UPDATE: Here’s my review of the show in The Dallas Morning News, though you may need a subscription to read the whole article.

The largest gathering of North Texas performing artists in memory will raise money for local AIDS organizations Tuesday night at Winspear Opera House. The dance world will be represented at A Gathering: The Dallas Arts Community Reflects on 30 Years of AIDS by Texas Ballet Theater, Bruce Wood Dance Project and student ensembles from SMU and the Booker T. Washington arts magnet.

TBT artistic director Ben Stevenson has made a pas de deux set to the so-called “Caccini Ave Maria” for company members Heather Kotelenets and her husband, Alexander Kotelenets. The aria will be sung by countertenor John Holiday, who won this year’s Dallas Opera Guild Vocal Competition.

Bruce Wood has choreographed three new pieces for the show: Blue for dancers Dallas Blagg, Albert Drake and Harry Feril, set to the Joni Mitchell tune to be performed by Denise Lee; a solo to the Chopin Prelude in E Minor for Kimi Nikaidoh that will use panels from the AIDS Memorial Quilt as decor; and Blackbird for Nikaidoh, Feril and Jennifer Mabus to the Beatles song, with Robin Hackett on vocals.

SMU dance professor Millicent Johnnie has worked up MAW Expensive (A Tribute to Fela) for a company of 12 students. And from Booker T., dance coordinator Lily Cabatu Weiss has choreographed This Woman’s Work for Mabus, Dallas Black Dance Theatre company members Katricia Eaglin and Richard Freeman and six students, and faculty member Bridget L. Moore has made Human for six students, and The Road Home for DBDT’s Claude Alexander III and Sean Smith and student Mason Manning.

Both good and inexpensive seats remain for the fundraiser, with the organizers offering half-price tickets. Just use the promo code “artist” without quote marks.

Photo by Sharen Bradford/The Dancing Image

 UPDATE: Bruce Wood let his choreography and dancer Nycole Ray do most of the talking Saturday afternoon at the TEDxSMU conference, where this year’s theme was “disruption.” “I usually don’t explain dances,” Wood said before briefly doing just that, then stepping aside for a performance of the solo he made for the Dallas Black Dance Theatre veteran a year ago, At the Edge of My Life…So Far. “Change happens when something needs to break…You can either resist it or pass right through it.”

Ray began the piece sitting at a table covered in flour but was soon jumping on and around it, scattering white powder in the air, on the floor and all over her long and elegant maroon dress. Wood’s movement patterns were sharp and angular, especially Ray’s arms, which wheeled and flapped as if acted upon by an unseen force or internalized frustration.

She pounded the table with her fists, rolled across it, and flailed into it with sudden changes of direction. Away from the table, she made tight turns and grasped at her head and face. While others at TEDxSMU talked of disruption, Wood and Ray brought the theme to physical fruition.

Nycole Ray/Photo courtesy Dallas Black Dance Theatre

Ahead of his debut of three new dances Tuesday at Winspear Opera House, Bruce Wood is speaking and demonstrating at this year’s TEDxSMU at the Wyly Theatre. The theme of the all-day conference Saturday is “Disruption,” and Wood is bringing along Dallas Black Dance Theatre’s Nycole Ray for a performance of the disruptive solo he made for her last year, At the Edge of My Life…So Far.

The dramatic dance is typical of Wood’s quasi-narrative style, depicting one woman’s distress with the help of a table covered in flour. The conference, which runs from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., is invite-only but will be live-streamed on the Web and at three venues, including the Texas Theatre in Oak Cliff. Wood and Ray should be taking the stage between 2:30 and 3 p.m. during the second of three sessions, according to Unfair Park.

Wood returns to the Performing Arts Center on Tuesday night for A Gathering: The Dallas Arts Community Reflects on 30 Years of AIDS, where the Bruce Wood Dance Project will perform three new works.

Bill T. Jones with a portrait of Lincoln/Photo courtesy Kartemquin Flims

Bill T. Jones is one of the most important choreographers of the postmodern era in part because he’s willing to ask big questions. In Fondly Do We Hope…Fervently Do We Pray, his 2009 commission from the Ravinia Festival, he raises the issue of Abraham Lincoln’s “goodness” as well as that of his own – all of ours, for that matter.

