Carmelina Martin

“The vision and goals of Pulse are to grow a supportive and interconnected dance community that fosters collaboration, growth and understanding of diversity and complexity,” said conference founder and artistic director Carmelina Martin, an alumna of York’s dance program (BFA ‘90) and a teacher in the Peel District School Board. “The dialogue between the dance community, teachers and students that happens here will help shape the future of dance in this province. I would like to imagine a future where every child grows up dancing.”

The conference has its roots from Martin’s work with the Council of Ontario Dance and Drama Educators (CODE), where she was commissioned with the task of providing support for Ontario dance teachers delivering dance curriculum, expanding dance programs in under-serviced areas of Ontario, and forging lasting relationships between dance educators and the professional dance community.

From the outset, York’s Department of Dance has been a strong supporter and collaborator in Pulse. Professor Mary-Elizabeth Manley, a specialist in dance for children, has been actively involved in the conference since its 2006 launch, serving as liaison for York’s dance program.  Professor Claire Wootten, Chair of the Department of Dance, is opening this year’s edition of the Pulse conference, which draws on the expertise of over 30 professional dance artists, including many York alumni, for workshops and performances.

Brazilian-Canadian dance artist Newton Moraes leads a workshop at the 2010 Pulse conference, held at York University

The workshops include dance technique, repertoire, composition, and diverse cultural and world dance styles ranging from flamenco, Chinese and Afro-Caribbean dance to contact improvisation, belly dancing, hip hop and hula. Many of the participating students and teachers, especially those from rural Ontario, will have a chance to experience dance styles they may have never seen before. The workshops are open to all the conference participants, with teachers learning alongside their students to model a foundation for life-long learning in dance.

To further expose students and educators to the broad spectrum of dance in Ontario, Pulse will showcase the premiere of acclaimed Brazilian-Canadian choreographer Newton Moraes’ new work, Saudades do Brasil, a kinetic expression of love and longing for Brazil and its peoples.

“Having witnessed the transformation of the students who participated in the last Pulse experience, I can say with confidence that this conference transforms, engages and leaves the students with a wealth of experience that is invaluable, and currently not widely available in our province,” said York dance graduate and Pulse instructor Allen Kaeja (MA ‘09).

A highlight of the conference is the Dance-for-Camera film festival curated by Kaeja, who is known internationally for his dance work for film and his award-winning choreography.

Hip hop workshop led by Mariano Abarca at the 2010 Pulse conference

The opening night of the conference features the Free Flow symposium, moderated by York alumna Kate Cornell (MA ’98, PhD ’08), with presenters Jennifer Bolt (MA ‘01),  Zihao Li (MA, BEd ‘03), Blake Martin (BFA ‘91, MA ‘07), Marc Richard (BEd ‘88), Allen Kaeja and York Dance Professor Mary Fogarty. The symposium focuses on the transition from elementary to high school to post-secondary education. The young students participating in the conference will get a sense of that transition first hand, staying in student residences and experiencing York’s Keele campus.

“The Pulse conference began as a means of building dance in schools,” said Martin. “Dance has been part of the curriculum in the Ontario public school system for over a decade now, but appropriate teaching spaces, financial access, expertise, knowledge and opportunity are all issues of equity that need to be addressed as a province-wide concern, in order for dance education to flourish in Ontario.”

Hailed as “a charismatic arts educator with an infectious passion for dance”, Martin was named Teacher of the Year as the recipient of a Premier’s Award for Teaching Excellence in 2011 in recognition of her passion, commitment and contributions to her art form, her students and professional development in her field.

Carol Bishop-Gwyn

Author, journalist and educator Carol Bishop-Gwyn delves into the Canadian social climate with her talk, “Celia Franca and the Concept of a ‘National’ Canadian Ballet Company.” In the optimistic but culturally under-developed Canada of the 1950s, Franca’s role as the founder and first artistic director of the National Ballet of Canada provides an excellent entry point for an analysis of the heightened demand for Canadians to have ‘a voice of their own’ in the art form. Franca’s support of home-grown talent and her insistence on national tours despite the vast distances and paucity of proper facilities and audiences showed a fundamental difference in approach between Franca and her Toronto supporters and other regions of Canada about a model for a ballet company.

