The 14th Annual Evening of Dance on Lied Center’s Johnny Carson Studio Theater
The 14th Annual Evening Dance was a modern dance concert which was directed by the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Associate Professor of Dance Susan Ourada. There were five choreographed dances which had been structured by different acclaimed professional. The dances were to run for four consecutive days, which was from April 25-28, 2019. The venue was Lied Center’s Johnny Carson Studio Theater, which was marked as the Evening of Dance. Professor Ourada and Johnny Carson School of Theater played a significant part in the production of the dances. The context of these dances is influenced by the decision of the dance faculty Dr. Hwang and professor Ourada who decided to work with Ravel and Gorecky classical works separately. The 14th Annual Evening of Dance depicted moments of choreography such as rhythmic movement, lighting, music, formation and shape, and costumes, which explored planned and improvisation choreography.
The first dance, which was referred to as Unuttered Echo by Hwang, depicted a rhythmic type of movement which was characterized by the music and the background lighting. The dancers’ movements correspondingly correlated with the rhythmic pattern of the music. The movement of the dancer was to capture emotions and the spirit of the audiences through the deem lighting and acrobatic style of dancing. The moment of choreography was characterized by the rhythmic movements (Glenn Korff School of Music 10:10), which depicted both a weak and robust accent interchangeably, thus making drawing an acrobatic type of dance which originated from the United States. Acro dance is performed for an audience because it is originally a concert dance form because of music and costumes, which incorporate planned choreography where the dancers’ movements follow a specific pattern.
In the dance “We Should Pray for the Woman,” by Maren Schutler portray a moment of the choreography of lighting. The dancer’s floor movement and background changes as the rhythmic music remains the same. The change of background lighting depicts the shift in energy to the audience. There is no apparent movement flow in the dancers’ pattern, which represents an awkward transition in the next movement. The movement accent in this dance has incorporated force and sharp motion, thus making it a strong accent. Unlike Masen choreography, which has focused on the dancers’ strong movements, Press/Sure by Susan Levine Ourada incorporated a soft gradual movement (Glenn Korff School of Music 31:32), thus making the dance a weak accent. In the Tanna Kreclow choreography dance, I noticed a moment of choreography from shapes and formation of the dancers (Glenn Korff School of Music 35:47), which portrayed a sense of an ancient battle because of the costumes used by the dancers. This dance incorporated many moments of choreography, such as lighting, to trigger emotions from the audiences. Translation/Babel/ Noise by Melissa Templeton dance was the last in the 14th Annual Evening of Dance 2019, where the moment of choreography notice was lighting and music, which covered the improvisation approach of choreography that was depicted in this particular dance.
In modern concert dance, incorporation of different types of moments of choreography such as rhythmic movements, lighting, costumes, formation and shapes, and music are used to connect with the audience. The dances performed in the 14th Annual Evening of Dance depicted different imagery that elicits a reaction to the audience and communicates a message, particularly in the movements of the dancer and the music. The acro dance characteristic seen in almost all the dances shows that the concert was a modern form of dance, thus eliminating the polyrhythmic type of music. All the moments of choreography observed in this dance event offered a sense of transformation and interpretation s of modern dances to pass through critical social messages from the formation and shapes, music, and type of movement and music incorporated in contemporary concert dance.