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 Two
Worlds, One Dance Planet
By Nancy Wozny
An argument against the divide between commercial & concert
dance
If we had to divide the dance world in two, we would separate
it by commercial versus concert dance. And many of us do; the
two worlds are in fact distinct, with their own rules,
histories, aesthetics, and protocols. Sometimes, though, it
seems like they don’t have anything to do with one
another. I would even go so far as to say that often their
members don’t hold a mutual sense of respect.
I should confess at this point that I hail from the concert
world, and the modern dance end of it. That’s about as far as
I can imagine you can get from the commercial world, which I
have little exposure to other than Momix’s snazzy Hanes
underwear commercials and my summertime addiction to So You
Think You Can Dance. MTV came of age during the years I
was not likely to own a working TV , and I have never seen a
live show by the likes of Janet Jackson or Madonna.
(Truthfully, I confess to loving dance TV commercials,
especially the one with Ellen DeGeneres dancing through her
world with her American Express card.) So what qualifies me to
mouth off on this topic? Just one thing: I love dance, the
whole dance planet. I look for dance wherever I can find it,
whether it’s a high school step group rehearsing or the kids
down the street playing their dance version of Duck, Duck,
Goose.
That said, I get concerned when members of the dance community
do not support one another. Not long ago I overheard an
academy mother referring to a competition dancer as “not a
real dancer.” Not real by whose standards? Tell that to
Garrett Smith, who won National Teen Male Outstanding Dancer
at the New York City Dance Alliance 2005 and is now dancing
with Houston Ballet II. The Riverton, UT, native is part of a
new generation of dancers who cull their training and
interests from diverse sources.
Too often we make quick judgments about these worlds.
Sometimes it’s vocabulary—words like “routine” or “number” as
o pposed
to “piece” or “dance”— that separates us. In truth, the term
“number” dates back to vaudeville, when each act really had
a number. And then there’s music. There’s not much on the
concert circuit that is choreographed to Top-40 hits, rap, or
hip-hop. Wait a minute—didn’t Merce Cunningham set a dance to
Radiohead? And then there’s concert/hip-hip legend Rennie
Harris, who defies categorization. See, it’s not so easy after
all—these two worlds are colliding whether we like it or not.
There’s also a kind of mythology concerning money. If you go
commercial, will you make more money? Maybe so—but maybe not.
Are commercial contracts longer than those with professional
dance companies? Has anyone compiled statistics on that yet?
Dancing in videos or live shows is not steady work, which is
why so many people turn to teaching in the convention circuit
after a few years. But more than a few U.S. ballet and
modern-dance companies offer dancers a full season, a living
wage, and full benefits. A dance career in the concert world
may be more predictable. Has the industry done its homework to
confidently say that one path is more financially viable than
the other?
Dancers are moving in and out of concert and commercial dance,
no doubt partly out of economic necessity. Or maybe dancers
are naturally daring people who like to try new ways of moving
and work. Some of them only want to dance works that have been
blessed by critics and historians as masterful. Others find
masterful work in other venues. Artsy types need to let go of
the idea that art happens only on the concert stage. I’m a
critic, and I will be the first to tell you that artfulness
and artlessness exist on both sides. I’ve seen better
choreography on Gap commercials than in some of the shows I
have reviewed. (By the way, I wonder where the choreographer
for the Gap’s “Boyfriend Trouser” commercial came from; what
Claire Danes and Patrick Wilson are doing sure looks like
modern dance to me.) Incredible creativity can happen
anywhere; it is not the discrete domain of the concert world.
I wonder if there is some kind of watchdog group out there
that is preserving the best of commercial dance choreography,
in the vein of what Lee Theodore did with Broadway
choreography with her short-lived company, The American Dance
Machine.
Speaking of Broadway, I see it as the place where both sides
meet. Look at people like multiple Tony Award– winner Susan
Stroman, who has also set w ork
on New York City Ballet. And wasn’t it thrilling when
postmodern artist Bill T. Jones
won the Tony for best choreographer for Spring Awakening?
There is a long history of concert choreographers crossing
over to the
Broadway stage. Consider Agnes de Mille’s work in Oklahoma
in 1943, George Balanchine’s handful of Broadway shows
(including On Your Toes, Babes in Arms, and, with
Katherine Dunham, Cabin in the Sky), and Jerome
Robbins’ huge impact on American musicals with On the Town,
The King and I, and West Side Story, among others.
Savion Glover has performed in concert halls worldwide and
tapped on TV and Broadway. John Selya, Elizabeth Parkinson,
Ashley Tuttle, Desmond Richardson, and Charlie Neshyba-Hodges
are some of the concert dancers who have crossed over into
musicals through Twyla Tharp’s Movin’ Out and The
Times They Are a-Changin’. Broadway may very well
represent the way station where both art and commerce collide.
There is ample evidence of crossover outside of Broadway as
well. Many of the dancers in college programs today who are
preparing for performance or teaching careers have been
trained at competition studios. And according to their
professors, they have benefited from that exposure. When I
read bios of the dancers in professional companies, I am
finding more and more references to dancing on cruise ships,
in Vegas, or in other commercial ventures. Closer to home, I
think about Dawn Dippel and Amy Cain. Now studio owners, they
grew up on the competition circuit, have a studio team, and
also dance with Dominic Walsh Dance Theater, a company that’s
about as artsy as you can get. Their bios boast ballet
training alongside training from Dee Caspary and Wes Veldink.
They are from the “I can do it all” generation.
What if we stopped judging each other? Yes, that means concert
people would stop thinking that commercial people have sold
out, and commercial people would recognize that money and
stability can be found in the concert world. Dance
is a big place. How best to keep it thriving is simple: mutual
respect for wherever we find ourselves
on this grand dance planet. I imagine a dance world where
people can dance anywhere, in any genre, without being
labeled. After all, we are all on the same team.
Back to Garrett Smith, a National Foundation for the
Advancement for the Arts Presidential Scholar whom I recently
interviewed for a feature in The Houston Chronicle.
When I asked him about favorite choreographers, he named Jirí
Kylián and Mia Michaels. About his career ambitions he said,
“Next year I want to be on So You Think You Can Dance,
then join a major dance company like Houston Ballet or Hubbard
Street Dance Chicago.” There you have it.
Photo captions (from top to bottom):
Charlie Neshyba-Hodges gets airborne in Twyla Tharp’s
The Times They Are a-Changin’.
The athletic performer’s concert dance credits include
Sacramento Ballet and Twyla Tharp Dance. Photo by Craig
Schwartz, courtesy The Old Globe Theatre
(Second and third photos) Garrett Smith is one of those
versatile dancers who help blur the line between commercial
and concert dance. He represented New York City Dance Alliance
as its National Teen Outstanding Dancer in 2005 (above) and
performed in the 2007 Ben Stevenson Academy Summer Intensive
Showcase at Houston Ballet (top). Second photo by Amitava
Sarkar; Third photo by Eduardo Patino
Dawn Dippel (left) and Amy Cain, pictured here in Dominic
Walsh Dance Theater’s world premiere of Walsh’s
I Napoletani,
are also school owners with backgrounds in competition dance.
Photo by Amitava Sarkar
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