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Dance
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Dance Preview: JOFFREY BALLET’S 16TH ANNUAL WINNING WORKS (Museum of Contemporary Art)
FIVE CHOREOGRAPHERS, FIVE PREMIERES Winning Works gives emerging dancemakers a coveted professional stage—and a glimpse of dance’s next generation The Joffrey Ballet’s Winning Works initiative has quietly become one of the most influential launching pads for emerging choreographers in American dance. Now in its 16th year, the program returns to Chicago’s Museum of Contemporary Art…
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Dance Preview: STILL/HERE (Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company on Tour at Royce Hall)
STILL HERE, STILL ESSENTIAL The tour of Bill T. Jones’s landmark dance comes to Royce Hall with undiminished force The first time I saw Still/Here, it was at BAM. It was 1994, the year of Stonewall’s 25th Anniversary and The Gay Games in NYC. So, yes, there was celebrating, but the AIDS epidemic was still…
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Dance Review: AMERICAN ICONS (Joffrey Ballet)
A legacy program celebrating Joffrey’s founders while showcasing the company’s present vitality A richly performed evening where history fuels a thrilling, forward-looking repertory Preternaturally spry and acutely seasoned may be good ways to describe Joffrey Ballet Chicago these days—at least based on the company’s Spring program, American Icons, now in performance at the Lyric and…
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Dance Review: EUGENE ONEGIN (San Francisco Ballet World Premiere)
A PUSHKIN ROMANCE REIMAGINED THROUGH DANCE A handsome and emotionally direct adaptation that prioritizes storytelling and visual appeal San Francisco Ballet opens its 2026 repertory season with the world premiere of Eugene Onegin, choreographed by Resident Choreographer Yuri Possokhov and based on Alexander Pushkin’s 1833 novel. The story, perhaps best known through Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s…
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Dance Review: GRAHAM100 (Martha Graham Dance Company at The Auditorium Theatre, Chicago)
About midway through Martha Graham’s powerful Chronicle, performed last Saturday at the Auditorium Theatre in Chicago, I realized that the elevated platform at center stage was not just a platform but a highly stylized Olympic podium. It’s an important distinction. In 1936, Graham had been invited to participate in the Berlin Olympics, hosted under the…
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Dance Preview: GRAHAM100 (Martha Graham Dance Company International Tour in Chicago)
GRAHAM’S DANCE DYNASTY DESCENDS ON THE AUDITORIUM THEATRE Martha Graham Dance Company pairs signature works with a Bernstein-inspired Chicago premiere. On January 24, The Auditorium Theatre will host the living legacy of a pioneering genius. As part of its celebratory 100th anniversary international tour, the Martha Graham Dance Company will commemorate this unmatched milestone with…
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Dance Review: CHRISTOPHER WHEELDON’S NUTCRACKER (The Joffrey Ballet at Lyric Opera House)
A FAIRYTALE REBORN ON THE SOUTH SIDE Wheeldon’s Chicago-set Nutcracker still casts a decade-long spell Ten years in, Pyotr Tchaikovsky and the World’s Columbian Exposition are still a match made in ballet heaven. It’s December 24, 1892, in Jackson Park, a working-class neighborhood on Chicago’s South Side. A young girl (Amanda Assucena), accompanied by her…
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Dance Review: MATTERS OF THE HEART (The Joffrey Ballet at The Harris Theater)
FROM FRIDA TO FUNK, MATTERS OF THE HEART THRILLS When words fall short of capturing the fullness and depth of life’s experience, there is dance—or more broadly, art itself. That truth was made irrefutably clear last weekend when The Joffrey Ballet joined forces with Harris Theater for Joffrey at the Harris: Matters of the Heart,…
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Dance Review: PAUL TAYLOR DANCE COMPANY (2025 Lincoln Center Residency Opening Night)
TAYLOR MADE During his 64-year career, Paul Taylor helped lead, define, and shape American modern dance. Out of his 147 works, the Paul Taylor Dance Company opened its three-week Lincoln Center season last night with one of his final creations, Concertiana, which premiered in 2018—the year of his passing. Paul Taylor’s Concertiana Eleven dancers, clad…
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Dance Review: AN EVENING WITH JOHAN INGER (Gibney Company Up Close / New York Live Arts)
RUNNING IN PLACE AMONG THE STARS: A TRANSFIXING EVENING OF JOHAN INGER “I hate dance reviews,” my friend says to me during intermission. There are vertical trails on her cheeks, wet where her tears made slalom paths moments ago. “What could you say that would describe what we just saw?” I agree with her. I…
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Highly Recommended Event: THE 2025 3ARTS AWARDS CELEBRATION (Harris Theater)
CELEBRATING THE INDESPENSIBILITY OF CHICAGO’S CREATIVES Glowing cultural vibrancy and great world cities are so often intertwined they are effectively one. Scan the globe and nearly every city that enjoys high international prestige harbors a rich, and often dazzling, arts community. Whether it’s Paris, Cape Town, Mexico City, Lisbon, London or Hanoi, the arts explode…
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Dance Review: GRAVITY (Ballet Preljocaj, The Joyce)
Angelin Preljocaj has carved out a daring niche in the dance world, fusing classical ballet with contemporary flair to invent a unique, bold alphabet of movements. Now, the US premiere of Ballet Preljocaj’s Gravity is at The Joyce Theater, and it is an amazing experience, a meditation on the invisible force that binds us all….
