature 53 performances by 26 companies and choreographers, including several premieres.<\/b>
\nPutting together a dance season is never an easy task, nor is it easy to predict how a live performance will turn out.
But Jodee Nimerichter, executive director of the American Dance Festival, wants as many people as possible to see acclaimed performances from national dance companies and choreographers, whether attendees are first-timers or longtime season ticket-holders.
This year’s festival is June 14 to July 21 and will spotlight a range of performers in a variety of venues \u2014 something for everybody, Nimerichter hopes.
Plus, there is a new feature \u2014 an ADF alumni weekend with a first-ever concert by five former ADF students \u2014 and, as always, an ADF faculty concert and a musicians\u2019 concert with ADF School musicians. There will be tours, parties and hundreds of young dancers in Durham.
The American Dance Festival continues to draw a dizzying array of talent. This year’s festival will feature 53 performances by 26 companies and choreographers in 7 different venues. All are in Durham except for the North Carolina Museum of Art in Raleigh.
That includes 14 ADF debuts, 11 ADF commissions and 10 world premieres. That also includes more women choreographers as well as a showcase for local talent.
We dove into through this year’s lineup to pick some of our best bets. Use this as your guide.
The following is at the Carolina Theatre.
«Wondrous Women» features five women, five solos \u2014 five works created by women at a time when women are raising their voices like never before \u2014 a showcase for the diversity of female choreographers in dance today. The shows are scheduled for The Carolina Theatre in downtown Durham, a handsome, old historic space, although not usually an ADF venue. Friday, July 13,8 p.m., and Saturday, July 14,7 p.m.
Chapel Hill native\/tap wonder Michelle Dorrance\u2019s company, Dorrance Dance, has performed for audiences from Singapore to Montreal, London to Stockholm. Three years ago, the tapper herself won a coveted MacArthur \u201cgenius\u201d award, and currently is choreographing works for the American Ballet Theater. It’s not only tap shoes that can make a noise, she says, but also pointe shoes normally worn by ballerinas. She\u2019s taught Stephen Colbert the shim sham on his late-night show and continues to take tap to new heights.
Rhapsody James creates what she calls \u201cstreet jazz,\u201d dance with an asphalt beat, electric energy and alleyway formations, combining hip-hop, jazz and modern. She\u2019s choreographed for Beyonc \u00e9, Madonna, Puff Daddy and The Jonas Brothers, among others, and is artistic director\/choreographer for the company, R. E. D. \u2013 Rhapsody En Dance. She teaches at the ever-popular Broadway Dance Center in Manhattan.
Aparna Ramaswamy, along with her mother, Ranee (both Indian-Americans), teaches and choreographs Bharatanatyam dance in Minneapolis, a South Indian dance form originating in Tamil temples. This fall, their company, Ragamala Dance Company, will perform at The Kennedy Center in Washington, D. C. Aparna has been lauded for her sculptural, lyrical dancing and for her complex rhythms.
Yabin Wang is considered the leading contemporary dance choreographer in Beijing, China, and head of a dance studio there, Yabin & Her Friends. She is also the leading actress in the Chinese soap opera, \u201cThe Love Story of the Village.\u201d Wang trained in Chinese classical dance, ballet and contemporary dance, and admits she likes the control that dance gives her. Her movement style goes to the heart of drama: how life deals us pain, loss and beauty.
Camille A. Brown presents a solo from her latest work, \u201cink,\u201d the last in a trilogy on black identity. Brown attended the University of North Carolina School of the Arts, and hails from Queens, N.Y. A storyteller, she combines gesture, ritualistic references, history and contemporary culture, and is known for interweaving African-American social dance, African dance, tap, jazz, modern and hip hop \u2013 all to tell a tale of positive black cultural life.
The following are at Durham Performing Arts Center.
\u25aa Pilobolus is back again with another ADF-commissioned world premiere slated for the big stage, for the first time showcasing a female trio of dancers in what was once an all-male company. Given the line-up, the show should be a sumptuous look at why a company made history with its astonishing physicality \u2014 acrobatic, sculptural, even comic. Also included will be \u201cGnomen,\u201d featuring a male quartet, and \u201cDay Two,\u201d set to a soundtrack by the Talking Heads and encapsulating nature\u2019s creation, perfect for a group named after a fungus. Thursday-Friday, June 21-22,8 p.m.; children\u2019s matinee, Saturday, June 23,1 p.m.
\u25aa Paul Taylor Dance Company is back as well with two Taylor pieces from the 1980s, \u201cMercuric Tidings\u201d and \u201cRoses,\u201d marked by the renowned choreographer\u2019s flowing grace and liquid power. Never forget Taylor started out as a swimmer. Also on tap is a newly commissioned work by Doug Varone, \u201cHalf Life.\u201d Tuesday-Wednesday, June 26-27,8 p.m.
\u25aa Shen Wei Dance Arts gives performances that are highly visual as well as kinetic. Choreographer Wei tackles the 1977 anti-opera, \u201cNeither,\u201d by Irish playwright Samuel Beckett and American composer Morton Feldman, portraying the writhing darkness of existence combined with the strength of hope. From China originally, Wei studied Chinese opera and traditional Chinese ink painting and calligraphy, and his works are like animated 3-D paintings. Saturday-Sunday, June 16-17,7 p.m.
\u25aa L-E-V Sharon Eyal and Gai Behar, scheduled for one performance, will present \u201cOCD Love,\u201d a darker piece about love out of sync, physical angst, prayers for deliverance and the repetition inherent in obsessive-compulsive disorder. Both Eyal and Behar are from Israel, and the word \u201clev\u201d in Hebrew means \u201cheart.\u201d Music is by percussive techno musician Ori Lichtik. Tuesday, July 3,8 p.m.
