[NEohioPAL] PRESS RELEASE: Verb Ballets has Alternative Moves, February 17!

[Dan Kilbane]

For
Immediate Release
Contacts:
At
Verb Ballets:                                                  For
Media:  
Margaret Carlson                                                 Dan
Kilbane
216.397.3757,
ext. 3                                            216.513.3654
margaret-carlson at sbcglobal.net                              kilbanedan at yahoo.com
www.verbballets.org
Verb
Ballets Has Alternative Moves
Friday,
February 17, 2012    8:00
p.m.
Dances
Tell Our Stories 
Dinner-Show
Packages Available
 
January
9, 2012, Cleveland, OH – One of the wonderful things about dance is that it
can be a different way to tell a story.  There is exhilaration in seeing a group of dancers move in sync,
connecting through their bodies.  Theme and variation come alive in a leap, a hand gesture, a facial
expression.  And, as human beings, we
love to pass stories to the next person; we deal in fiction and true-life tales
every day.  Verb Ballets, Northeast
Ohio’s contemporary dance company, continues its season-long theme of “Dances
tell our stories,” this February with three exhilarating works that tell tales
from an alternative point of view.  
 
Join
Verb as the company weaves together the amazing journeys of heroes, tribes,
rebels, choreographers, and dancers.  For Winter 2012, how about a look into the native people of Taiwan
through one of their own legends?  What do a group of religious pioneers have in common with us, and how
does their perseverance shine today?  How does a tango light up passion and energy?  On Friday, February 17, 2012, Verb Ballets returns to the
Breen Center for Performing Arts in historic Ohio City for an evening of ritual
and tradition for Alternative Moves.
 
The
Board of Trustees, Director Dr. Margaret Carlson, dancers and staff are pleased
to present the work of Chung-Fu Chang, Doris Humphrey, and Troy McCarty.  The Plain Dealer has called the
company’s work “vibrant…. bold….poetic…. bursts of passion.”  Dance Magazine, in 2008, named
Verb one of 5 “Great Tiny Troupes” in America. 
 
Advanced
preferred seating section is $28, general admission is $20, with a $10 student
rate, and is available by calling the Verb Ballets box office at 216.397.3757,
or by ordering online at www.verbballets.org. 
Tickets are also available at the door the night of the performance.  The
theatre is located in the historic Ohio City neighborhood of Cleveland (Lorain
Ave. at 2008 W. 30th St., 44113), just a short walk from many great
restaurants.  Free parking is available at the theatre.
 
Speaking
of great restaurants, Verb Ballets has a great deal in store for patrons, too,
and it helps a good cause:  enjoy
dinner prior to the performance at the nearby, critically lauded The Fly Fig
restaurant, and receive a Preferred Seating ticket to the show.  Tickets are $78 each, and all proceeds
benefit Verb Ballets operations and educational outreach programs.  Call 216.397.3757 to reserve tickets to
this benefit/show package, which begins at The Flying Fig at 5:30 p.m. on
February 17, 2012.
 
More
on the repertory for Alternative Moves:
 
The
Lily(2012) World Premiere.  Experience with
Verb the mystery and love between Princess Baleng and the Hundred-pace Snake
deity through the masterful choreography of Chung-Fu Chang in this World
Premiere, titled The Lily.  This dance is dedicated to Margaret Wong, longtime Northeast Ohio
immigration lawyer and community builder.  


The
Shakers(1931) Company Premiere.Shaker Heights, Ohio, Verb’s home, has a long and
rich history, as well as diversity, that were begun by the The Shakers.  Verb celebrates this group of pioneers
and the city the company calls home with Doris Humphrey’s “Dance of the
Chosen.”  The piece, performed in
honor of Shaker Heights' centennial in 2012, is based on Shaker ritual,
focusing on religious purification achieved through ecstasy. The design of the
dance includes small quaverings and tremblings that increase to violent shaking
and twisting of the whole body, of running half-falls and single wild jumps
into the air.  In this way,
Humphrey, a modern dance pioneer and contemporary of Martha Graham, broke new
ground with her work and reflected an uniquely American spirit.  The acquisition of this work was made
possible by a special projects grant from the Ohio Arts Council.
 
