Kinetic stories

Movement and messages at Dance Portland

by June Vail

ON THE UPSIDE: Sara Whale, who performs in "Voices."

Last weekend's Dance Portland at the Portland Performing Arts Center gathered Maine dancers and choreographers together for a mini-festival celebrating

the dance community's talents and tenacity. The Friday and Saturday evening concerts featured nine dances, three by local choreographers and six by the winners of a Choreography Showcase competition held on August 20.

For more than 10 years Dance Portland has aimed to "nurture the creation of new works" by bringing prestigious adjudicators to offer constructive criticism, along with encouragement in the form of cash prizes in two showcase categories, for professionals and students. Both showcase and performances are generously supported by Millicent Monks, Portland's (and Maine's) most prominent dance patron for 30 years.

Millie Monks founded Ram Island Dance Company in 1969 and her direction of both the company and Dance Portland creates a close, if unarticulated, relationship between the two institutions. Sara Whale, now artistic director of Ram Island, organized a collaborative work for Dance Portland called "Voices" (underwritten by the Millicent Monks Foundation) for herself and three other well-known Maine choreographer-performers (contemporary dancer Lisa Hicks of Portland's New Dance Studio; jazz dancer and improviser Debi Irons of Art Moves Dance Studio in Norway, Maine; and Oriental dancer Josie Conté of Portland). The quartet of dancers worked with musician-composer Barb Truex to create a score, performed on stage by Truex, for voice, autoharp and drums. Sara Whale also performed in "Aloft" with Ram Island dancer Louis Gervais, who choreographed the three-part duet for himself and Whale. In another Ram Island connection, Gervais was chosen the first place winner of the professional showcase for a solo, "Baggage," which proved to be the evening's most engaging dance.

Gervais, originally from Lewiston, tells a fragmented story in movement and words that evokes complex family relationships. Through a series of vignettes using metaphors of suitcases, purses, and backpacks he conjures the emotional baggage of anger, exasperation, admiration, sibling rivalry, and finally, love. Gervais has a knack for physical comedy and satire: call it a shtick, but he creates a real bond with the audience with his intentionally repetitious narrative and nearly pantomimic gestures. If I had been an adjudicator I might also have voted "Baggage" first prize. I also would have suggested more stringent editing of the movement material. A tighter form would strengthen the humor and deepen the dance's emotional impact.

The first place winner of the student competition was Kate Garroway with her stark dance "Caught (in)(by)(with)" to music by the Pills. In an extended concert like this one, brevity has a lot going for it: this dance was clean, punchy, and black-and-white. The dynamic was percussive, body parts angular. Lying on the floor at the start of the dance, Garroway's splayed body appeared twisted and broken. The dance seemed alternately an abstract investigation of the rotational possibilities of elbows, knees, hips, shoulders, and neck, and the frantic convulsions of a trapped animal.

Other winners in the professional category were "Jammed In" by Tina Wentzel (Colby College professor of dance), a solo of ambivalence danced by Holly Labbe Russell to a live jazz score by Eric Thomas on saxophone and Rick Bishop on bass, and "Three Synonyms for Death: Masculine, Feminine, Neuter," choreographed and performed with clarity and wit by Karen Hurll Montanaro. Her simple but evocative music was by Henry Cowell and Otto Luening.

In the student category two choreographers shared second place: Jessica Stephenson for her solo "Roads," to music by Portishead, and "Go Down Easy," by Jennifer Rosenblit and danced by seven teens from the Debi Irons' Art Moves Studio. The evening concluded with "Britten," performed by the Maine State Ballet. Director Linda Miele had choreographed the contemporary ballet for Dance Portland in 1990.

Sometimes it seems as though Maine choreographers and dancers co-exist in parallel universes, though they are usually aware of each others' work and sympathetic with each others' situations. For this reason the concert's collaborative opening piece "Voices" for five dancers and a musician seems an appropriate metaphor for Dance Portland. "Voices" unpretentiously weaves together four different sensibilities and dance styles. These differences could have been even more clearly defined, even to the point of contrast or even conflict, to good effect. Deb Iron's playful jazziness and Josie Conte's full out belly dance, Sara Whale's classical modern/modern classical style and Hick's post-modern matter-of-factness need not always accommodate to find a common denominator. Choreographers' voices can also contradict one another.

Dance Portland does a great service by acknowledging and encouraging the commitment of Maine performers. But it too could benefit from greater variety and energy, with a renewed focus on not just new but also risk-taking work in any dance style. By figuratively adding a comma and an exclamation mark, Dance Portland becomes Dance, Portland! - an exhortation to Maine performers and the prospect of more exciting dance for everyone.

June Vail can be reached at jvail@bowdion.edu.