By Tara Mitton Catao
Parsons Dance has been bringing its own brand of churning dynamics and punchy athleticism to audiences around the world for decades, including one last night at the Duncan Theatre.
David Parsons started his career at age 17 dancing for master choreographer Paul Taylor and his choreography still reflects that grounded, strong, exuberant physicality and enthusiastic execution of movement. There is a sense of youthfulness that just makes people happy to be there watching his dances unfold.
Round My World (2012), the newest work on the program, which spanned 30 years of Parsons’ creativity, opened the performance. For six dancers, the work was choreographed to a very cool score composed and performed by cellist Zoe Keating. The first of three ensemble pieces, it is the strongest, being crafted to give poignancy and pause for reflection amid a tumultuous movement that never stops.
The simple, pale blue-gray costumes and the haunting low, plucked and strummed notes of the cello give a serene beauty to the simple concept that we are one-world-connected. Parsons linked pure images of the circle, like chapter titles in a book, and in between them, he released his tumult of movement for three couples: Christina Ilisije and Eric Bourne, Melissa Ullom and Ian Spring, Elena D’Amario and Steven Vaughn. The ceaseless wrapping of dancers in movement and the innumerable ways the symbol of the circle was utilized just worked, and the overall effect was pleasingly satisfying.
The delight and magic on the program was supplied by two works that are classics of the Parsons repertory. Like a rock star who needs to perform the audience favorites, Parsons Dance makes no bones about the huge appeal that these clever ditties have on their audiences, so they are always included in every program.
Brilliantly simple, these works were created in collaboration with lighting designer Howell Binkley. Hand Dance (2003) is for five dancers or, to be more accurate, 10 hands. Performed in and out of a block of light, the arms and hands of the dancers whose bodies are obscured in black costumes create a cascade of delightful images of silliness to the equally delightful music of Kenji Bunch. It does the trick and the audience was delighted.
The other must-be-seen work is Caught (1982). Performed first in a series of overhead spotlights that established the parameters of the stage and then, in complete darkness, as a synchronized strobe light created the illusion of the dancer caught in mid-flight, it the kind of work that remains in the memory. Performed Friday night by Vaughn, the tour-de-force solo was mind-blowing, as one suspended image after another punctuated the darkness and just hung in space. An outstanding image, toward the end of the dance, is of bare-chested Vaughn who, after covering every inch of the stage, stood motionless in one of the spotlights with just his abdominal muscles pounding for breath.
Vaughn used the apron in front of the stage to dance and, in doing so, the strength of the illusion that the work relies on was somewhat weakened. The magic when the dance is performed contained behind the proscenium arch is truly flawless because you cannot see the dancer in between the strobe. The width of the seating in the house might have also contributed to seeing the dancer in the transitions.
Company members Lauren Garson and Florida boy Jason Macdonald joined the cast in in Nacimento Novo (2006). Danced to songs by the iconic Brazilian singer Milton Nascimento, there was little that was new as the title suggested, in its play on the word “nascimento,” which means birth in Portuguese. The movement itself was awkward and not particularly different or creative. It lacked that connection to the music that we have come to expect when we hear the sensual rhythms that are so engaging in Brazilian music.
Though the dancers were exuberant, almost making the stage seems too small for them, the performance of Nacimento Novo itself somewhat flat except for D’Amario, a dancing dynamo. This petite Italian dancer is the kind of performer one just can’t keep searching for onstage all the time.
The dancers seemed more comfortable in In The End (2005), the final selection of the evening, as they strutted their stuff to the music of the Dave Matthews Band. Dressed in jeans and T-shirts, flipping their hair, the dancers attacked the movement in this footy, turn-filled work where social dancing, tinged with shades of show dancing, went into overdrive. It was a bit dated, but upbeat, solid fun.
Parsons Dance repeats this program at 8 tonight at the Duncan Theatre, Palm Beach State College, Lake Worth. Tickets: $45. Call 868-3309 or visit www.duncantheatre.org.