The PBS documentary series American Masters uses the elaborate dance-theater production to examine Jones’ point of view, style and intentions. Bill T. Jones: A Good Man makes its television premiere Friday, locally at 8 p.m. on KERA-Channel 13. Back in the summer, I reviewed the film for The Dallas Morning News when it screened at the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth. Here’s the article, originally published on July 14:

Bill T. Jones knows he’s a potential dinner story for anyone who spends time with the self-described pushy, prosecutorial choreographer. “Grace is for the saints,” he says near the end of A Good Man, a penetrating documentary that traces Jones’ contentious creation of a multimedia dance work about Abraham Lincoln as a window into his driven, questioning artistic process. “There’s a fire every day. There is no easing up.”

In a sneak preview ahead of its November premiere on the PBS series, American Masters, the film screens Sunday at 2 p.m. as part of the Modern Dance Festival at the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth. Bob Hercules, who directed A Good Man with Gordon Quinn, will participate in a Q&A afterward.

Because dance is inherently collaborative, Jones’ visionary zeal depends on others seeing it his way. This leads to confrontations with his dancers and the music composer for Fondly Do We Hope…Fervently Do We Pray, a commission by the Ravinia Festival to mark Lincoln’s bicentennial birthday. “Sometimes I wake up, and I think, ‘You’re not big enough to deal with Lincoln,’ ” Jones says.

But these doubts only fuel his outsized ambitions. Lincoln was the only white man he was allowed to love unconditionally growing up the son of black potato pickers. His research turns up a more complicated picture of the 16^th president. “The ‘good man’ – what does he have to say to us today?” Jones asks in his typically interrogatory style. “Are we good people? Am I a good man?”

Scenes from 'Fondly Do We Hope...Fervently Do We Pray'/Photos by Paul Goode

Performing artists are always looking for ways to break down the barriers between the work they’re making and those who come see it. Installations that take dancers off the stage and into the crowd are one method. Muscle Memory Dance Theatre and Ghost Town Arts Collective have collaborated on such a project, You Will Know When You Are There: A Journey in Art and Modern Dance, a combination gallery show/installation/performance culminating over the next two nights at Life in Deep Ellum.

The idea started with Meghan Cardwell-Wilson, a member of both groups, says Muscle Memory co-artistic director Lesley Snelson. Snelson, Muscle Memory co-artistic director Amy L. Sleigh and Cardwell-Wilson joined with Ghost Town members Heidi Rushing, Liz Elsberg and Jean Roelke around the broad theme of an introspective journey. “The subject of this event,” according to the press release, “is transformation and myth: processes that twist and turn, taking us somewhere … a place that is unknown until arrival. You will know when you are there.”

With each group playing off of the other, Snelson says, the visual artists designed and built an installation inside the performance space, and the choreographers created a 40-minute dance piece that interacts with the objects. The action takes place off the stage at floor level, but the audience will be seated – a concession to sight lines. Muscle Memory is accustomed to collaborating. “Pilot,” their annual concert of new work by emerging choreographers, has been a success in bringing public attention to young artists.

A gallery exhibition of works by Ghost Town has been up at Life in the Deep Ellum since Oct. 10 and a reception and dance preview was held Oct. 15. This weekend, gallery doors open at 7 p.m., with performances at 8.

Contemporary Ballet Dallas/Photo courtesy of the company

My story on the North Texas college-dance scene, focusing on resident choreographer programs at SMU, UTD and TCU, leads Sunday’s Dallas Morning News arts coverage. The experience gained by students is key to their future professional careers and also provides opportunities for audiences to see work that otherwise would not be available here.

I’ll dig deeper into this phenomenon with looks at the individual residences over the next two weeks, leading up to the performances eventually. Meanwhile, I caught this weekend’s season opener of Contemporary Ballet Dallas, a decade-old company founded by SMU graduates.

CBD revived a Halloween-themed concept, Danse Macabre, for Friday and Saturday shows in the small hall at the Eisemann Center. The program of seven premieres and one revival got off to an appropriate start with House of Mirrors by choreographer Jill S. Rucci, featuring a ballerina (Jeana Robers Mosher) haunted by Night Terrors (Rachael Burns, Victoria Dolph, Danielle Georgiou, Jennifer Obeney and Carolyn Robbins).

