Under the influential artistic directorship of Yolande Yorke-Edgell, Yorke Dance Project has carved a distinctive place in the UK dance landscape. Simultaneously rooted in tradition while looking to the future, her company presents immaculately reconstructed classics of contemporary dance and ballet alongside premieres of new work by both established and emerging choreographers.
Yorke Dance Project’s latest programme Modern Milestones features world premieres by 79-year-old Christopher Bruce and 32-year-old Liam Francis, the UK premiere of Bella Lewitzky’s 1970 work Kinaesonata, Martha Graham’s 1937 solo Deep Song and Robert Cohan’s 2015 work Lacrymosa.
Modern Milestones celebrates 100 years of Martha Graham Dance Company, the centenary of Robert Cohan’s birth, the 80th birthday of Christopher Bruce in November, 60 years of Lewitzky Dance Company and Liam Francis’s year as Yorke Dance Project’s first-ever associate artist.
Christopher Bruce’s Troubadour is the choreographer’s first new work in over a decade. Bruce is known for a wide range of work, often choosing unconventional music accompaniment, such as The Rolling Stones when he created his acclaimed Rooster. On this occasion, he has choreographed a dance to six iconic tracks from Leonard Cohen’s live performance at the 02 Arena in 2008, deeply inspired by Cohen’s wonderful prose.
A dancer with Lost Dog and former member of Rambert and ZooNation, Liam Francis’ passion for play and his embodied knowledge of hip-hop and contemporary dance are the drivers for his creative practice. His new work CAST |x| is set to Jethro Cooke’s minimalist score composed entirely of fragmented cinematic voice samples and thrumming textures. Four figures are caught mid-action; accusation hangs in the air. What follows is a gradually-escalating knot of narrative and emotional tension, fractured memory, moral ambiguity and the stories we tell to escape blame.
Bella Lewitzky’s soaring 1970 work Kinaesonata is a kinetic response to Argentine composer Alberto Ginastera’s Piano Sonata No. 1, Op 22. Fast, energetic, intricate and colourful, the work is packed with repetition, lifts, symmetry, and mirrored movement, its eight dancers in constant motion from beginning to end.
Set to music by Henry Cowell, Martha Graham’s 1937 solo Deep Song is a visceral reaction to the Spanish Civil War. The work is a cry of deep anguish – its contractions, swirls, crawls and falls are powerful physical representations of human experiences in war. The dance disappeared from the Graham company repertoire in the 40s and wasn’t revived again until 1989.
Robert Cohan’s Lacrymosa was created on Yorke Dance Project in 2015, entering the company’s repertoire the following year. A duet set to music of the same name by Dmitri Yanov-Yanovsky, Lacrymosa explores both the loss and return of a loved one, moving from initial sorrow to the transforming power of reunion. Cohan has said that his starting point was Jesus returning home to Mary Magdalen.
Modern Milestones will have its UK premiere at the Stanley and Audrey Burton Theatre in Leeds on 15 November. It will then tour to Frome Memorial Theatre on 28 & 29 November, then conclude in London at the Linbury Theatre from 19 to 22 January. Visit https://yorkedance.com/ for bookings and tour details.
