Below is a list of past American Masterpieces: Dance grant recipients.
Artist: TAPESTRY DANCE COMPANY, Austin, TX Project Title:The Souls of Our Feet - A Celebration of American Tap Dance Under the direction of internationally acclaimed tap artist Acia Gray, Tapestry Dance Company will
tour "The Souls of our Feet," a broad range of Hollywood and Vaudeville tap classics, master works
of our 20th century legends and their living protégés. Led by tap ambassador Dianne “Lady Di”
Walker, this tour will feature historical works of Bill “Bojangles” Robinson, Charles “Honi” Coles,
The Condos Brothers, The Nicholas Brothers, Miller Brothers and Lois, Eddie Brown, Buster
Brown, Gene Kelly & Donald O’Connor, Fred Astaire & Eleanor Powell, The Copasetics and Leon
Collins as well as contemporary artists Sarah Petronio, Acia Gray and Dianne Walker.
Artist: LULA WASHINGTON DANCE THEATER, Los Angeles, CA Project Title:Donald McKayle's Songs of the Disinherited Created in 1972, "Songs of the Disinherited" is a signature work of celebrated choreographer, Donald McKayle.
McKayle was named by the Dance Heritage Coalition as one of “America’s Irreplaceable Dance Treasures.” This
18-minute dance suite, in four scenes, traces the Black Diaspora in the New World. It begins with a flight from
slavery in the opening trio "I’m On My Way," followed by the heart rending protest of the searing duet, "Upon the
Mountain." The third movement is the timeless "Angelitos Negros" performed to the haunting vocals of Roberta Flack.
This poignant and touching solo leads into the culminating movement, the rousing urban gospel, "Shaker Life." This work is a finely wrought dance suite that celebrates the enduring strength of the human spirit both in despair and in joy; it breaks your heart and mends it again.
Artist: ALVIN AILEY AMERICAN DANCE THEATER (AAADT), New York, NY Project Title:Talley Beatty's Road of the Phoebe Snow AAADT will reconstruct Talley Beatty’s Road of the Phoebe Snow (cast of 12 dancers) for its 2007-2008 season. Beatty had a profound influence on Alvin Ailey, and this work stands as one of his enduring masterpieces. Set to American jazz music by Duke Ellington and Billy Strayhorn, the work weaves a turbulent and gripping love story of young Americans from “the wrong side of the track” – literally, as the title refers to the name of a train on the Erie-Lackawanna Railroad.
Artist: COMPLEXIONS CONTEMPORARY BALLET, New York, NY
Project title: Ulysses Dove’s Dancing on the Front Porch of Heaven, Odes to Love and Loss Complexions, led by Artistic Directors Dwight Rhoden and Desmond Richardson, will reconstruct Ulysses Dove’s Dancing on the Front Porch of Heaven, Odes to Love and Loss (1993). This 20 minute work, which Dove said he created as a “poetic monument over people I loved”, involves 6 dancers and is set to Cantus in Memoriam Benjamin Britten by Estonian composer, Arvo Part. We believe that the beauty and emotional pulse revealed in this work will spread the appeal of Dove’s choreography to new dance audiences.
Artist: DAVID GORDON, PICK UP PERFORMANCE CO (S.), New York, NY
Project title: Trying Times
Trying Times was made in 1982 after many viewings of Balanchine’s Apollo. The Pick Up Co. included three women/muses - Susan Eschelbach, Margaret Hoeffel and Valda Setterfield. Philip Sandstrom, resident designer, lit. Artist Power Boothe designed frames/cloths/boards called “visual devices.” DTW will produce the 25th anniversary of this work. Phil and Power will collaborate with me again. I watched the record tape and was impressed (yes, I was) with range of movement, design, dialogue and response to Stravinsky’s glorious music in the fragmented narrative journey culminating in a mock trial - I’m indicted for making dancers talk and abandoning post modern aesthetics. This piece was/is an example of piercing boundaries between disciplines and pursuing positive movement relationships between aesthetic forms. -David Gordon
Artist: DAYTON CONTEMPORARY DANCE COMPANY, Dayton, Ohio
Project title: Las Desenamoradas, choreography by Eleo Pomare At the 40th anniversary of its creation, Dayton Contemporary Dance Company will engage choreographer Eleo Pomare to refurbish his 1967 master work, Las Desenamoradas, which has been called “a splendid piece of dance theater…powerful…grand-scaled.” Based on Federico Garcia Lorca’s The House of Bernarda Alba, with music by John Coltrane, this 17-minute piece with 10 dancers is a dramatic, tension-filled story of a tyrannical widow and her daughters, in a house where heartless pride and sterile convention destroy love and life. Outreach and education activities will be available.
Artist: HOKULANI HOLT / PA`U O HI`IAKA, Maui, Hawai`i
Project title: Kahekili Celebrating Kahekili, one of Hawaii’s most influential chiefs, this hula drama includes original choreography, chant, and music by native Hawaiian kumu hula (hula master) Hokulani Holt. This work transports audiences into pre-contact Hawai`i through the earthbound movements and gestures of kahiko, ancient hula, accompanied by live traditional percussion instruments and chant, as well as ceremonies and cultural practices rarely performed on stage today. Through educational services and master classes, this project shares authentic Hawaiian culture through the dance protocols and cultural practices of Kahekili’s time.