In the second half of the program, seen Friday, Diablo by Jennifer Arellano employed a similar strategy. To music by Bach and Saint-Saens, the title character (Brandon McGee) controlled his Minions (Audrey Archer, Brittany Bollinger, Lea Essmyer, Sandra Plunkett, Addison Reed and Emilie Rupp) until a last-minute reversal.

These dances contained accomplished group work, but they weren’t as frightening as Beset by Confectionary and Not a Clue! were funny. Beset by choreographer Anna Marie Ewert-Pittman (who also has a piece in the SMU Fall Dance Concert) was a competition between Lela Bell and Jennifer Mabus with candy at stake. It required a broom to clean up.

In a takeoff on the popular board game, Not a Clue! (2002) by CBD co-founder and artistic director Valerie Shelton Tabor ended the night with a tour de force of hilarious tableaux fueled by slapstick pantomime. This is the kind of fun, accessible piece that can be enjoyed by audiences that might not sit still for other types of contemporary dance and shows that there is still a place for mimetic, acting-driven movement if it’s well conceived.

My other favorite piece of the evening was All for Fire by Victoria Dolph, which built momentum through depictions of the four elements. Jennifer Obeney, portraying Water, emerged to twirl and whip a long ribbon into eye-catching shapes. Dolph created some beautiful juxtaposing as the other elements arrived. Dolph also stood out as The Dame, the femme fatale in Obeney’s wryly dry Dance Noir, a takeoff on the detective genre that included Sam Spade/Mike Hammer-style voiceover.

Less successful was Love Lost, a duet choreographed by CBD assistant artistic director Lindsay Bowman. Starting with the treacly music by Evanescence, the piece was a clichéd look at the ups and downs of a young relationship that included some fine dancing by the ubiquitous Obeney and Stephen Raikes but also a lot of moody dead spots apparently meant to create atmosphere.

Aberration, Part II by Kate Walker showed what it’s possible to do with mood and inventive movement as Bollinger, Essmyer, Georgiou and Lisa Lagravinese created mystery out of Walker’s snake-like choreography.

Here’s Cheryl Callon’s review for Theater Jones, and here’s a link to CBD’s YouTube channel, with looks at Clue, Aberration and Diablo.

Elledanceworks co-founders Michele Hanlon and Ronelle Eddings/Photo by Brian Guilliaux

Elledanceworks Dance Company opens its 15th season this Friday and Saturday, Oct. 7-8, outdoors in McKinney. The program in Katie’s Garden at the Heard-Craig Center for the Arts includes the first North Texas performances of work by Berlin-based choreographers Birgitt Bodingbauer and Simone Grindel, who are in residence at the University of Texas at Dallas.

The pair from the German troupe Nightmare Before Valentine are showing A Shot in the Dark, a duet that won first place at the 5th International Online Dance Festival in 2009. Later this month, Bodingbauer and Grindel will premiere V.I.P., a new piece they have been conceiving with UTD dance students.

This weekend’s free program, titled Elledanceworks 15: Garden Party, also features From One Fountain by company co-founder and UTD professor Michele Hanlon, who runs the UTD residency; Unravel by company co-founder Ronelle Eddings; and a piece by company member Tiffanee Arnold.

Music will be performed by the Amy Seltzer Quartet, led by the Elledanceworks resident composer joined by musicians Tom Ottinger, Tomas Hernandez and Russell Blair.

Michael Serrecchia (left) touring with Chita Rivera/Photo courtesy Dance Council of North Texas

The Dance Council of North Texas hands out its annual awards Sunday afternoon at the Arts District studios of Dallas Black Dance Theatre. Among the honorees is Michael Serrecchia, an original cast member of A Chorus Line now ploughing his trade as an actor and choreographer for Theatre Three and other local companies. Serrecchia will receive the Natalie Skelton Award for Artistic Excellence.

The ceremony also features performances by DBDT, Bruce Wood Dance Project and eight Dance Council scholarship students. The scholarship program is the beneficiary of the Dance Council Honors. Tickets to the 2:30 p.m. event are $35 and available at the Dance Council website or by calling 214-219-2290. Discounts are available for Dance Council members and students. Press release after the jump.

