PUSHING THE BOUNDARIES OF CLASSICAL BALLET
Founded in New York in 2000 as a means to put professional ballet dancers to work during their summer hiatuses, Chamber Dance Project, now based in Washington D.C., combines art forms to offer live, spontaneous performances, says Project Founder Diane Coburn Bruning.
Dwellings, choreographed by Christian Denice (photo Rachel Malehorn)
“I wouldn’t say we’re avant garde,” said Bruning, “but we push the edges of classicism in every way. I love the lines and the pristine training ballet dancers bring, but [our choreography] bends them in new ways. I have a wide range of interests in music and choreography; I commission work that pushes boundaries and expectations. I believe in a breathing art form; not a stagnant one.”
Dwellings, choreographed by Christian Denice (photo Rachel Malehorn)
D.C.’s leading contemporary ballet company is presenting through June 27 its latest works at The Shakespeare Theater’s Harmon Hall. The exhilarating evening combines live chamber music, dancers, and for one of its pieces, a narrator reciting a poem. It also showcases dancers from Atlanta Ballet, BalletMet, The Washington Ballet, as well as several freelance dancers from New York City, New Jersey and elsewhere. (The company also holds open rehearsals four times a year and in the past has combined slam poetry with dance.)
This annual summer season performance, named after one of its pieces–Red Angels–is a collection of CDP repertory favorites, music performances by CDP’s string quartet, a world-premiere by Argentinian choreographer Jorge Amarante, and the D.C. premiere of Ulysses Dove’s “Red Angels.”
Sophie Miklosovic and Patric Palkens in Red Angels (photo Alexander Sargent)
Red Angels opened with the first movement of Christian Denice’s “Dwellings” (2021), set to Swiss composer Stephan Thelan’s “Circular Lines.” Originally a dance film created during the pandemic, the work drew inspiration from our collective experience of quarantining at home, Bruning said. Containing six dancers, the work is airy and fluid, flowing and focused. “On some level, it was like dancers scribbling in space; reminiscent of a Jackson Pollock painting to me,” she said.
Next, CDP’s chamber quartet performed Composer Charlton Singleton’s haunting and percussive “Testimony” (2019), which will be turned into a dance work for CDP’s 2026 summer season.
Tensión Por Vos, choreographed by Jorge Amarante (photo Rachel Malehorn)
The highlight of the evening, for me, was the world premiere of Argentinian Jorge Amarante’s “Tensión Por Vos” (“Tension For You”). What was meant to be a three-part work had to be limited to the middle movement–an exquisite modernistic tango depicting a struggling, complicated relationship–because Amarante’s visa didn’t come through. Since Amarante wasn’t in the country, the work was taught to Dancers Iris Davila and Marius Morawski over Zoom! For this piece, musicians Sally McLain on violin, Karin Kelleher on violin, Uri Wassertzug on viola, and Benjamin Wensel on cello shared the stage with the dancers.
Tensión Por Vos, choreographed by Jorge Amarante (photo Rachel Malehorn)
Next, the program’s title piece, the D.C. premiere of “Red Angels” took the stage. The work, choreographed by Ulysses Dove (1947-1996) and restaged by Peter Boal, was danced to Richard Einhorn’s tune “Maxwell’s Demon,” and beautifully played on electric violin by CDP’s Principal Musician Sally McLain. The majestic piece involves four dancers who exhibit balletic choreography defined by technique and outstretched limbs.
Jonathan Jordan, Julia Erickson, Francesca Dugarte in Prufrock (photo Mariah Miranda)
The program’s second half features Coburn Bruning’s “Prufrock” (2019), based on author T.S. Eliot’s “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock,” and set to a commissioned score for the work by James Bigbee Garver. Narrator Matthew Torney, who also helped to conceive the piece, expertly recites the caustic, existential poem while the dancers brought his words to life.
“The inspiration for the piece started with my desire to work again with Matt Torney, who comes from a dance/movement background,” said Bruning. “I wanted to do something with three pools of light, and fragmenting stage movement with light. We thought about using text that didn’t impose a story – not a literal narrative. Prufrock is my favorite poem; I can’t put a pin in what it means, it’s stream of consciousness, fragmented strong images that don’t dictate a story. It’s brilliant and comes alive with dance.”
Dancers Andile Ndlovu, Patric Palkens, Gian Carlo Perez and vocalist Lena Seikaly
in Songs by Cole (photo Eduardo Patino)
The evening also included an audience favorite “Songs By Cole,” (2017) danced to a suite of music by Cole Porter and sung by lead vocalist Lena Seikaly.
The epic evening (and just for opening night) ended with longtime CDP dancer and Rehearsal Director, Patric Palkens, honored in a special performance of an excerpt of Coburn Bruning’s “Four Men” (2021).
From spoken word to string quartet, from modern tango to existential poetry, Chamber Dance Project’s summer program is a vivid reminder that dance doesn’t live in isolation—it thrives at the intersection of music, language, and daring. This year’s Red Angels program is not just a performance, it’s a curated experience: eclectic, evocative, and joyously alive.
Red Angels
Chamber Dance Project
Harman Hall, 610 F St NW, in D.C
ends on June 27, 2025
for tickets, visit Chamber Dance
