Amid the sea of extracurricular dance opportunities and performances on campus at the end of the semester, the Drama and Dance Department will put on its student-faculty spring concert. With a runtime approaching one hour, shorter than the average student dance performance, the concert promises to be, as coordinator and faculty member Alice Trexler put it, "an opportunity and an avenue for students to learn about modern dance."
The dance features five faculty-choreographed dances and two senior projects from dance minors Maggie Brunner and Stephanie Sirabian. The three faculty members involved in the concert are Trexler, Daniel McCusker and new faculty member Mila Thigpen. The dance genre falls under the general umbrella of modern dance. The department works predominantly with choreographed dance, although there are some elements of improvisation in a few of the dances featured in the show. Within the dances lies a multiplicity of themes ranging from baseball to total abstraction. Most of the participating dancers were invited to dance by the corresponding choreographers, but there were some students selected directly from Tufts dance classes.
The faculty decided to challenge themselves for this concert by agreeing to have very few rehearsals. Thigpen's dance has had only four or five rehearsals before the show, and she did not meet her dancers before the first rehearsal. "I came in with some movement ideas without knowing how [the dancers] could move or their particular physical interests," she said.
Because of this added challenge, Thigpen gave her dancers a suggested sequence and allowed them to come up with dance phrases on their own, which she then tweaked and sometimes completely altered to her liking. McCusker has two dances in the show, one of which is an interlude piece with solely male dancers, each having a surprise prop, while the other is a solo piece choreographed by Trexler.
The senior projects did not follow this challenging mold of very few rehearsals, but each has its own signature idea. Brunner's project is actually two dances integrated into one for the show; one of her dances was shown in last week's Spirit of Color production, and the second part will be shown next week in Sarabande's spring concert. Sirabian worked her dance around providing dancers with restrictions, such as being blindfolded or not having music, and seeing how effectively they managed to communicate their dancing to the audience.
While many student groups rely heavily on interesting and innovative music for their shows, this concert focuses mainly on the dancing. The dances begin with movement vocabulary and materials first, and music is then added in later. The music differs from other groups in that it's not mainly pop or mainstream music, but rather classical or jazz. Trexler choreographed her dance to chamber music, but with unusual instruments, and many of these choreographers have done extensive musical research, exploring new and different types of music before settling on one for their piece.
Trexler says the hardest part about putting this show together was "working with students' academic and extracurricular schedules." Because Tufts only offers a dance minor, this show is not a large arena show, but more of an exhibition for faculty and students. She hopes that Tufts students will come to this show not only to support the Tufts arts scene, but also to "become exposed to this type of modern dance ... enjoy it and return" to see future performances.
The Dance Department's spring concert will be held tomorrow at 7 p.m. and then again at 9 in the Jackson Dance Lab. Admission is free.