The other honorees are:

Revathi Satyu, Mary McLarry Bywaters Award for Lifetime Contribution to Dance

Danny Curry, Mary Warner Award for Service to Dance

Dorothy "Dottie" Williams Hunt Kleeb, Larry White Dance Educator Award

Gene Pflug, Texas Tap Legend

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Celebrating Outstanding Artistic Accomplishments: The 2011 Dance Council Honors

WHAT: A significant Dallas, TX awards ceremony to recognize five outstanding Texans for professional and service achievements in dance. Event includes a gala showcase of selected 2011 DCNT Scholarship recipients and the exciting Dallas Black Dance Theatre. Attendees enjoy a silent auction and a complimentary reception.
WHEN: Sunday, October 2, at 2:30 p.m.
WHERE: Dallas Black Dance Theatre, 2700 Flora Street, Dallas, Texas 75201.
TICKETS: $35 adults, $25 DCNT members, and $20 students under the age of 16. Ticket price includes complimentary reception. Prices rise after September 26: $40 adults; $30 DCNT members; $20 students under the age of 16. Proceeds benefit the Dance Council of North Texas and its celebrated Scholarship Program.

Purchase Tickets: By phone at 214-219-2290, or at the door. Beginning September 1 tickets may be purchased on line at the DC website (www.thedancecouncil.org). Seating is limited; reservations are strongly urged. Parking is free.
___________________________________________________________________________
Each year five outstanding individuals are selected by the Dance Council of North Texas to receive the annual Dance Council Honors. The awards program is unique to the metroplex. Celebrating the excellence of the careers and contributions by the recipients, DCNT spotlights the diverse roles these individuals play to enhance and advance the art of dance. DCNT is proud to announce that the prestigious 2011 Dance Council Honors will be awarded to the following exemplary persons on Sunday, October 2, 2011, 2:30 p.m., at Dallas Black Dance Theatre, in the Arts District. Parking is complimentary.

Named for revered Dallas dance leaders, the recipients represent the best-of-the best. As dance artists, educators, and philanthropists, their stunning talents, creativity, dedication and professional accomplishments have enhanced the dramatic role of dance in North Texas.

The ceremony includes a showcase of performances by selected DCNT Scholarship recipients and features the stunning Dallas Black Dance Theatre. Following the award ceremony is a reception and an opportunity to bid on exclusive theatre items at a silent auction. Proceeds benefit DCNT and its Scholarship Program. The following five awards will be presented:

Mary McLarry Bywaters Award for Lifetime Contribution to Dance — Revathi Satyu
An elegant and respected exponent of Bharata Natyam, classical Indian dance, Satyu performed her debut, called Arangetram, in Bangalore, India in 1963. She holds a B. A. from Bangalore University. Between 1965 and 1974 she pursued special study in Indian Music and Dance. Then, with a Government of India Scholarship, Revathi received advanced training in Bharata Natyam. Between 1964 and 1973, she performed in major recitals across India, Canada, and parts of the United States. In 1972 Revathi had the distinct honor to dance in New Delhi for then President Mr. V.V. Giri and Prime Minister Indira Gandhi.
Founder and director of the Arathi School of Dance in 1980, she sowed the seeds of classical Indian dance when she opened the School in Dallas and San Antonio and was a founding member of the Hindu Temple Society, Irving TX. She served as President of the Indian Cultural Heritage Foundation. Between 1996 and 2009, Revathi produced several full evening productions for the ICHF. She has been a guest lecturer in classical dance and culture at Texas Woman’s University. Each year she returns to her native India to expand her creative horizons and take her students to study and prepare for their solo debut concerts. Under her leadership the International Asian Indian Convention was held in Dallas. The School celebrated its 25th Anniversary with internationally known dancers and choreographers.

Natalie Skelton Award for Artistic Excellence — Michael Serrecchia
Now a sought after choreographer/director, Michael Serrecchia was part of the original cast of the historic Broadway production, A Chorus Line. We can view his memorabilia from that Tony award winning production permanently displayed at Dallas’ Fair Park Music Hall. Having developed his talents studying with the cream of New York’s ballet, modern dance and jazz master teachers, Michael had an 18 year Broadway career which included touring the world with Chita Rivera.
As a formidable choreographer/director whose work receives rave reviews, among Michael’s recent credits are Theatre Three’s The Drowsy Chaperone and The Full Monty, Uptown Players’ Next to Normal, Theatre Arlington’s The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, and Water Tower Theatre’s Oklahoma! Several of Michael’s productions were prestigious regional premieres. He approaches directing and choreography from the premise that a show must “live truthfully under given imaginary circumstances”. Striving to remain true to the author/composer’s work, Michael incorporates a strong point of view and style that blends with the vision of the producer and ultimately the cast. Serrecchia also teaches at KD Studios where he inaugurated an Associate of Applied Arts degree in musical theatre performance. How fortunate for north Texas that Michael settled here.

