Email Author Linda Shapiro

2011 Stories by Linda Shapiro

• Choreographers' Evening

  published November 23, 2011

  This annual, not-to-be-missed survey of local dance yields numerous rewards: veteran choreographers trying new stuff, folks new on the scene, and... More >>

• Zenon Dance Company

  published November 23, 2011

  Zenon's debut concert at the new Cowles Center for Dance and the Performing Arts seems designed to show the eclectic-electric vibe this company... More >>

• Ballet of the Dolls: Songs for a Swan

  published November 2, 2011

  If Myron Johnson wasn't born in a trunk, he should have been. This consummate theater artist, founder and director of Ballet of the Dolls, has... More >>

• Jerome Bel: Cedric Andrieux

  published October 26, 2011

  The 10-day celebration of the late, great choreographer and all-around experimental genius Merce Cunningham kicks off with a... More >>

• James Sewell Ballet: Fall Mainstage Performances

  published October 26, 2011

  James Sewell's bright and edgy company looked great on the stage of the Goodale Theater at the opening of the Cowles Center for Dance & the... More >>

• Scottish Ballet

  published October 19, 2011

  This fresh young company presents a provocative double bill that includes a modern masterpiece and a new ballet that has been compared to the... More >>

• Aparna Ramaswamy vitalizes ancient Indian dance

  published September 21, 2011

  When Aparna Ramaswamy dances Gangashtakam, she virtually embodies the sacred Ganges's flowing currents, the rain that feeds it, the... More >>

• Tidal Tendencies

  published September 14, 2011

  Two choreographers view gender through a multifaceted lens in this shared concert. Jessica Briggs uses nautical metaphors in her exploration of... More >>

• Ananya Dance Theatre: Tushaanal: Fires of Dry Grass

  published September 7, 2011

  The latest in Ananya Chatterjea's powerful series of dance works exploring the lives of women of color in third-world countries, "Tushaanal: Fires... More >>

• Zenon Dance Company’s 28th Spring Season

  published April 27, 2011

  Zenon's spring concert covers the stylistic map. Titles of premieres like "My Quarreling Heart" by New York phenom Kyle Abraham and "My Empty... More >>

• Shapiro & Smith Dance: Burning Air

  published April 6, 2011

  Last year Joanie Smith choreographed a dance of epic proportions, "Bolero," to Ravel's explosive (and often exploited) score. It united... More >>

• Lucinda Childs: Dance

  published April 6, 2011

  With its fluid architecture and incremental repetition, Lucinda Childs's 1979 work "Dance" has become an icon of post-modern abstraction. I saw it... More >>

• Flying Foot Forum: Heaven

  published March 23, 2011

  Joe Chvala has been blending traditional and contemporary percussive dance forms, European myths and folk tales, and wildly imagistic dance... More >>

• Ragamala Dance: Yathra (Journey)

  published March 23, 2011

  One of only two U.S.-based companies invited to perform in the Kennedy Center's recent Maximum Indian Festival, Ragamala Dance knocked the socks... More >>

• Beyond Ballroom Dance Company: Change of Hue, and other works

  published March 9, 2011

  This plucky company was founded several years ago by a bunch of rebellious championship ballroom dancers who, weary of the grueling competition... More >>

• ARENA Dances: I hate myself. Will you please love me?

  published March 2, 2011

  Mathew Janczewski has a way with popular music. It illuminates his elegant, free-flowing choreography while giving some air to his darkly comic... More >>

• James Sewell Ballet: Ballet Works Project

  published February 23, 2011

  In her absorbing book Apollo's Angels: A History of Ballet, Jennifer Homans avers that ballet is a dying art form. Not to James Sewell, a... More >>

• The Joans

  published February 16, 2011

  Annie Enneking's hybrid play/concert riffs on fact and fiction surrounding the legend of Joan of Arc. Enneking certainly picked the right woman to... More >>

• Stuart Pimsler Dance & Theater: The Ends of Love

  published February 9, 2011

  What better way to celebrate the pre-Valentine's Day weekend than with a dance/theater event in which Plato's Symposium, a child's... More >>

• Ballet of the Dolls: Goldilocks and Little Red Riding Hood

  published February 9, 2011

  One gal breaks into an abode inhabited by another species and makes herself at home; the other fails to recognize the Big Bad Wolf in Granny... More >>

• The Voronezh State Ballet Theatre of Russia: Swan Lake

  published January 26, 2011

  This 19th-century masterpiece unfolds as both visceral drama and classic dance architecture. Despite the nasty-versus-nice swan dichotomy that... More >>

• Burkina Electric

  published January 12, 2011

  Brilliant curatorial vision means seeing how disparate artists from far-flung corners of the globe could produce something terrific together, then... More >>

• Tandem

  published January 5, 2011

  This shared program features work by Minneapolis-based April Sellers and Chicago-based Rachel Damon, women whose fierce, fresh, and aggressively... More >>