Otra
Luna(2012) World Premiere.  Placed in post-WWII Argentina, Troy McCarty takes
a different tact with the sexy and passionate tango and examines the many kinds of
relationships that are going on while bound by their connection to Peron and
the rebellious spirit of the time.  The creation of “Otra Luna” has been made possible through
the support of the Gay Endowment Fund of the Akron Community Foundation.
 
Biographies
Dr.
Margaret Carlson (Director)
has international expertise in performing, teaching, choreographing, and
working in a variety of settings.  Dr. Carlson was an original member of the Cleveland Ballet, serving as a
Principal dancer from 1972-1983.  Also a member of Actors Equity, she performed in numerous musical
theatre tours throughout the 1970's, including Sweet Charity, Ballroom, How
to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, Brigadoon, Mame, Hello Dolly! and The Merry
Widow.  For many years, she choreographed for
the Cleveland Opera.  Dr. Carlson
served as Director of the School of Dance at the University of Akron from
1985-1993.  In 1993, she became
Dean of the School of Dance at the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts, until
she returned to Cleveland in 1999. She then served as the Development and
Education Director for the Cleveland San Jose Ballet. She consulted both
nationally and locally through her company, Carlson Consulting Group, Inc.,
with groups that have included The American Dance Guild, Chinese Performing
Artists of America, Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo, Ohio Ballet, Dancing
Wheels, Ohio Youth Ballet, Ohio Conservatory of Dance, Tom and Susana Evert
Dance Theatre, and White Cloud Studios.  Dr. Carlson founded the American Alliance of Dance Artists and served as
its first President.  She has
served as a Board member and officer for Kids on Broadway, DANCECleveland, the
Cleveland Ballet Council, the American Dance Guild, the Council of Dance
Administrators, the Hong Kong Ballet, the Hong Kong Dance Company and The Hong
Kong Jockey Club Music and Dance Fund.  She served as the secretary of the International Organization for
Transition for Professional Dancers, a sub-committee of UNESCO, based in
Switzerland from 1998-2006, and was Treasurer and Board member of the American
Dance Guild in NYC and was its vice-president for 10 years.  She is known for her work as the
regisseur for the works of Ian (Ernie) Horvath.  She received her doctorate from Durham University in the
United Kingdom.
 
Chung-Fu
Chang(Choreographer) was born in Taiwan, where he danced with the country’s
internationally renowned Cloud Gate Dance Theatre and Kaohsiung Contemporary
Dance Company.  His solo
performances and choreographic works have been showcased throughout the United
States, and abroad.  A full evening
of his work was presented as the closing program of the Festival Internacional
de Danza Contemporanea Avant Garde 2009 and 2008 in Merida, Mexico. His commissioned works include Compañia Umbral Danza
Contemporánea and Danza Libra Contemporánea in Mexico; in the United States:  Aspen Dance Connection, Ballet Nouveau
Colorado, Boulder Ballet, Ohio Ballet, Ormao Dance Company, MOMENTA Dance
Company, the Dancing Wheels Company’s Icarus Project, the Mulberry
Street Theater’s Ear to the Ground Series; in Taiwan:  the 2003 Taiwan International Human
Rights Film Festival, the 2005 and 2000 Asian-Pacific Young Choreographers' Project,
the Counterpoint Chamber Music company’s evening show – Peter Pan, Solar Site Dance
Company, and many others.  In 2011,
he had eight dances premiered and performed in New Zealand, Mexico, the U.S.,
and Taiwan.  Orange County
Register dance
critic Laura Bleiberg named Chang in “Faces to Watch ’98:  A Look at People in the Arts”.  Chung-Fu was a Chancellor's Fellowship
recipient from the University of California, Irvine, where he completed his
M.F.A. in Dance in 1998, and was named Distinguished Alumni.  Prior teaching appointments include University
of Florida and Kent State University.  He also taught as a guest
artist at major dance companies, institutions and festivals throughout the
U.S.,and overseas.  Currently, he is an associate professor at Colorado State
University Dance Division.  He has
received an Outstanding Faculty Award from CSU Mortar Board in 2008, and The
2009 Best Teacher Award from The CSU Alumni Association.  Chung-Fu is thrilled to work with a
group of beautiful and talented dancers at Verb Ballets. He is very proud to
present his Taiwanese culture and heritage to you! 
 