Mary Warner Award for Service to Dance — Danny Curry
Curry is a successful entrepreneur, dance aficionado and patron extraordinaire. Curry is one of a kind. An unwavering supporter of dance throughout the greater Dallas Fort Worth region, Danny has served on the boards of many nonprofit organizations from president of the Dance Council of North Texas (DCNT), vice president of the Bruce Wood Dance Company and now treasurer of the Bruce Wood Dance Project, board member of Fort Worth/Dallas Ballet and Sammons Center for the Arts.
Curry’s generosity exceeds expectations and includes donations of time, labor, hospitality, business management, and financial contributions. Drawing on his mechanical know-how, he designed and built a production trailer used not only by DCNT for the Dance Planet festival but by Shakespeare Dallas, City of Dallas CityArts, and the Town of Addison for Taste Addison. He has contributed much to the firm foundation for dance and dancers through his business acumen, generosity and tireless energy.

Larry White Dance Educator Award — Dorothy “Dottie” Williams Hunt Kleeb
Born in east Texas, Dorothy came to Dallas at 17 to perform with the Summer Musicals, and then went to New York City where she performed in the famed Radio City Music Hall Rockettes. Her career included performing throughout the USA in night clubs and USO tours.
Since 1949, Dottie dedicated her life to teaching and choreographing or youth development programs, pageants and musicals for the Longview Civic Opera and community theater. A respected tap teacher in Longview, “Miss Dottie” organized and piloted the Tap/Jazz Dance Department in 1977 at Kilgore Junior College. She took her students to the International Educational Institute at the University of Exeter, England, where she taught seminars and produced Bye Bye Birdie for local student audiences. In 2007, Williams danced again at Radio City Music Hall for the 75th anniversary Christmas celebration. Now retired, for 49 years she operated her studio In Longview where generations of students studied all genres of dance, gymnastics and baton twirling.

Texas Tap Legend — Gene Pflug
Gene Pflug is best known as a tap dancer extraordinaire. A Dallas native, Gene began performing professionally in night clubs at age 14 before moving to Hollywood where he danced in movie musicals. He holds a B. S. in education and drama at North Texas State College (now U.N.T.) where he had a four-year scholarship. From 1951 – 1953, Gene performed in major military shows and was named the Outstanding Entertainer at Ft. Meade.
Following his stint in the service, Gene toured in USO shows and went on to perform in 33 Dallas Summer Musicals. His television credits include being a regular on the Eddie Cantor Comedy Theatre. A chance meeting with Livy Crutchfield, who owned three Dallas area Gingham Girls Studios, changed his life. For 12 years and taught tap at her studios, then musical comedy and advanced tap at the Calico Kids, Inc. in Garland for over 25 years. During these years, his students and productions received 110 gold medals.
The 2000 Olympics found him in Australia where he staged exhibition numbers for the Olympic Park and in Sydney. Gene was the tap instructor for Stars for Tomorrow for 5 years. He also created dances for the 1999 and 2000 DCNT’s National Tap Dance Day grand finales and received an award from the Tap Dance committee for his creative excellence.

New York City Ballet dancers in scene from "NY Export: Opus Jazz"/Photo courtesy Bar/Suozzi Productions

From musicals like Chicago to TV programs such as Great Performances, dance has enjoyed a place on the big and small screen for decades. In more recent years, Dancing with the Stars and So You Think You Can Dance have drawn sizable audiences for a commercialized version of the art form. But that increasing interest doesn’t seem to have helped put many butts in the seats at live concert-dance performances. The reason may be as simple as our long-running, ongoing economic downturn making it hard for the average fan to afford tickets.

One answer to dance’s difficulties may be Screendance, a growing movement the treats filmed choreography as an end unto itself. One of the best recent examples is NY Export: Opus Jazz (2010), a quasi-narrative that coolly and cleverly re-imagines Jerome Robbins‘ 1958 ballet of the same name. The 41-minute film screens at 9:45 p.m. this Thursday, Sept. 22, on the patio of the Angelika as part of the Dallas VideoFest. (I’ll be introducing it.)

