This fall Ford Evans, DDE director and head of dance at the Hopkins Center for the Arts, wanted to take his dancers out of their home studio and expose them to the gritty reality of dance in New York City.
Over the last weekend of October, Oct. 30 to Nov. 2, Evans led his troupe to New York to soak up inspiration for its Spring term performance.
The DDE, which holds auditions every fall, is composed of approximately 15 dancers from the Dartmouth student body and the local community who take classes together and rehearse every weekday,
Since the DDE formed in 1999, the group has traveled extensively and worked with professional dancers and international and local choreographers.
"They are so used to the big, clean dance studio here, but in the real world of dance, that's not always the case," Evans said.
Aside from taking the group out of its usual learning environment and comfort zone, Evans planned the trip to New York as a source of inspiration, which is especially important this term since many of the dancers in the group will have the opportunity to choreograph for the Ensemble later this year.
"I wanted the trip to be a springboard and get them thinking about their own creativity," Evans said.
The Ensemble started the tour by observing Doug Varone and Dancers in rehearsal in the immaculate Alvin Ailey studio.
Doug Varone, who began his career working on operas and musicals, is internationally renowned for his dynamic choreography. His works are filled with pairs and groups pushing and pulling one another in constant motion. Varone's New York City"based company is known for its acting and musical abilities and has toured the world.
"We got to observe them in a private show and saw them running over small details and their directors giving them notes," Julia Kelson '12 said.
"It was a very interesting experience for me because the piece that they performed for us was about Daniel Pearl, someone I knew," she said.
Daniel Pearl was a journalist for The Wall Street Journal who was investigating terrorism in Pakistan when he was captured and beheaded by militants.
His story garnered international attention when a video was released by his murderers showing his last statement and death.
Evans then led his students into Brooklyn to tour the Center for Performing Research, founded by choreographer Jonah Bokaer.
Bokaer, who studied with Merce Cunningham for seven years, is now quickly gaining respect in the dance community by choreographing commissioned works worldwide.
During his residency at Dartmouth this winter Cunningham will create a new piece for the Ensemble's spring performance.
The choreographer spoke to the ensemble about the aggravations dancers face, citing the legendary 78-year-old choreographer Paul Taylor and his troupe, who will soon be evicted from their New York City base to make room for a Banana Republic retail store.
To learn more about the challenges of professional dance, the DDE attended a master class by Eddie Taketa, a member of the Doug Varone Company who told them about his struggle to support a family. Taketa juggles raising two-year-old twins with his demanding schedule.
After this, the Ensemble headed to Performance Space 122, where they watched several performances, including a show created by unknowns Rob Roth and Theo Kogan along with the latter's band "Theo and the Skyscrapers."
The performance, entitled "Screen Test," incorporates live rock music and elaborate period prostitute costumes into sexual dance and theater. At one point, a performer began kissing Evans.
"We had a discussion afterwards that was just the Ensemble members, and we discussed how the performance discomforted us," said Mayuka Kowaguchi '11, a member of the Ensemble who was also kissed during the performance.
"But because they persisted with sexual actions or sexual noises, it started to make us think about why we were uncomfortable," she said.
The group continued its tour, attending a master class with the rehearsal director of the Stephen Petronio Company at Dance New Amsterdam.
Evans said the established company was known for its experimental techniques and compared their dancers' broad stokes to a calligraphy brush.
In keeping with his description, the difficult class focused on fast movement and maintaining definition in lines. The students said they learned new "dance vocabularies" in the way they move on stage.
"One of the things that really surprised me is that professional dancers don't try to convey any emotion," said Kowaguchi, who will choreograph a piece for the DDE spring show.
"Their mind is not focused on that but more on the sequencing and phrasing, and, because of that, their movements convey the emotion," she said.
Even while exposing them to the difficulties of a career in dance, Evans wanted to motivate his dancers for their spring recital, which will be the first to feature works choreographed by members of the Ensemble.
Each piece will be based on David Crystal's collection of sayings, "As They Say in Zanzibar" (2006).
"It's great that we have artistic freedom this year because we have a lot of committed freshmen; this is the first year that we initiated the '12s when we took them to Fort Lou's at midnight and had breakfast." Lilai Guo '11 said.
"We've really bonded as a group, so I will be very proud to perform works that [other dancers] choreograph," she said.
The DDE will perform later this month in Novack Cafe.
The Ensemble's spring show will run on May 29 and May 30 in the Moore Theater at the Hop. The Paul Taylor Dance Company will perform from April 7 to April 9 in Spaulding Auditorium at the Hop.