Bishop-Gwyn is the author of The Pursuit of Perfection: A Life of Celia Franca, published in December 2011 (see story). Critics have hailed the book as a “wonderfully candid” (Globe and Mail) account that gives “… a much fuller and more sympathetic picture of Celia Franca than we have ever had before” (Macleans). She is now working on a biography, Wilde Women, about three 19th-century women with connections to Oscar Wilde who left colonial Canada to win international acclaim. Bishop-Gwyn has taught courses at York University, Ryerson University and the School of Toronto Dance Theatre in addition to working as a broadcaster and producer for CBC National Radio and as a freelance magazine writer.

Allana Lindgren

Dr. Allana C. Lindgren explores how the National Ballet of Canada presented normative gender identities in “Gender Cues: The National Ballet of Canada’s Marketing of Masculinity and Femininity in the 1950s”. Using Bryan S. Turner’s The Body and Society: Explorations in Social Theory as a starting point, she demonstrates the falseness of the imaged boundary between society and the art form. She argues dancers’ bodies are sites where social issues, including acceptable gender roles, are expressed through corporeality.

Lindgren, a professor of theatre at the University of Victoria, is the author of From Automatism to Modern Dance and co-editor with Kaija Pepper of Renegade Bodies: Canadian Dance in the 1970s. Her articles have appeared in a variety of publications including American Journal of Dance Therapy; Canadian Dance: Visions and Stories; Canadian Theatre Review; The Journal of Arts Management, Law and Society and Theatre Research in Canada.

Samanatha Mehra

In her presentation “Pen Pointe: The Multifaceted Relationship between Toronto Newspaper Critics and the National Ballet of Canada”,  Samantha Mehra looks at the relationship between newspaper coverage and commentary on the National Ballet of Canada and the company’s artists, particularly during the 1970s and 1980s. She investigates the nature of the relationships between critics such as John Fraser, Penelope Reed Doob, Michael Crabb and William Littler, their publications, and the National Ballet itself. Based on her research into Toronto’s dance critic ‘culture’, Mehra highlights significant connections between critic and company, pointing towards the multifaceted role of the Toronto dance critic as reviewer, journalist and most importantly, as champion of certain Toronto companies and artists.

Mehra is a dancer, writer and emerging dance scholar and historian who is currently pursuing doctoral studies in dance history at York. She works in development at Dance Collection Danse, writes for The Dance Current, and has presented her scholarly work at international conferences. Her work has also appeared in DCD Magazine, The Canadian Encyclopedia Online and in Oxford University’s Forum for Modern Language Studies.

The fact that all three presenters are alumni of York University’s Graduate Program in Dance is a fitting tribute to dance scholar and educator Professor Emerita Selma Odom, a pioneering force in the field of Canadian dance studies who played a lead role in establishing the program, and for whom the lecture is named.

The Selma Odom Lecture takes place Wednesday, April 25 from 3 to 5pm in the McLean Performance Studio, 244 Accolade East Building on York’s Keele campus. Admission is free. There will be a reception following the talk.

York Dance Ensemble – Tangled Dances

The York Dance Ensemble (YDE) presents its year-end concert, Tangled Dances, March 22 to 24 in the Sandra Faire and Ivan Fecan Theatre. The lively young repertory company of the Department of Dance presents an engaging collection of contemporary choreography by established and rising dance artists. The show runs nightly at 7:30 pm.

The YDE’s artistic and managing director, Professor Holly Small, says viewers should come with high expectations.  “With occasional blood, plenty of sweat and not a few tears, the Ensemble has achieved a level of excellence of which York can rightly be proud,” she said.

The program opens with Suddenly Everyone…,  a piece which runs the gamut from highly-structured to completely free improvisation. It was created collaboratively, with the YDE providing the movement and music, and Small contributing structure and direction.

