MEGAN KURASHIGE San Francisco Conservatory of Dance San Francisco, California USA BIO | POSTS

Right, now I have something to displace the slightly scary vision of Jack Black in baby blue tights and Luchador cape.

Last Thursday and Saturday I had the good fortune to see Compania Nacional de Danza perform at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. I saw two different programs of work choreographed by Nacho Duato, the first being: Castrati (very educational program notes there; did you know that the male sopranos were considered “on-stage heroes” in 17th century Italy?), Rassemblement, and White Darkness. This is the first time I’ve seen CND and only the second time I’ve seen any of Duato’s choreography (I saw Hubbard Street perform “Duende” several years ago).
This is “Farinelli,” uber-star of opera in the 1700s and a castrato:

(photo from the NY Times, picture from the Royal College of Music)

So:
The dancers are AMAZING! They have particular and individual ways of moving, but they all have the most astonishingly mobile backs. They articulate the entire length of their spines as if they are one long swish of muscle. The movement is very creature-like (Eel? Snake? Sea cucumber? So not the image I’m looking for…), but the effect is more human. It’s as if the dimension and depth that they get at somehow makes them more vividly people.

They can also rock the unison. Everyone on stage moving so fast and so huge at precisely the same time? Thrilling.

I read the program notes before the performance for the first program, which I think was a mistake. All three pieces were very much about something: castration, slavery, and drug addiction, respectively. Once I had that list in my head, I couldn’t get it out and it distracted me from the dancing. The movement is beautiful and interesting, but having all those meanings in my head made me feel uncomfortable with the drama.

Favourite moments:
A lush pas de deux in Rassemblement, danced by (I think) Marina Jiminez and a great man who I couldn’t pick out in the program.
The huge spills of white sand that poured onto the stage in White Darkness (CND has a brief video of this effect on their website).

Program two was Gilded Goldbergs, Gnawa, and Por Vos Mueros. This time I didn’t read the program notes and was much happier. My favourite piece was Gnawa, mostly for the exciting, rhythmic parts that swept all of the dancers across the stage. This was the piece that made me most jealous of the people on the stage. They were all caught up in this amazing dance and I was sitting on my bum in a chair (in an orchestra pit. The pit was covered and filled with more seats. My sister and I felt a bit like we were smashed up on the stage, but we got over it).
Whew. That was a lot of blather.

I don’t have any pics of the fun Yerba Buena theater because it was gloomy and wet, but to make up for it here’s one of Hattie instead:


Ah the cuteness!

Other random oddments:
I started barre a couple weeks ago. I feel at once doddering and babyish, but who knew that plies and tendus could be so exciting?
Interviewed Thomas McManus for the Conservatory’s latest newsletter. He talks a bit about working with William Forsythe and is generally his smart, wonderful self.
With Thomas during the summer:

I hope you are all getting excited for Leap Day! An extra day in the year… Anyone have thrilling plans for it?
xx. Megan