Obama/McCain Dance-Off

Have a good fall break everybody:


Unbelievable McCain Vs. Obama Dance-Off

Patterns of Inheritance, Internet Opera

Come see Patterns of Inheritance, a "modern opera about the internet", by Ben Bernstein '10. This sounds ridiculously intriguing:

The entire libretto is composed of chopped up blog posts and Wikipedia articles, and the orchestrations are fragments as well. Using movement and a cast of five singers and eight instrumentalists, and six dancers, the opera attempts to paint a picture of the information we process, distribute, and inherit through the internet.

Basically, just imagine the lovechild of Phillip Glass and Gawker...a digital dream. You have 4 chances to catch the free show this Homecoming Weekend, so don't miss out!

Live performances at the '92 Theater
Dates/Times:
10/16 - 8pm
10/17 - 8pm
10/18 - 2:30pm, 8pm
Place: '92 Theater

Contra-Dance

contra dance this friday!
8 - 11pm in the '92 theater
free and fun!

Date: Friday, October 10
Time: 8-11 pm
Place: '92 Theater

Swing Dancing

Swing dancing on Saturday:

Like the soulful sounds of Billie Holiday? How about the toe-tappin' tunes of Michael Bublé? The bangin' beats of Kanye? Or the melodious musical stylings of Michael Jackson? Then my friend, swing dancing is for you.

Come join us, this Saturday, 10/11, at 3pm in the Fayerweather Theatre Room to swing it like you're at a playground and drop it like it's hot.

Beginners welcome.

No partner required.

Laughs guaranteed.

Contact Jan Marie at jolownia@wes for more info.

Date: Saturday, October 11
Time: 3 pm
Place: Fayerweather Theater Room

An evening with The Clack Mountain String Band

An evening with The Clack Mountain String Band, a talented young band from Eastern Kentucky playing some of the fastest, wildest dance tunes to come out of the mountains. See a video of them in action here!

Date: Thursday, October 2nd
Times:

• 7:30-8pm - Flat foot dance workshop with award winning dancer Julie Shepard-Powell, from North Carolina. Learn how to dance like this guy.
• 8-10 Music and Square dance! Banjoes, fiddles, and calling by Julie, who'll call some boot stomping southern-style dances. NO EXPERIENCE necessary. Just bring yourselves, and your dancing feet!

Location: 92 Theater

Go Forth and Swing Dance: NOW

Jan Marie Olownia '11 writes in to ask what might be a rhetorical question for Wes students:

Never danced before? Fear not! Cheek to Cheek swing dance club is looking for fresh faces and eager spirits to jump-start their club. Meet tomorrow in Fayerweather to learn everything you need to know to about tapping your feet and moving to the beat. No prior experience necessary, no special shoes required. Beginners preferred!

What: FREE Swing Dance Lesson

When: RIGHT NOW: Saturday September 20th @ 3pm

Where: Fayerweather Theatre Room

Questions: Contact Jan Marie Olownia '11 (jolownia@wesleyan.edu)

Guy Doing Goofy Dance Around the World

Ok these four-and-a-half minutes of pure joy have been everywhere on the Internet except here, which changes now:



MinnPost: Dancing with the universe

Foss Dance Party

Wish you could have partied it up this weekend? Do something about it! Dance like nobody's business - you can always write that 12-page metaphysics paper later.

What: Random dance party

Where: The base of Foss Hill

When: Today (September 17) at 4:00

Walk it Out

I preface this with a warning: I don't care if this is old. If you do (and really who are you if you do?) you can...not watch it. Simple as that.

I find this following video very enjoyable. You might enjoy it as well.



(and if you are taking intro to dance this semester, I urge you to consider this routine.)

Thai Night

Following the theme of April Awareness month, PADThai will be having their 8th annual Thai Night:

"You eat Pad Thai, watch Ong-Bak, and go to Thai Garden.

I bet you never heard of Thai live music,
You never seen or learn Thai boxing,
You never seen beautiful Thai ladies performing Thai Dance,
And never gotten Thai massages while you are enjoying our Thai food all at once!

You don't want to miss those, right?

