Known as the “mother of contemporary African dance,” Senegalese-French dancer and choreographer Germaine Acogny first saw Pina Bausch’s The Rite of Spring performed by dancers of the Paris Opéra Ballet. Presented with the tale of human sacrifice and gender relationships, she couldn’t help but draw parallels between the ritualistic choreography and traditions from her African […]

When the Richard Alston Dance Company performs at London’s Sadler’s Wells this March, it will be the swan song for a company that has been at the forefront of British dance for 25 years, with a choreographer who has been making dance for half a century. Sir Richard Alston, 71, is the most prominent of […]

Feminist takes on The Graduate and The Godfather, international collaborations and a whole lot of flamenco. The shows we’re most excited to see this March are all about unexpected takes on familiar ideas. The Roadless Road MELBOURNE The 16th-century Chinese novel Journey to the West recounts a Chinese monk’s pilgrimage to India in search of […]

Since her high-profile move from The Royal Ballet to English National Ballet in 2013, Romanian star Alina Cojocaru has been quietly forging her own path. In addition to creating major roles at ENB, including in Akram Khan’s Giselle, the beloved 38-year-old ballerina now divides her time between London and Hamburg, where she enjoys a close […]

While you might think of dance as a primarily visual art form, performances engage us on multiple levels. Our ears take in the score, the artists’ breathing patterns, fellow audience members’ reactions, and the physical percussion made by the dancers’ footfalls and partnering. All of this information is available to audience members with limited to […]

You never quite know what’s going to happen when Natalia Osipova steps onstage—you know you’re in for something extraordinary, but the exact nature of what you’ll get is a mystery until it’s happening. It’s only fitting, then, that we would learn of Force of Nature, a new documentary following a year of the ballet superstar’s […]

By now, these formulas aren’t anything new: Choreographers are increasingly recruiting pop stars to create scores. And Broadway producers have long followed the time-honored (not to mention moneymaking) tradition of building shows from an artist’s hit catalog (see: the currently running Cher Show and Beautiful: The Carole King Musical, and the Broadway-bound Jagged Little Pill […]

We might have gotten a little bit carried away with this year’s “Season Preview”—but with the 2018–19 season packing so many buzzy shows, how could we not? Here are over two dozen tours, premieres and revivals that have us drooling. A Night of Natalia Osipova—With David Hallberg David Hallberg and Natalia Osipova have a rare, […]