Populated by a street-styled cast of limber youngsters from New York City Ballet – where the idea to adapt Opus Jazz originated with dancers Ellen Bar and Sean Suozzi – the hard surfaces and dessicated locales of urban abandonment become the setting for Robbins’ athletic and expressive group numbers. Coming off of West Side Story, he had decided to tell another teen-jungle story for a State Department world tour, but one that left impressions rather than used a spelled-out plot.

Directors Jody Lee Lipes and Henry Joost handle the skeletal narrative with no dialogue per se, only barely audible overheard conversation as if the audience were eavesdropping.

ASFB in "Red Sweet" by Jorma Elo/Photo by Rosalie O'Connor

Aspen Santa Fe Ballet is a relatively young company, but its stature in the dance world has grown quickly. As one of the country’s premiere commissioning organizations for new work, ASFB has established ongoing relationships with a number of choreographers. They include Nicolo Fonte and Jorma Elo, whose latest pieces frame the troupe’s upcoming performance Saturday night at Winspear Opera House. It’s the third time in seven years that ASFB has been part of the dance season put on by presenting organization TITAS.

I recently talked to artistic director Tom Mossbrucker about his group’s approach to dance, the way they select the choreographers they want to work with, their business model and their focus on beauty. My review of the show ran Sunday in The Dallas Morning News. Here’s Margaret Putnam’s take for Theater Jones.

Tom Mossbrucker

Mossbrucker, a former Joffrey Ballet dancer, and executive director Jean-Philippe Malaty were recruited in 1996 by Aspen Ballet School founder Bebe Schweppe to start a company. In 2000, they expanded to a second home base in Santa Fe. The group puts on seasons in both cities and tours about 12 weeks a year, performing work by some of the best dance-makers in history, among them George Balanchine, Twyla Tharp, Jiri Kylian, William Forsythe, Paul Taylor, Martha Clarke, Lar Lubovitch, David Parsons, Laura Dean and Karole Armitage.

ASFB in "Chameleon" by Itzik Galili/Photo by Rosalie O'Connor

DFW Dance Blog: How would you describe the style of Aspen Santa Fe Ballet?

Mossbrucker: We’re a contemporary ballet company. The dancers are all classically trained. And the repertoire is contemporary based, so a little different from a modern company or a classical ballet company. I would describe it as contemporary dance.

The women are able to dance on pointe and many of our dances are performed on pointe, though we’re not doing any pointe work in Dallas. The choreographers we choose use a broad vocabulary, modern and ballet vocabulary.

 DFWDB: The company is successful both artistically and financially, even in this down economy. Is it that you’re based in these two affluent communities that support the arts or is it something else?

Mossbrucker: It is that, but it’s also that we’re very lean. Everyone in the organization works very hard. I’m not saying that they don’t in other places, but we’re also a very diverse organization. We have two schools, one in each community. We have a presenting series. We have a folklorico outreach program. We’re a little bit of a hybrid. We’re not just a dance company. But it is also that we’re based in two very arts-minded communities.

DFWDB: The company commissions a lot of new work. What do you look for in choreographers?

Mossbrucker: We do commission a lot of work. That’s one of the hallmarks of the company: we’re always looking forward. We’re always trying to find new work, new voices. And that’s what we look for in a choreographer – somebody who has got a distinct voice and also a forward-looking voice, which is not always easy and it’s hard to describe in words, but when we see it we know it right away.

One of the choreographers on the Dallas program is Nicolo Fonte. He’s been working with us for more than 10 years now and when we saw his work – he sent us a videotape – we knew so fast that we wanted him that we were on the phone before the video was even out of the machine.

So it’s just sort of a feeling we have. If we respond to it emotionally, then we know it’s right.

We also try to develop relationships with choreographers. Once we find one that we think is a good fit for the company, we work with them once and if everything goes well we try to develop that relationship. That’s what we did with Nicolo Fonte. He’s done eight works for us now.

DFWDB: What was it about him that you knew right away you wanted to work with him and has continued to be the case?

Mossbrucker: When we saw his work on video, we thought it was interesting and innovative and new. But more than that, it was the relationship that developed. It was the way he worked with the dancers, the way they responded to him and then the final product on stage. So we keep doing that and now we’re at the point where he knows the company so well, the dancers so well that when he comes back he’s able to continue where he left off and not start over.