Come to our annual Thai Night!
$3 admission ( all proceed goes to educational fund for Thai underprivileged youth)"

Date: Saturday, April 14th
Time: 5:30 - 7:00 pm
Place: MPR

Annabella Gonzalez Dance Theater

From Facebook:

The Annabella Gonzalez Dance Theater troupe, in its 30th year of performance and with over 60 original pieces in its repertoire, describes the work they do as Latin Classicism, an unusual mix of primarily European or American classical music with Hispanic elements including tango and merengue.

Annabella Gonzalez Dance Theater will present a highly varied program with excellent dancers from its recent Spring Series at Lincoln Center Plaza: "Treinta," a multi-style group piece with modern classical music; "The Deer Dance," a struggle between a man and a deer based on a traditional Mexican dance; "Aluminum Frame," a woman bathing provocatively to Schubert music; and the comedic "Danza de los Viejitos". Some of the pieces display the Company's Latin Classicism or use of classical music, whether of the past or the present, with Latino dance styles and rhythms.

Prior to the performance, Annabella Gonzalez, the Director of Annabella Gonzalez Dance Theater, will teach a two-part master class on "Traditional Mexican Dance": an informative lecture with a video on traditional dances from different parts of Mexico, many of which display the magic of masks, followed by a class concluding with a section of the famous "Danza de los Viejitos". Traditional Mexican dance is an extremely rich field with over 20,000 danzas that reflect Mexico's indigenous peoples' political, social, and dance culture.

It's free, but space is limited, so get tickets at the Box Office the day of the performance.

Date: Friday, April 13
Time: 8-9:30 pm (Master class 5:30 - 7:00 pm)
Place: Greene Room, Alpha Delt

Struttin

Andrea Silenzi '07 invites you all to....

Tonight's Struttin'!

Struttin' is WESU's monthly dance party, hosted by DJ Lord Lewis the
Velvet Knight. Come to Vinnie's Jump and Jive for some awesome funk
beats and great dancing. Only $3 to get in and the money goes to WESU
Middletown. Don't want to walk that far? Call the ride: 860.685.3788

Date: Tonight at 9pm
Place: Vinnie's Jump & Jive (424 main street)
Time: She did not say? I assume it's 9-12. They all are.

Move Deliciously

Visiting scholar Eiko Otake of Eiko and Koma will be hosting a Delicious Movements Workshop this weekend.

This workshop is designed for anyone who loves to move or who wants to move with delicious feelings. The workshop employs images and Eiko's own floor movement and vocabulary which emphasizes the transformative quality of time/space.

No experience necessary! Everyone is welcome.

For more info, contact Lydia Bell '07, lbell@wes.

Date: Saturday, Jan. 27
Time: 2-4pm
Place: Pine Street Dance Studio

So You Know You Can't Dance?

The Green Streets Arts Center is offering two ten-week dance classes, Salsa and Belly Dancing, for the spring:

BELLY DANCING I
(Age 18+)
Instructor: Joan “Natalia” Downing
Thursdays 7–8pm
10-week session: January 31–April 4 The ancient art of belly dance is a sacred expression of spirit, emotion and sensuality. This course embraces isolations, shimmies and undulations of different parts of the body. Women of any shape, size, age and ability can enjoy this art form!
Tuition: $100

SALSA
(Age 21+)
Instructor: David Polon
Tuesdays 6:30–7:30pm
10-week session: January 30—April 3 Learn the sultry rhythms of salsa, and make new friends in this fun and active class. Beginners will master all the basic steps, those with more experience can refine their moves with support from teaching artist David Polon. Bring a friend or come by yourself
Tuition: $100

Call 860-685-7871 to register by phone. 10-week class registrations must be received no later than Thursday, January 25th.

Struttin' WESU Dance Party

WESU's monthly dance party, hosted by DJ Lord Lewis the Velvet Knight. Come to Vinnie's Jump and Jive for some awesome funk beats and great dancing. Only $3 and the money goes to WESU Middletown.

These are actually more fun than one might suspect. They're done by midnight, so you won't really miss too much action on campus. Also good for those nights that you need to turn in early...

Date: January 27th
Time: 9:00PM-12:00AM
Venue: Vinnie's Jump and Jive (424 Main Street)

Photos from inDANCE

I ushered at inDANCE from the Navaratri festival today. Crowell's all decked out in paper flower garlands, chrysanthemums and miniature shrines.