Richard
Dickinson(Rehearsal Director) A former dancer with Ohio Ballet in Akron, OH, Dickinson’s
association with that company began in 1988.  He later became ballet master and director of company
touring.  Richard has served as
Artistic Associate for Hubbard Street Dance Chicago.  He currently is an adjunct professor at Youngstown State
University; co-director of State Street Ballet’s Summer Intensive (located in
Santa Barbara, CA), and Artistic Director of Ballet Western Reserve, also
located in Youngstown, OH.  He was
most recently the Artistic Director of Great Lakes Festival Ballet (Warren, OH),
and Dickinson has also directed Boston Ballet II and was a soloist with Boston
Ballet for eight years.  At age
fifteen, he joined the Pasadena Dance Theatre and was awarded a National
Endowment for the Arts Emerging Choreographer Award for a work premiered by the
same company.  He performed in the
PBS television production of “Frankie and Johnny” with the Chicago Ballet and
danced principal roles in Asian, European and American tours with Rudolf
Nureyev and the Boston Ballet.  In
addition to an extensive dance career, including principal and soloist roles
with Ohio Ballet, Boston Ballet, Honolulu City Ballet, various regional
companies and Chamber Dance Theatre in Milwaukee, where he was Artistic
Director, Dickinson has adjudicated four Regional Dance America festivals held
throughout the United States.  He
received his Master of Fine Arts degree in Contemporary Dance from Case Western
Reserve University in 2005. 
 
Doris
Humphrey (Choreographer)is
acknowledged as one of the greatest choreographers of the American modern dance
movement of the twentieth century.  Championed as an American modern dance pioneer, Humphrey is celebrated
not only as a prolific choreographer but also as teacher, mentor and
author.  Her influence on dance
continues to resonate in the works of those choreographers whom she touched and
in those who have come after her.  Humphrey's book, The Art of Making Dances, is still used around
the world as a guide for fledgling choreographers.  Her training began in childhood and she was encouraged to
study music and all forms of dance.  Her professional career began in 1913 as part of a Santa Fe Railroad
vaudeville tour and four years later she traveled to Los Angeles to study at
Denishawn School of Dancing and Related Arts, the enterprising school and
company spearheaded by Ruth St. Denis and Ted Shawn.  While a Denishawn dancer, Humphrey performed all over
America and Asia as a principal dancer in many of the extravagant Denishawn
pageants and spectacles and in her own works, which she was encouraged to
create.  She remained with
Denishawn until her abrupt departure in 1928.  Thereafter she broke new ground with her own works
reflecting an American spirit.  These
works, revolutionary and different for their time, were crafted and based
on her innate musical ability and sense of form.  Much of her groundbreaking work was based on the principles
of fall and recovery, utilizing the body's potential to travel between the
polarities of balance and imbalance.  During this period she created some of the all-time hallmarks of the
modern dance repertory, and when arthritis forced her to retire from performing
in 1946, she turned her attention to developing her protégé, José Limón, and
his new company.  For the José
Limón Dance Company she would create what are still regarded today as
masterpieces, foremost among them Lament for Ignacio Sanchez Mejias, Ruins
and Visions, Day on Earth, Ritmo Jondo, and Night
Spell.  Central to Humphrey's
approach to dance was her belief in its power to communicate the pathos,
complexity and richness of life and to convey the deepest yet most subtle
intricacies of human experience.  Through motion and gesture, she used the human body as the eloquent
narrator of that experience.
 