Dancers Anastasia Feigin and Nikolaos Markakis in "Tangled Rags", choreographed by Holly Small. Photo: David Hou

Set to a mix of music from the films Alice in Wonderland, The Wizard of Oz and Mary Poppins, Professor Darcey Callison’s exuberant Down The Road takes inspiration and physicality from the rabbit-holes and yellow brick roads we follow as we find our path through life.

Short Ride in a Fast Machine is a demanding trio choreographed and performed by YDE members Yvon Allard, Miles Gosse and Nikolaos Markakis.

Undergraduate student Anne Goad’s It’s Just What You Do is a duet about true love, inspired by the choreographer’s grandparents and their 69 years of marriage.

Shae Zukiwsky, a PhD candidate in dance, joins the YDE in the performance of his new piece for large ensemble, Resistance. Through the work, he explores the concept of being an outsider and how he could move within that – seeing as he can’t seem to move from it.

The program culminates with Small’s Tangled Rags, a suite of three tender, soulful dances that the choreographer has dedicated to her father. The work is set to “Three Rags”, a composition by the late Canadian composer James Tenney, who taught in York’s music department, recorded by pianist and York music professor Casey Sokol.

Tickets for the YDE show are $20 ($10 for students and seniors) and are available by calling 416-736-5888, visiting the Fine Arts Box Office online, or at the door.

York Dances: Light in the Attic

Hard on the heels of the YDE concert comes York Dances, the Dance Department’s annual showcase of new choreography.  Third-year dance majors present 21 world premieres in the two-part production Light in the Attic, running Thursday,  March 29 and Friday, March 30. The light switch is flipped on nightly at 7 and 8:30pm, with two different programs of original solos, duets and large ensemble works running in the McLean Performance Studio in Accolade East Building.

Light in the Attic unearths and shares new discoveries, hidden treasures, personal stories, memories, dreams, fears and desires, all revealed through the art of dance. Independent dance artist and York faculty member Julia Sasso serves as artistic director for the show.

“Treasures await you in Light in the Attic,” said Sasso. “This is a rich and varied choreographic offering, ranging from dark to light, intensely personal to coolly abstract, politically provocative to extraordinarily absurd. I’m thrilled by the risks these emerging dance makers are taking in developing original, contemporary dances that reflect and enhance their own experiences and those of the viewer.”

Admission is $10 for each York Dances show. Tickets may be purchased through the Fine Arts Box Office online or by calling 416-736-5888.

PhD student Katie McMillan, Theatre Criticism & Engagement Intern with World Stage

McMillan’s first blog contribution – a informal, personal response to the opening night performance of the Wayne McGregor | Random Dance production Entity – is now live on Upfront, Harbourfront Centre’s World Stage blog.

McMillan’s article, Dancing on the Brain, includes her experience of a master class held by Antoine Vereecken, rehearsal director for Entity, in the Department of Dance at York University on March 1.

McMillan’s internship is just one component of a lively, ongoing partnership that the Faculty of Fine Arts and Harbourfront Centre launched in 2010 to nurture a vibrant and thriving arts ecology in Toronto (see story). Along with residencies and workshops held on campus by renowned guest artists from World Stage shows (see story), the collaboration has also led to the establishment of production internships on-site at Harbourfront Centre, extending experiential learning opportunities for York’s undergraduate fine arts students (see story).

Based on a chapter from The Aeneid, penned by the Roman poet Virgil in the first century BCE, Dido and Aeneas recounts the tragic tale of Dido, Queen of Carthage and the Trojan hero Aeneas. Dido loses her heart to the fierce, handsome warrior Aeneas after he is shipwrecked on her shores, only to be devastated when he abandons her to continue his quest to found Rome.

Young artists from the Faculty of Fine Arts in rehearsal for "Dido and Aeneas"

This story of doomed love has resounded through two millennia. York’s production, a collaboration between faculty and students from the Departments of Music, Theatre and Dance, is a strikingly contemporary but timeless re-imagining. Thirty performers play the characters as well as the place, forming a living set on an otherwise empty stage.