The following are at Reynolds Industries Theater.
\u25aa Dayton Contemporary Dance Co. kicks off the season with an ADF-commissioned world premiere. This rather large company is known for its evocative, energetic dancing and technical prowess, as well as its archive of classic African-American dances. The company will again revive choreographer Donald McKayle\u2019s \u201cRainbow \u2018Round My Shoulder\u201d about life on a chain gang from 1959, set to work songs.
They also will present \u201cAwassa Astrige\/Ostrich,\u201d a brief solo from 1932 by Asadata Dafora, who introduced authentic African music and dance to the U. S.; \u201cThis I Know For Sure\u2026\u201d by choreographer Ray Mercer, who danced in \u201cThe Lion King\u201d; and a new work by Abby Zbikowski, who is also featured in the Footprints show at the season\u2019s end. Thursday, June 14,7 p.m.; Friday, June 15,8 p.m.; children\u2019s matinee, Saturday, June 16,1 p.m.
\u25aa Ronald K. Brown\/Evidence melds traditional African dance with contemporary choreography, along with the spoken word. Brown, the choreographer, is set to receive this year\u2019s Scripps\/ADF Award. On tap are \u201cTorch,\u201d a tribute to one woman\u2019s life and featuring incredible spins; \u201cOn Earth Together,\u201d inspired by and danced to Stevie Wonder\u2019s music; \u201cWalking Out the Dark,\u201d a funeral-like conversation about our relationships; and a duet from the larger \u201cLessons, March,\u201d set to a speech by Dr. Marin Luther King Jr., about man\u2019s value. Thursday-Friday, June 28-29,8 p.m., Saturday, June 30,7 p.m.; children\u2019s matinee, Saturday, June 30,1 p.m.
\u25aa Rosie Herrera Dance Theatre, from Miami, draws on performance art, opera, drag and contemporary ballet, and is led by Cuban-American Rosie Herrera. The company will present an ADF-commissioned world premiere of Herrera\u2019s dance-theater piece, \u201cMake Believe,\u201d probing the line between religion and fantasy, spirituality and magic, paganism and celebrity. Friday, July 6,8 p.m.; Saturday, July 7,7 p.m.
\u25aa Footprints ends the ADF season with three ADF-commissioned world premieres by three emerging female choreographers: Dafi Altabeb, from Israel whose work reflects youthful searching and tenderness; Abby Zbikowski, who teaches dance at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and creates work that\u2019s weighted, even hard-core, and marked by punk, hip-hop and the martial arts; and Jillian Pe\u00f1a, whose work centers on the probing of self and others, giving a nod to psychoanalysis and queer theory. Friday, July 20,8p.m.; Saturday, July 21,7 p.m.
\u25aa Tere O\u2019Connor has said he sees \u201cdance as a system with its own properties.\u201d His rather abstract work plays with gesture and movement defined as shape and space, attempting to bypass spoken language and any assigned meanings. He has created works for the Lyon Opera Ballet and Mikhail Baryshnikov. To be performed is his latest work, \u201cLong Run,\u201d an ADF commission. Tuesday-Wednesday, July 10-11,8 p.m.
The following is at Rubenstein Arts Center’s von der Heyden Studio Theater in partnership with Nasher Museum of Art, Duke University.
\u25aa «Places Please!» starring Nicole Wolcott & Larry Keigwin offers audiences a comedic look at backstage moments just before the curtain goes up, along with the craziness of making dance and being in New York\u2019s dance world. Friday, June 22,7 p.m., 10 p.m.; Saturday, June 23,10 p.m.; Sunday, June 24,5 p.m., 7 p.m.
\u25aa Anne Plamondon hails from Quebec, Canada and has danced in that country and Europe. Her solo, \u201cThe Same Eyes as Yours,\u201d takes on mental illness, portraying the struggles, obsessions, fragility and release of being inside a body in need. Saturday, June 30,7 p.m.; Sunday, July 1,2 p.m., 5 p.m.
\u25aa Kyle Abraham\u2019s A. I. M. is Abraham\u2019s New York-based company that will present \u201cDearest Home,\u201d solos and duets that represent an intimate probing of relationships and our deepest feelings of love, longing and loss, or what it means to be at home inside yourself. Abraham grew up in Pittsburgh, Pa., and teaches at UCLA in California. He has received a MacArthur \u201cgenius\u201d award. Tuesday, July 17,8 p.m.; Wednesday, July 18,2 p.m., 8 p.m.; Thursday, July 19,8 p.m.
The following is at the North Carolina Museum of Art in Raleigh.
\u25aa Dana Ruttenberg Dance Group performs the interactive \u201cNaba 2.0,\u201d created by Israeli-born choreographer Dana Ruttenberg and offering audiences in this ADF debut a gallery tour with four dancers dressed as museum guards. Participants use audio guides to select their own music, do some dancing of their own, live it up and be the art. Stand, walk, sit and lie on the floor. Ages 6 and up. Saturday-Sunday, July 14-15,6 p.m., 8 p.m.; Monday, July 16,12 p.m., 2 p.m., 6 p.m., 8 p.m.; Tuesday, July 17,6 p.m., 8 p.m.
The following is at the Durham Fruit & Produce Company warehouse.
\u25aa Murielle Eliz\u00e9on is French-born, but works in Saxapahaw, now as part of the arts nonprofit Culture Mill. She describes \u201cBrown,\u201d her ADF debut, as \u201ca collision with the lingering allure of gender and racial stereotypes.\u201d Adult content and nudity. Sunday, July 8,2 p.m., 7 p.m.; Monday, July 9,7 p.m.
The 2018 American Dance Festival (ADF) season is June 14-July 21. For tickets, locations and schedules, go to americandancefestival.org .<\/p>\n

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