Troy
McCarty (Choreographer),
an international ballet master, trained under some of the East Coast's most
prominent teachers.  He appeared as
a dancer in the national tours of Barnumand Woman of the Year.  Troy was director and principal
choreographer of the Vancouver City Ballet for four years.  Subsequently, he was a faculty member
of the Hong Kong Academy of the Performing Arts, where he restaged Paquita.  Troy has taught for Ballet British
Columbia, Alberta, Cincinnati Ballet, Dancing Wheels, and was master teacher
for the Regional Dance Companies of America in 2006.  Troy entered a couple in the International Ballet
Competition in Paris where they received an honorable mention.  Previous Verb Ballets’ choreography
credits include “Volver, Volver” and “Scent.”  He is the owner and director of White Cloud Studios, a
Cleveland-based Pilates studios that is in its 17th year of promoting
strength, flexibility, and endurance for Cleveland bodies.  www.whitecloudstudios.com


About
Verb Ballets
Verb
Ballets, Northeast Ohio’s contemporary dance company, and its “best in class”
professional dancers, under the leadership of Director Dr. Margaret Carlson, is
a nationally recognized leader in performing dance works of the highest
caliber; a catalyst to promote learning, nurture wellness and encourage
dialogue about the dance art form.  The company strives to be a thought leader in cultivating dance
appreciation and support, and serves to help make Northeast Ohio a national
destination for the arts.  Verb’s mission is to ignite audience passion
and participation in contemporary dance through performance, outreach programs
and community engagement.  Verb Ballets was named one of “25 to Watch in
2004” by Dance Magazine, the country’s leading news magazine covering dance,
and recently the magazine bestowed more kudos on the company by naming Verb
Ballets one of 5 “Great Tiny Troupes” in America.  The Plain Dealerrecently hailed
Verb Ballets as “vibrant…bold…poetic… bursts of passion…”  For more information about Verb Ballets
please call our office in Shaker Heights, Ohio, at 216.397.3757 or visit our
website at www.verbballets.org.  
 
The
Verb Ballets company includes Danielle Brickman, Ashley Cohen, Erin Conway
Lewis*, Katie Gnagy, Stephanie Krise, Kara Madden, Leslie Miller, Rebecca
Nicklos, Brian Murphy, Arthur Prettyman, Or Sagi, Jarrod Sickles and Jason
Wang*.  The Director is Dr. Margaret Carlson, and the Rehearsal Director
is Richard Dickinson.  *on leave of absence
 
Generous
support: 
Major
sponsors of Verb Ballets includes AHS Foundation, The Bascom Little Fund, The
Eva L. and Joseph M. Bruening Foundation, Cuyahoga Arts and Culture, The City
of Shaker Heights, Cleveland Bikes, The Cleveland Foundation, The Gay Endowment
Fund of the Akron Community Foundation, The George Gund Foundation, Kulas
Foundation, The Laub Foundation, Lubrizol Foundation, The McGregor Foundation,
John P. Murphy Foundation, The National Endowment for the Arts, The Ohio Arts
Council, and Shah Capital Management. 
 
Individual
sponsors include Millie Carlson, Jeri Chaikin, Chuck and Ann Ennis, Kenneth
Milder, David R. Pierce, Alan Miles Ruben, and Robert M. Shwab. 
 
Additional
sponsors:  Baumgarten &
Company, LLP; Cedar Hill Communications; FITWORKS; WCLV; and WCPN/Ideastream.
 
The
Ohio Arts Council helped fund this organization with state tax dollars to
encourage economic growth, educational excellence and cultural enrichment for
all Ohioans.
 
Verb
Ballets is generously funded by Cuyahoga County residents through Cuyahoga Arts
and Culture.
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