Artist: JAZZ TAP ENSEMBLE, Los Angeles, CA
Project title: American Tap Masterpieces: The Hollywood Journey-Dance, Music, Film
Tap dance pioneer Lynn Dally celebrates American rhythm tap with a company of five musicians and seven
dancers including legendary tap master Arthur Duncan. This evening length program of re-creations and new inventions brings to life famous tap dances from the heyday of the 30’s and 40’s film musicals (Bill ‘Bojangles’ Robinson, Fred Astaire, Eleanor Powell, Gene Kelly, Ann Miller, Coles & Atkins and the Nicholas Brothers), along with contemporary masterworks by legendary artists Gregory Hines and Jimmy Slyde, in a vivid, highly entertaining, ever changing action portrait.
Artist: JOSÉ LIMÓN DANCE FOUNDATION, New York, NY
Project title: The Quartet Project
This work will be a restaging of The Traitor and Lament for Ignacio Sanchez Mejias choreographed by our founders, José Limón and Doris Humphrey, respectively. Lament for Ignacio Sanchez Mejias was choreographed by Doris Humphrey in 1946 and draws its inspiration from the famous poem of the same name by Federico Garcia Lorca. Choreographed in 1954 to Gunther Schuller’s Symphony for Brasses and Percussion, The Traitor uses Sholem Asch’s novel, The Nazarene, as the impetus for re-telling of the Christ and Judas story.
Artist: MARTHA CLARKE, Durham, NC
Project title: The Garden of Earthly Delights
Choreographer and director Martha Clarke will reconstruct her seminal work, The Garden of Earthly Delights. This critically acclaimed piece, based on the painting by Hieronymus Bosch, is designed for the proscenium stage and incorporates aerial dance work. The cast of 13 will include ten dancers and three musicians who perform as part of the cast. The evening-length work consists of four sections: Eden, The Garden, The Seven Sins and Hell and captures the essence of Bosch’s painting through movement and live music.
Artist: PAUL TAYLOR DANCE COMPANY, New York, NY
Project title: Book of Beasts/Airs/Roses/Sunset/Av Ovo Usque Ad Mala (From Soup to Nuts)
Paul Taylor will reconstruct a landmark work from his half-century as a dance innovator. The reconstruction will draw on the knowledge of current and former company members, as well as materials from the works’ original creation. This work will be available for touring as part of evening-long programs that will include additional Taylor repertory. Performances can be accompanied by residency activities which can help provide an insight as well as a historical context for Mr. Taylor’s work.
Artist: RIRIE-WOODBURY DANCE COMPANY, Salt Lake City, UT
Project title: Alwin Nikolais’ Tent
In a collaborative project with the Nikolais/Louis Foundation, Alwin Nikolais’ 1968 multimedia ballet Tent will be reconstructed and added to a substantial repertory of reconstructed works being kept alive for a new generation of audience members. Cited among Nikolais’ most celebrated works, Tent includes 10 dancers who erect a canopy, which is continually manipulated to architecturally transform the stage for the dancers to move in, under, over, around, and through it. The 35-minute dance is illuminated by original slides and set to Nikolais’ original electronic score.
Artist: THE MARTHA GRAHAM CENTER OF CONTEMPORARY DANCE, New York, NY
Project title: Martha Graham’s Ardent Song
The Martha Graham Dance Company will reconstruct Graham’s 1954 ballet, Ardent Song. The work illustrates the phases of the moon from moonrise through dawn as personified by the goddesses Aphrodite, Hecate, and Aurora, as it invokes the imagery of Minoan, Greek, and Hindu cultures. Following the premiere of Ardent Song, critic John Martin said, “It may well be the richest and the most consistently beautiful of all of Graham’s rituals.” Renowned choreographer Anthony Tudor commented at the time of its creation that it “transcended all her other dance works.”
Artist: THE PHILADELPHIA DANCE COMPANY, PHILADANCO!, Philadelphia, PA
Project title: Reconstruction of Southern Landscapes by Talley Beatty
The Philadelphia Dance Company will reconstruct the Talley Beatty classic Southern Landscapes. This extraordinary work, one of the first choreographed by the late Mr. Beatty, has stood the test of time and has been found instructive and dynamic for both audiences and dance historians alike. Mr. Beatty and Philadanco have had a mutually beneficial relationship spanning decades. The company will remount the work using the artistry of their current dancers under the direction of veteran dancers who were involved in the initial piece. Philadanco will revitalize both the visual and musical vision created by Mr. Beatty in order to expose new generations to his genius.
Artist: TRISHA BROWN DANCE
COMPANY, New York, NY
Project title: Trisha Brown: Early Works
Trisha Brown Dance Company presents five works from Trisha Brown’s groundbreaking early repertory: Accumulation (1971), Group Primary Accumulation (1973), Spanish Dance (1973), Spiral (1974), and Walking on the Wall (1971). Challenging the conventions of early modern dance, these works draw on natural human movement and gesture, the choreographic maxims of the time they were created. The five works vary broadly in scale, some requiring only one dancer and others necessitating many dancers, extensive equipment, or alternative performance spaces.
Artist: URBAN BUSH WOMEN, Brooklyn, NY
Project title:Chicken Soup, by Blondell Cummings
Created in 1981, Chicken Soup is a portrait of lifetime domesticity set to music by Brian Eno, Meredith Monk, and Colin Walcott; text by Grace Paley and Pat Stein; and a recipe from The Settlement Cookbook. This 12 minute solo will be restaged by Ms. Cummings working with Urban Bush Women to illuminate the political, social, and personal issues that surrounded the creation of the work. The highly theatrical Cummings was one of the first artists to integrate film into her choreographic explorations.
