http://swarthmorephoenix.com/2015/02/26/funk-group-brings-socially-conscious-music-dance-to-campus/

At 4:30 pm on March 12, 2015 in the Stewart Theatre, Lewis Center for the Arts, Princeton University, 185 Nassau Street, Princeton, New Jersey, Professor Sharon Friedler of the Swarthmore College Department of Music and Dance and Director of Dance at Swarthmore College from 1985-2014 will join a panel of directors of college and university dance programs in a discussion entitled  “Debating the Role of Dance in Higher Education”.  This event, sponsored by the Princeton University Program in Dance, is free and open to the public.  No advance reservations are required.

FUNKY CHARISMA AND PROPHETS OF FUNK, a lecture with Kate Speer ’08

When: Monday, 2/23 at 10:30AM

Where: Lang Music 204

A PERsentation that presents an inside reading of David Dorfman’s PROPHETS OF FUNK, revealing how the work positions Funk composer and musician Sly Stewart as a charismatic prophet and transfers that charisma to the audience. By using the rhythms of Funk, Dorfman and the cast draw upon Pentecostal practices of testifying and transcendence, which are modes of receiving God on a personal level. Additionally, the work suggests that if charisma can be caught, like catching the spirit in Pentecostal worship, then there is the possibility for the audience to leave the theatre with their own charisma. Thus, this dance serves as an example for activists and artists alike that charisma is a potent and palatable method to shift their audience’s perspective so that it is in line with their message and to potentially ignite social change.

Kate Speer ’08 says of herself: “I am a dance artist who relishes a good beat that sends my sweaty, exhausted body into motion, who choreographs huge landscapes that crescendo into mountains and dissolve into streams, and who writes in order to open my mind to the body’s subtle, hidden meanings. Within the discipline of dance, I identify as a scholartist, a term that evokes a synthesis of choreography, performance, and scholarship. As a choreographer, I live at the intersection of social activism and artistic production by merging theatrical storytelling with athletic, momentum-based movement in order to engage the audience’s visceral and emotional capacities.”

Plus

BETWEEN APATHY AND ACTION, a lecture/discussion with Kate Speer ’08

When: Tuesday, 2/24 2:40 p.m.

Where: Lang Music 407

For this lecture in the RADICAL DEMOCRACY AND HUMANISM residency, Kate Speer ’08 will address how David Dorfman Dance uses dance as political activism. Since its formation in 1985, David Dorfman Dance has become one of the leading American modern dance companies known for politically relevant and community based works. By analyzing the choreographies of Disavowal (2008) and underground (2006) through the lens of activist art and protest theories, Dorfman’s work reveals a set of beliefs that are distinctly American, including democracy, individualism, and activism. Additionally, his works strive to encourage the audience to begin dialoguing, effectively employing democracy within the concert stage environment. Consequently, David Dorfman’s work aims to create active American citizens who are more critical of their actions in the world, perhaps even inspired to act after leaving the theater.

Kate Speer says of herself:”I am a dance artist who relishes a good beat that sends my sweaty, exhausted body into motion, who choreographs huge landscapes that crescendo into mountains and dissolve into streams, and who writes in order to open my mind to the body’s subtle, hidden meanings.
Within the discipline of dance, I identify as a scholartist, a term that evokes a synthesis of choreography, performance, and scholarship. As a choreographer, I live at the intersection of social activism and artistic production by merging theatrical storytelling with athletic, momentum-based movement in order to engage the audience’s visceral and emotional capacities.” http://www.katespeerdance.org/about.html

Swarthmore College and the William J. Cooper Foundation present David Dorfman’s PROPHETS OF FUNK on Friday, February 20, 2015 at 8PM in the Lang Performing Arts Center’s Pearson-Hall Theater. Rhythm, groove, and love: PROPHETS OF FUNK is a “dynamic engagement of movement driven by the popular – and populist – funk sounds of Sly and the Family Stone.” Ahead of their time, Sly and the Family Stone is one of the first racially and gender-integrated bands in American music history and solid purveyors of social consciousness. David Dorfman Dance (DDD) celebrates the band’s groundbreaking, visceral, and powerful visions of prophetic love that continues to shine on despite everyday struggles. PROPHETS OF FUNK lifts up the spirit of Sly: that in the face of the funk of life, there are still hopes and aspirations that reside in all of us. DDD will also host a Master Class in dance technique on Thursday, February 19, 2015 at 4:30PM in the Lang Performing Arts Center’s Troy Dance Studio (LPAC 2).