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Dance Review: LIMÓN DANCE COMPANY (Joyce)
WHAT TO DO WITH MIDCENTURY MODERNISM? The first piece on the evening bill of the José Limon Dance Company’s residency at the Joyce was Limón’s Chaconne. As the director’s note in the program points out, the chaconne was a Mexican musical style interpreted by European composers. This piece, from 1942, was given a contemporary makeover,…
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Dance Review: DEATH AND THE MAIDEN WITH BURLESQUE: VARIATION IX (American Contemporary Ballet)
CORPS MEETS CORPSE: ACB DANCES LIFE TO DEATH (AND BACK AGAIN) Loss and longing pervade the revival of American Contemporary Ballet‘s surprisingly optimistic Death and the Maiden, now running at Bank of America Plaza through November 1, paired with a brand-new installment in the company’s Burlesque series, all accompanied by live music. Death and the…
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Highly Recommended Dance: IGNITE THE SOUL (Giordano Dance Chicago)
Jazz Dance at its Finest Landing Soon on Chicago’s North Shore From the look of Giordano Dance Chicago’s (GDC) upcoming program, Ignite the Soul, at Skokie’s North Shore Center for the Performing Arts on the October 18 & 19, they’ll be entering their fall season hot. The country’s original jazz dance company, who’ve proven themselves…
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5 TIPS FOR SUCCEEDING AS A PROFESSIONAL DANCER
While a career in dancing can be challenging and physically demanding, it offers many fulfilling avenues beyond just performing. In this article, we’ll explore five effective strategies for succeeding as a dancer to help you achieve your career goals. Cultivate Your Artistry While versatility is valuable, developing your unique identity as an artist is essential….
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Dance Review: GRAHAM100 (Martha Graham Dance Company at The Soraya)
GRAHAM100 DANCES THE CENTURY AWAKE Every analysis of 20th century American arts puts Martha Graham in a small class of visionaries who changed the world, with several calling her the “Picasso of Dance.” And since Martha Graham began her dance life in Los Angeles in 1911, it’s not a surprise that the Martha Graham Dance Company…
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Dance Review: FRANKENSTEIN (San Francisco Ballet at Segerstrom Hall in Costa Mesa)
When creation becomes choreography in Frankenstein, the laboratory turns into a stage of desire Mary Shelley’s creation continues to haunt not only literature but the stage, where movement and music conspire to make visible the tremors of his unnatural birth. The late choreographer Liam Scarlett’s Frankenstein, brought vividly to life by San Francisco Ballet, joins…
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Highly Recommended Dance: DANCE FOR LIFE 2025 (Auditorium Theatre, August 16 at 6pm)
NOW SERVING LEGS, LEAPS, AND LIFE: AN EVENING THAT OFFERS PIROUETTES WITH A PURPOSE Dance for Life, the exuberant gala of dance created in 1992 to help address the impact of AIDS on a beleaguered community, returns to the Auditorium Theater on August 16, 2025, stronger than ever. Much has changed since its first fundraising…
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Dance Review: LADY WHITE SNAKE (Lincoln Center)
A Woman’s Journey of Self-Discovery Presented in the Year of the Snake, Lady White Snake offers a contemporary interpretation of one of China’s great folktales—long retold in theatre, film, and television, and now reimagined as a two-act dance drama. The story follows a wife’s awakening consciousness and her struggle for freedom against the forces that…
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