Pauline Koner Centennial Celebration
Friday May 17 at 12 noon
92nd Street Y Harkness Dance Center, 1395 Lexington Avenue
On the 100th anniversary of her birth, Pauline Koner will be celebrated with a performance of three of her works: the 1956 The Shining Dark, inspired by the life of Helen Keller and performed by the 360 Dance Company; Poeme (1962), a tender duet danced by Ryoko Kudo and Francisco Ruvalcaba of the Limon Dance Company; and Concertino (1955), performed by Dancefusion Company of Philadelphia. All works have been reconstructed and staged by Evelyn Shepard, who presents this program with David K. Manion. Guest speakers include Charles Reinhart and C.C. Conner. Curator for Fridays at Noon at the 92nd Street Y is Catherine Tharin.
Two Chamber Operas by Martin Halpern
May 23-25 at 8 PM; May 26 at 3 PM
440 Studios, 440 Lafayette Street
Chamber opera in an intimate setting, accompanied on piano, by veteran composer/lyricist Martin Halpern. Purgatory and The Hour Glass are both freely based on plays by William Butler Yeats, and both center around an aging man's struggle with a troubled conscience.
Miro Magloire's New Chamber Ballet
May 31 & June 1 at 8 PM
City Center Studio 5, 130 West 56 Street
Magloire's elegant chamber ballet company of dancers and musicians will premiere Magloire's "The Conversion," music by Mozart. Known for his daring music choices, Miro's other ballets on the program have been set to scores by young British composer Rebecca Saunders and one of the choreographer's childhood musical heroes Karlheinz Stockhausen.
Lydia Johnson Dance
June 6-8 at 7:30 PM
Ailey Citigroup Theater, 405 West 55 Street
Choreographer Johnson presents her 12-member company in premieres to music by Osvaldo Golijov and Franz Schubert. They will also repeat last season's Change of Heart, set to J.S. Bach's Three Part Inventions, and the 2009 Dusk, music by Henryk Gorecki. Dancers' credits include the companies of Lar Lubovitch, Trisha Brown, and Kyle Abraham.
Ballet Tech
Kids Dance
June 13-16 at The Joyce Theater
Eliot Feld's KIDS DANCE returns to the Joyce along with special guests (for June 13th opening night): Tiler Peck in Feld's 1976 "Impromptu," Wu-Kang Chen dancing the premiere of "One Dances," Kaitlyn Gilliland in the premiere of "Inwit," and Wei-Chia Su premiering the second act of "Zeppo, an intermission in three acts." And the loveable, 37-member Kids Dance will charm with a Feld classic "Meshugana Dance," and "A Stair Dance."
Dances for a Variable Population
Friday & Saturday, June 14 & 15 at 5 PM & 6:30 PM (2 performances daily)
Hudson River Park's 14th Street Park (at 10th Avenue)
Naomi Goldberg Haas, artistic director/choreographer premieres "Hudson River Dances," her new site-related work set to a specially commissioned score by Jascha Narveson. This delightful work of dance dialogues unites performers ages 10 to 90, erasing the border between dancer and non-dancer. Goldberg Haas presents her multigenerational dance company that brings dance to the community, and the community onto the stage.
Overground Physical Theatre Company
June 20-22 at 8 PM
St. Mark's Church, 131 East 10th Street
Antonia Katrandjieva presents her all-female ensemble in X-Stream, a "kinetic zoom" of dance, video and theatre that views the transcience of the human experience through the lives of nine women living on the edge of uncertainty. Bulgarian Katrandjieva's work combines dance, theater and film.
Valentina Kozlova International Ballet Competition (VKIBC)
June 27-30 (June 27-29 Rounds; June 30 Awards Ceremony and Gala Performance)
LaGuardia Concert Hall, 100 Amsterdam Avenue
After two successful seasons in Boston, Valentina Kozlova moves her international competition to NY, with Andris Liepa as President of the Jury. Dancers from around the world will dance for company contracts, scholarships, guest appearances and cash awards. They will come prepared with dances selected from the VKIBC list, from Swan Lake, Raymonda, Sleeping Beauty, many other classics. They are also required to learn, by video, dances by Jacqulyn Buglisi (female solo), Viktor Kabaniaev (male solo), and Paulo Arrais (duet).
Lisa Jo Sagolla's new book Rock 'n' Roll Dances of the 1950s, a fresh look at those cool dances of the 50s, including The Bop, The Slop, The Stroll, The Madison, The Hand Jive, and the Jitterbug. Dance historian/critic/choreographer/educator Sagolla is also the author of The Girl Who Fell Down: A Biography of Joan McCracken.
PENTACLE announces that Ivan Sygoda, co-founder of the organization with Mara Greenberg, will assume a new role on July 1, 2013. After 37 years, Ivan will get a well-earned reprieve from the daily responsibilities and pressures of a running not-for-profit arts organization, and will move to the new position of "Founding Director." Ivan will still maintain a hectic schedule as he continues to work at Pentacle with artists and serve the greater dance community, as Pentacle's representative, through his affiliations with the Bessie committee, the NYC Arts Coalition, the NYS DanceForce, and the SouthArts Dance Touring Initiative.