Professor Catherine Robbin, producer and music director for "Dido and Aeneas"

“This Dido project is the realization of a dream I’ve had since I joined York,” said Professor Catherine Robbin, who heads the university’s classical vocal music program. “There’s so much talent and expertise in our performance programs, and it’s a joy to bring it together in an opera production. The experience of combining our creative energies is tremendously exciting and rewarding, both for the students involved and for those of us who teach and work professionally in the field.”

An internationally renowned mezzo soprano, Robbin fills the dual roles of music director and producer for the production. She is no stranger to Dido and Aeneas, having sung the title role in the memoral 1982 Stratford Festival production which earned her critical accolades as “… a voice which is unquestionably the greatest, in its range, that Canada has produced in several decades” (The Globe and Mail). Her discography features many Baroque composers including Purcell, Handel and Vivaldi, in collaborations with leading conductors such as Christopher Hogwood, Trevor Pinnock and John Eliot Gardiner.

Presiding over the orchestra pit for York’s Dido and Aeneas is Robbin’s Music Department colleague, award-winning choral conductor and composer Professor Stephanie Martin. Martin, who serves as music director for the historic Church of St. Mary Magdalene and conductor of Toronto’s Pax Christi Chorale, directs the 16- member York University Baroque Ensemble.

The stage director is Theatre Professor Gwen Dobie, who brings extensive directing credits in contemporary opera and theatre to the table. Her most recent productions include Opera Erotique and Sound in Silence for her company, Out of the Box Productions; the Canadian premiere of the Danish opera On this Planet by Anders Nordendoft; and the world premiere of the opera Eyes on the Mountain by Canadian composer Christopher Donison.

Susan Lee, an alumna and current contract faculty member in York’s Department of Dance, brings her longstanding interest in interdisciplinary collaboration to Dido and Aeneas. In a performance career spanning two decades and three continents, Lee has originated roles in some 50 world premieres by some of Canada’s most highly acclaimed choreographers. Her own choreography has been described as “…a tour de force of magic and mystery” (The Globe and Mail). She brings that magic to bear on this production, contributing original choreography to the work.

Music student Charlotte Gagnon sings the role of Dido, Queen of Carthage

Starring in the role of Dido is fourth-year music major Charlotte Gagnon. Gagnon recently won first prize at the Newmarket Voice Festival Senior Scholarship Competition, as well as two awards for opera performance and the prize for outstanding performing ability and career potential in classical singing. She placed second in her class at the 2011 National Association of Teachers of Singing Ontario chapter competition.

First-year music student Joseph Farahat sings the role of Aeneas. Both young artists are studying with eminent soprano Norma Burrowes in York’s classical vocal performance program.

In total, the cast for Dido and Aeneas features 21 singers, four actors and five dancers. Not only performers, these young artists also play an active role on the production side. Dressed all in white,  they have designed their own costumes based on their personae in Purcell’s opera, or – in the case of the non-speaking roles – inspired by characters drawn from the classical literature of five centuries, who were betrayed or betrayers in their time.

Eschewing a physical set, Professor Elizabeth Asselstine, Chair of the Department of Theatre, and Professor William Mackwood, who teaches design and production in the Department of Dance, have created elaborate lighting and projection designs for the show. Working with a technical team of four theatre students, they paint the white-costumed canvas of the performers with evocative colour and special effects.

York University’s Faculty of Fine Arts is one of North America’s premier schools for the visual and performing arts. Among the most comprehensive professional training and research institutions in the field in Canada, it offers conservatory and academic studies in all the fine arts: dance, design, digital media, film, music, theatre and visual arts.

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What: York University’s Faculty of Fine Arts presents Dido and Aeneas
When:  Thursday, March 1 and Friday, March 2 at 7:30pm
Where: Sandra Faire and Ivan Fecan Theatre, Accolade East Building, York University, 4700 Keele St. | Map
Admission: $17 | students & seniors $12
Box Office: 416.736.5888 | www.yorku.ca/perform/boxoffice

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 Media Contact:
Amy Stewart, Communications, Faculty of Fine Arts, York University
416.650.8469 | amy.stewart@yorku.ca