Marlon Simms performs 'Vignettes: Now is the Season' at the National Dance Theatre Company's Morning of Movement and Music at the Little Theatre yesterday.
Undoubtedly, the National Dance Theatre Company's (NDTC) annual Easter Sunday programme, Morning of Movement and Music, is well supported. This was evident yesterday when at 5:30 a.m., prior to the 6 a.m. start, approximately two-thirds of the audience at the Little Theatre was already seated.
And the programme lived up to its expectations. It flowed unannounced and contained material from the NDTC's repertoire, as well as new works. Some acts were cathartic while others were divinely uplifting. But all were creative in formation and well executed.
The choreographers, Rex Nettleford, Clive Thompson, Kevin Moore, Keita-Marie Chamberlain and Arsenio Andrade-Calderon, used their dances to not only reinforce the themes - death, hope and celebration - associated with Easter, but also reinvented the appearance of the otherwise bare stage with wonderful formations.
Great body extensions
The exploration of levels and great body extensions were utilised in Thompson's 'Vignettes: Now is the Season', presented in motifs. The dance shows fear, anger, joy and laughter. Nettleford's work in progress, 'Unastahili Kusifiwa', was fantastic and promises to be a wonderful dance when completed.
Chamberlain's 'Unconditional Love (Why You Love us So We Shall Never Know)' is cathartic in nature. Dancers Tamara Noel and Patrick Earle were graceful and emotive in their performance, especially when they interacted with the cross projected on to the backdrop. Choreographed to Kirk Franklin and Company's Now Behold the Lamb, the dancers received a resounding applause from the audience.
Andrade-Calderon's 'Aint No Nigger Child' also had a very powerful cathartic ending with the six male dancers as slaves forming a pact and dying together. The dance is choreographed to music composed and sung by Keith Mitchell.
Creative use of stage
Dancers of the National Dance Theatre Company in an expressive mood. - photos by Ricardo Makyn/Staff Photographer
The NDTC singers used the stage creatively, alternating their performances with the dancers. The group of nine performed songs such as Amazing Love and Marjorie Whylie's composed Psalm 23. Their performance of Hold Fast, with Earl Brown as soloist, was creatively presented. While Brown sang the verses, the other singers seemed to wander aimlessly around the stage in a circle. As Brown ended his verse, the singers stopped moving and began singing the chorus with perfect timing. The beauty of this performance was the ease in which they transitioned.
Leslie N. Daley, an ardent fan of the show for 10 years, explained the attraction to the event. "I look forward to being here because the combination of dance and music is uplifting in spirit," he said.
"It is a wonderful act of worship," added Arlene Daley, another devoted member of the audience for the last 10 years.
Morning of Movement and Music is the brainchild of NDTC's artistic director, Rex Nettleford. It was initiated 30 years ago as a tribute to Joyce Lalor, former leader of the NDTC singers, after her death.