Even the dancers took photo ops.

inDANCE Performance

In other words, quite possibly one of the sexiest descriptions for a dance performance I've ever seen:

Under the artistic direction of Dance Department artist-in-residence Hari Krishnan, Toronto-based inDANCE presents a performance inspired by the devadasis (temple-women and courtesans) of South India. The never-before-seen repertoire blends a contemporary aesthetic with ritual and court dances from the city of Tanjavur (the cultural epicenter of nineteenth-century South India) and interprets the deeply spiritual, erotic and sensual love poetry of another time.

"Without a doubt, the choreography of Krishnan has an inspired, even genius quality to it, working creatively within and around his classical traditions...Thee effect is a lively and fresh fusion of tradition and contemporary dance, beautifully rendered by this expert dance company, inDANCE"--The Kitchener-Waterloo Record

Date: Friday, October 06, 2006
Time: 08:00 PM
Location: Crowell Concert Hall
Admission: $8 for Wes Students

Make Your Move

ISIS, Wesleyan's women of color dance troupe, is having their first performance/dance party this Friday. It's $1 with WesID and the performance starts at midnight but the party begins at 10.

Name: Make Your Move
Date: Friday, September 29th
Time: 10pm
Venue: Westco Cafe

Bill T. Jones

We actually got an e-mail from the CFA about the Bill T. Jones dance event right when Wesleying first began, but it was somehow accidentally sent to our spam folder.

Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company
Another Evening
Friday & Saturday, September 15 & 16, 8pm
CFA Theater
Pre-show talk before Friday's performance, 7:15pm in the CFA Cinema
Tickets: $20 General Admission, $17 Seniors/Wesleyan Faculty & Staff/Non-Wesleyan Students, $8 Wesleyan Students

From the CFA events page:

Choreographer Bill T. Jones, famous for creating powerful works that fearlessly explore sexuality, race, politics, family and mortality, joins his company for Another Evening, an ever-evolving 90-minute collage interweaving new movement, excerpts from existing repertoire, original and traditional music and text into a vibrant multi-media work. Joining Jones and company members onstage is Daniel Bernard Roumain, who provides live music accompaniment and sound design through both acoustic and electronic violin, and a live DJ mix.

If you're a frosh, you might recognize this guy: A DVD about him was sent to you in your orientation packet and he was the "common reading program" for this year's First Year Matters.

I'm writing this post because one of my jobs is ushering at the CFA, and tonight I ushered the opening night of this event. It was absolutely amazing. And this is coming from someone who grimaces at most mention of modern dance.

If I had to characterize the experience, it would be something like the music of The Books, Godspeed You Black Emperor, and Saul Williams set into human motion. There's personal and historical narrative, news clips, readings from the Lotus Sutra, spoken word, the Old Testament, found sound bytes, live piano and violin, and a hardcore metal band (who, I might add, invited the entire audience to the afterparty during the Q&A), all woven seamlessly into an hour of energetic, fluid, primal, yet meticulously refined choreography. As one audience-member described during the post-show Q&A session, "It was like I was watching the beginning of time to its end and all the little times the world is destroyed in between."

There's just one more showing tomorrow, but this is one event for which it's definitely worth it to go early and snatch up the last tickets. They will be selling standing room seats (which aren't really standing; they put chairs in the back and in the sides of the theater) starting at 7:00PM tomorrow. After the show there'll be a short Q&A with the entire dance company followed by a reception in the lower lobby.

DO try to go to this event! I know this is a super late notice, but it really was just beyond words.

Precision Troupe Auditions!

Come audition for Precision Troupe, Wesleyan's premier hip-hop dance team on campus! Troupe performs twice a year in campus parties usually held at Psi U and Eclectic. These people are GOOD. If you do manage to get into Precision, you'll become someone's idol for sure.

Seriously guys, go audition and dance like you're from the Dirty Bronx with an extra pop that, pop that!

Precision Troupe
September 17th
12:30PM or 3PM
Freeman Athletic Center Multipurpose Rooms 2&3.
( If you don't know where the multipurpose rooms are located, use the back entrance to Freeman. Walk down the stairs to your right. Walk straight down that hall. Rooms are on your right)