Dancing the Dozens
Sandra Organ Dance Company
Sandra Organ Dance Company
Photography by Andis Applewhite
Neil Ellis Orts
Friday, February 19, 2010
Barnevelder Movement/Arts Complex
For their "12th Annual Black History Month Dance Concert," the Sandra Organ Dance Company presented Dancing the Dozens, an evening of short dance works that celebrate popular Black culture, especially (but not limited to) the music of Louis Armstrong and Michael Jackson.
The first half of the evening focuses on Armstrong, with the cast of dancers looking sharp in their bright jackets and fedoras (solid colors like red and green, costumes credited to Pat Covington and Sandra Organ Solis). The choreography by Organ Solis owes much to vaudeville, movie musicals, or Broadway hoofing, but her ballet history is also in evidence with her use of balletic lifts and extensions, especially in "Dream a Little." One of the more clever moments comes at the end of "Mack the Knife," when three dancers lie "dead" on the stage. As the music segues into "When the Saints Go Marchin' In," the three are "resurrected" and led to glory by angels (evangelists?) in off-white suits and toe-shoes.”
At the center of the evening is a dance choreographed to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech from the 1963 March on Washington. The sixteen-minute speech is played, with video, in its entirety as dancers move to Dr. King's powerful cadence, giving us another layer of meaning and imagery to the familiar speech. It's placement just before intermission works well to give the audience time to absorb that speech, it's potency undiminished after 46 years.
The second half the evening is much lighter and a great nostalgia trip for anyone who remembers the 1970s and '80s. Pulling from Michael Jackson's career with the Jackson 5 to his landmark album, Thriller, SODC's youthful dancers remind us of the joy and energy the young man from Gary, Indiana gave us. For this act, they're dressed in more funky costumes, including jeans that mimic the stonewashed look with gold paint (costumes again by Organ Solis and Covington). Once the company has shaken their bodies down to the ground, they come back as zombies for the finale, a staging of Michael Peters' choreography from the "Thriller" video. Members from the audience who arrived early to practice with the company jumped on stage to join the fun of the familiar claw-hands and dead dancers' stomp-and-drag.
Interspersed throughout the second part of the show are video clips from fondly remembered TV shows such as The Flip Wilson Show and The Jeffersons, giving the audience moments of laughter in between the grooves.
In a company of capable dancers, special notice should be given to Candace Rattliff. Her energy and stage presence draws the eye whenever she's on stage even when she's still. Some dancers who have moments of stillness simply stop moving, but Rattliff displays an understanding that stillness can be active. Her cast biography suggests that she's a recent addition to the Houston dance community, and a welcome one indeed.
Dancing the Dozens continues for a second weekend, February 26-27, at Barnevelder Movement/Arts Complex, 2200 Preston. Friday and Saturday shows are at 7:30 p.m., the Sunday matinee is at 2:30 p.m. For more information visit http://www.organdance.org/
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Toni Valle, Project Director
713-224-3262 / toni@houstondance.org
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