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Austin360 blogs > Austin Arts: Seeing Things > Archives > 2009 > March > 25 > Entry
Ailey’s ‘Revelations’ still brings the house down
A big slice of Austin went to church Tuesday night … in Bass Concert Hall.
When the round tones of “Rocka My Soul in the Bosom of Abraham” filled Bass as the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre ground out Ailey’s soulful “Revelations,” almost everyone in the audience came to their feet. Clapping and swaying along to the piece Ailey created in homage to black, rural, Southern church services seems like a fitting celebration of the Ailey legacy.
The company’s stop in Austin falls in the middle of its 50th anniversary tour. As usual for an Ailey performance, two things remain true: “Revelations” is one of the master works of American art and the Ailey dancers are among the most clear, precise dancers working today.
But for all the glory of Ailey’s achievements, other factors remain undeniable. Yet again the company has commissioned a lackluster work, “Go in Grace,” choreographed by Ailey dancer Hope Boykin with live music by Sweet Honey and the Rock.
For almost a decade, Boykin has been a broad-shouldered force among Ailey’s women. “Go in Grace,” her second work for the company is painfully superficial. The piece follows a family whose son strays until his father’s untimely death. Sweet Honey and a sign language interpreter walk around the family, providing a musical, ladies-on-the-stoop presence. The piece centers on the family’s young, deaf daughter (Yusha-Marie Sorzano).
But until a final solo where Sorzano imagines dancing with her now dead father, the daughter is nothing more than a small thing to be petted and protected. It’s ironic that a dancer as capable of texture and nuance as Boykin—qualities she displayed Tuesday as the dancer front and center in “Revelations” opening “I Been ‘Buked”—would create such a superficial female role.
Sweet Honey’s voices are so clear and open, it seems one could bathe in them, but their lyrics were clichéd and irritating in “Go in Grace.” Sweet Honey’s comments like “you’re so beautiful” filled in the ellipses that make dance such a porous, poetic art form. Leaving nothing to the imagination was a movement theme as well. Lyrics, sign language, and choreography aligned, providing moments where Sweet Honey sang of strength as the dancers flexed their biceps in unison.
Dancing together does not have to be boring could be the tagline for George Faison’s jazzy, sassy “Suite Otis” from 1971. New costumes that redefine the color pink bring out the company’s capacity for camp. For one example see the company’s men boogying to Otis Redding’s pleas to the “hip shakin’ mama” of “I Can’t Turn You Loose.” Ailey dancers can jump and kick higher and longer than anyone, but it is the moments of sass, struggle, and deep joy that keep Ailey performances alive.
The Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre performs again tonight at 8 p.m. See. www.utpac.org for more information.
Clare Croft is an American-Statesman freelance dance critic.
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By judy
March 28, 2009 7:25 PM | Link to this
I couldn’t agree more. “Go in Grace” verged on being cheesy. With so much talent at their disposal, it was insulting to have the dancers practically miming the words of the songs rather than using their interpretive artistry as dancers to tell the story.