We always joke that if we had a resident choreographer it would be Nicolo. And in fact he named a piece [to be performed in Dallas] Where We Left Off and that was really the reason. He felt that every time he comes back, he picks up where he left off and continues forward.

DFWDB: Tell me a little bit about the Fonte piece. Is it about something, what does it look like?

Mossbrucker: It’s an abstract work. It’s not about anything, and it was a real departure for Nicolo, whose work is sometimes a little bit edgy. He came with the idea of hope. And that’s not a common theme for a lot of choreographers. As he developed it, it became very beautiful, flow-y, not romantic but almost lyrical in feel. For many contemporary choreographers, it takes a lot of courage to make a beautiful piece rather than a serious work that’s dark. This one is about life and hope and light and relationships. They’re all in white, and we’re actually going to have a live accompaniment for it. It’s a Philip Glass score for solo piano played by Han Chen. He’s going to be a star, I think.

DFWDB: How does the Philip Glass music inform the dance?

Mossbrucker: In this case, it’s very literal. The music is very melodic. It’s very beautiful in places. It’s very poetic. And the dance really reflects that. Sometimes choreographers will work deliberately against the music. In this case, Nicolo worked deliberately with it. It has a very dreamy quality.

DFWDB: You put a premium on this idea of beauty. The pieces I watched online emphasized very beautiful clean lines and shapes. You can tell that the dancers are very well trained in ballet. Is beauty something that’s always there at the back of your mind when you’re looking for pieces?

Mossbrucker: I think what you’re talking about is an outcome of the way we work and the training. We strive for the dancers to be very pure because we have a wide repertoire. We don’t choreograph. All of the work is brought in. We want to give the choreographers a blank slate, so we encourage the dancers to be pure and open and without mannerisms or affectations. So I think that comes across as beauty.

DFWDB: Another piece on the program is Over Glow by Jorma Elo. What can you tell me about it?

Mossbrucker: The music is a Mendelssohn overture and then it goes into a long adagio Beethoven section and then it goes back to the Mendelssohn. Jorma is somebody very much like Nicolo who we’ve worked with a lot. I should mention that we were the first company to commission Nicolo and that’s happened many times with many of our choreographers.

We were not the first to commission Jorma, but we were one of the first to commission him before he became the megastar that he is now. We’ve really developed this relationship with Jorma to the point that this time when he came back he knew exactly which dancers he was going to use, he knew exactly how he was going to pair them up, and I think in his head he knew exactly how he was going to exploit their strengths.

This work I feel is such a personal gift to each one of the dancers, because it’s so beautifully suited to their individual strengths and characteristics.

DFWDB: Is there a way to characterize his style?

Mossbrucker: There is an easy way to characterize his style, which many writers and critics refer to. Many times he has very quirky movements that he uses, and that’s sort of on the surface and people pick up on that.

But the thing underlying is that there is an incredible human aspect to the work, an incredible physicality and humanity in the work that people don’t often as easily pick up on because they are so focused on the top layer of this quirky, jerky movement. He draws on hip-hop, he draws on classical ballet, he draws on modern. But in the end, if you look deeply, there is this incredible musicality and incredible humanity to it.

DFWDB: Choreographers can invent vocabulary that’s very specific to whatever they’re trying to say or do in a piece. Is that the case with Elo or something your company looks for?

Mossbrucker: No, I don’t think so. Jorma actually in many cases uses the same vocabulary over and over, much like a painter. You can tell a Picasso if you look at any of his paintings. There’s no mistaking a Picasso.

Jorma’s work is very much like that. You can recognize imagery, vocabulary. There’s no mistaking a Jorma Elo piece and yet one is very different from the other in feel. This is the fourth work he has done for us.

I think this work was a real departure for him in some ways. The second section is very slow and adagio and a lot of times his work is very kinetic and fast and complex and never stops, never stops, never stops. This piece is a real change.

DFWDB: Stamping Ground by Jiri Kylian, why is that piece on this program?

Mossbrucker: This piece we just added to our repertoire this year, and we’ve done it a lot. It’s a really great, great fit for the company. It really shows off the dancers. The work of Jiri Kylian is in a way a badge of honor for any company to do. Every dancer wants to do his work. I remember when I was a dancer all anybody wanted to do was dance Kylian work or be in his company.