The production of PROPHETS OF FUNK was made possible by generous support from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, The Harkness Foundation for Dance, The New England Foundation for the Arts, National Dance Project with funding from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, The Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Foundation, New York State Council on the Arts, The Jerome Robbins Foundation, and Friends of David Dorfman Dance. Choreographic material for PROPHETS OF FUNK was developed, in part, during residencies at the Tisch Dance Summer Residency Program at New York University and as company-in-residence at Connecticut College.

PROPHETS OF FUNK is the central performance of a three-week residency from February 9 to February 27, 2015 at Swarthmore College titled RADICAL DEMOCRACY AND HUMANISM: INTERSECTIONS BETWEEN PERFORMANCE AND ACTION. Conceived by Professor Sharon Friedler and led by Swarthmore graduate Kate Speer ‘08, the residency centers on engagements with DDD and is supported by critical discussions, workshops, classes, and lectures. Participants and leaders will address a spectrum of positions and assumptions regarding intersecting issues of race, class, gender, sexuality, religion, politics and the environment. More info available at: http://www.swarthmore.edu/dance-program.

For further information about the performance or residency events, contact Tara Webb at 610-328-8260 or lpacevents@swarthmore.edu. These events are free and open to the public without reservations.

Here’s an analysis of recent protests from a choreographic standpoint (via Jumatatu Poe): http://thefeministwire.com/2014/10/protest-in-ferguson/

And also take a moment to look at the article: “I Want to Be Ready: Improvised Dance as a Practice of Freedom” by Danielle Goldman. Swarthmore students can access if online at https://tripod-brynmawr-edu.proxy.swarthmore.edu/find/Combined/Results?lookfor=i+want+to+be+ready&type

Featuring the work of our students and faculty in Ballet, Modern, Drum & Dance, Taiko and Tap, this year’s dance concert is all about how dance transforms us. Please join our dancers in celebrating different variations on transformation, the joys of live music and rhythms, and the grace of movement and choreography.

Fri 12/5 at 4:30PM
Sat 12/6 at 8PM

https://www.facebook.com/events/764057333660975

Tawaifs’ were a elite female community of dancers and musicians in pre-colonial, India. In the process of creating an official ‘classical’ culture in post-independence India, several art forms fell into neglect, forcing many Tawaifs, their teachers, and their accompanists underground. Tawaifs became popularly perceived as prostitutes, a perception legitimized by the ultimate new music patron, All India Radio, who banned their performance. This confluence of puritanical Hindu state, Victorian morality, and colluding ‘Ustads’ annulled Tawaifs’ creative expression and economic freedom, negating that their accomplishment benefited the entire dance and music community.

Professor Rita Ganguly is an authority in the field of semi-classical Indian music, with particular reference to the romantic repertoire of Kathak dance and music performed by female courtesans or Tawaif. She is the foremost disciple of the legendary Ghazal singer Begum Akhtar. She has contributed richly to several fields – music, theatre and literature. Trained at the Martha Graham School, New York, she joined the faculty at the National School of Drama, Delhi (NSD) and set up a pioneering course in mime and movement. As a Fellow of the Ford Foundation, she did pioneering work on professional singing women, which gave her a PhD degree. Her project brought about a revival of interest in the practitioners of this art. Over the years Rita has developed her own distinctive style of performing music. Her interest in poetry led to a preference for`Nazms` sung in her unique style.

Lecture: LPAC 2 (Troy Dance Studio)

6PM

November 6, 2014