The Very Best of NYC Dance

Flamenco Festival 2012, Elisa Monte Dance

Flamenco Festival 2012, presented by New York City Center and the Flamenco Festival, will celebrate the tradition of great female flamenco choreographers and showcase four of today’s most acclaimed bailaoras (flamenco dancers). Running Mar 1-4 at the New York City Center, the festival will present four unique nights of dance including the New York premiere of a mixed-bill gala program featuring three of flamenco’s most explosive female dancers: Carmen Cortés, Rafaela Carrasco and Olga Pericet, accompanied by four male dancers and live musicians.

The internationally acclaimed Elisa Monte Dance returns to the New York stage to premiere an exhilarating season of dance at The Ailey Citigroup Theatre Apr 12-14. Celebrating 31 years of rich history, Elisa Monte continues to illustrate her intimate connection with many of the century’s greatest masters such as Martha Graham, Alvin Ailey and Agnes de Mille, while maintaining a fresh vitality to her work that is widely respected for its emotional, sensual style and intricate technique. The season features the New York premieres of “Unstable Ground,” with commissioned music by Lois Vierk; “In Absentia” featuring new music by Kevin Keller; and “Outside In” with original music by Ben Doyle, as well as a revival performance of “Pigs and Fishes” and an excerpt from “Amor Fait”.

The Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM) continues its 2012 Winter/Spring Season with Ohad Naharin’s Hora, playing at the BAM Howard Gilman Opera House Mar 7-10. Naharin’s choreography is infused with the rarest of qualities, experimenting boldly with body language to produce a distinctive and arresting combination of content and form. Noted for its physical virtuosity and bewitching lines, Tel Aviv’s Batsheva Dance Company conveys the daring spirit and exacting discipline of its artistic director. Naharin’s Hora unfurls a ravishing vision of abstraction, sensuality, and playfulness. Isao Tomita’s inventive soundtrack, a collage of classical masterpieces (Strauss, Wagner, Grieg, Debussy, and even John Williams’ Star Wars theme) played on an array of vintage analog synths, provides harmonic elegance to this remarkable work.


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