It’s the third work of his we’ve done. People look at it, and it’s not what they immediately expect from Kylian. It’s not what you have in your head when you think of Kylian. There’s humor to it. It’s a little bit quirky.

It’s a good fit for this program because it breaks up the two contemporary pieces. It’s also an older work. And it’s funny to think of Kylian as an older work, but this one is from the ‘80s. It’s also interesting because he influenced so much in the contemporary dance world. Jorma Elo was a dancer of his for many, many years, so it’s interesting to see the influence he had over other choreographers. He’s such a pioneer and continues to be so today.

DFWDB: When I think of Kylian’s Nederlands Dans Theater or European dance in general, people sometimes use the word expressionistic, which can have different meanings. I’m wondering if you think of yourselves as expressionistic or is this not a useful term any more?

Mossbrucker: We have tended in the past few years to use a lot of Europeans choreographers. And it’s not really intentional, it’s just that we’re drawn to that work. The contemporary dance that they’re doing in Europe is a little bit different than what they’re doing here. In a way, it defines the company, but I’m not sure how to answer that.

DFWDB: What’s different about what’s going on in Europe?

Mossbucker: Europe for the past 20, 30 years has really been a hotbed for choreographers. When you look at Jiri Kylian, William Forsythe, Nacho Duato, they’ve really revolutionized dance in their communities. They really changed dance, and also in Europe they had the money to do so. Forsythe could be in the theater for a month working on a piece. He had the luxury to do that. So did Kylian. In America, we don’t have that luxury of the financial means to do that. You bring in a choreographer for four weeks, they do a piece, you have a day in the theater and then you do a show. It’s not the same type of hotbed for choreographic creativity that they had in Europe.

DFWDB: You guys are in demand in Europe and around the world, touring quite a bit. What is it about your company that has made you hot?

Mossbrucker: I think it’s two things. It’s the beauty and the openness and the purity of the dancers that’s appealing to the audience. It’s refreshing. There are only 10 of them. If you have a bigger company – 20, 30 dancers – it’s hard for people to key in and relate to those individual artists.

In our company, there are five women and five men and you see them in all three pieces and you make a strong connection because they are engaging, they are open. They do give a lot back to the audience, not in showy way but in an honest way. I think it’s captivating.

And the second thing is the repertoire. I think people are interested in these works, and they’re accessible, they’re quality work. The combination of those two things – it’s surprisingly appealing. The audience doesn’t know what to expect and just loves it.

DFWDB: The merger of Bill T. Jones’ company and the performance space Dance Theater Workshop: Is that not as weird as it sounds?

Mossbrucker: In these times, anyone who can think outside of the box is the one who is going to succeed. I think for Bill to find a way to do something differently and a way to make it work for him is great. And that’s what we did. Everybody says we want to study your model. But you can’t. You have to make it work for yourself. Anyone who can do something different than the way everyone else is doing it, chances are it’s going to work. That’s why we’ve been successful, and I think he’s going to be, too.

DFWDB: Tell me about [dancer] Nolan [DeMarco McGahan], who’s from Dallas.

Mossbrucker: He’s been in the company for five years. He is a Julliard graduate. He came to us right out of Julliard. And he’s been the epitome of what we value in a dancer. To have watched him develop in the time he has been with the company has been really what we strive for, to see raw talent join the company and develop into a wonderful artist. He’s in all three pieces. He’s like a chameleon. He’s different in all three pieces. He gives so much of himself emotionally, not just technically, to the work. It just blasts across the stage to the last row of the balcony.

Aspen Santa Fe Ballet/Photo by Rosalie O'Connor

Nearly a dozen promising dance performances – half of them imported – dot the North Texas arts calendar this fall, from Savion Glover at Bass Hall to Garth Fagan at TWU to local heroes Dallas Black Dance Theatre and Texas Ballet Theater to shows mixing students and professionals by the dance programs at SMU, UTD and TCU.

The 2011-12 season unofficially opens with Aspen Santa Fe Ballet this Saturday, Sept. 10, at Winspear Opera House, sponsored by TITAS, and one of my five top picks for fall. Check out my curated calendar here and look for my interview with ASFB artistic director Tom Mossbrucker coming soon to this space and The Dallas Morning News Guide section on Friday.