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By
Ruth Keeling
Not having been near a dance performance since my childhood dancing
class days, I arrived at the Pegasus trying to empty my head of
prejudices. My layman's image of something incomprehensible and
heavy-going was making me unreasonably nervous of taking my seat.
The
first half, Nine Piece Suite, was unfortunately very much that.
The music was a Benjamin Britten cello piece, hard work for someone
who thinks music and dance should follow a recognisable beat. The
dance itself was abstract enough for me to lose the thread of what
it was about. I felt as though I had found the proof for my unkind
conception of modern dance.
The
second, and main piece, "future remembered past imagined"
was a welcome contrast. Fast-moving, witty, varied - truly interesting
and entertaining. The premise - each dancer showing their own past
and future - meant that three-quarters of an hour passed with practically
no fidgeting on my part.
Each
dancer's story had a different style and different mood. The audience
laughed out loud as the 30-something dad depicted 'one day I should
go to the gym'. The young man, clearly a fan of Capoera, wowed us
all with his break dancing skills. The woman showed the poignant
moment when babies grow to be adults taller than their mothers.
The
importance of the intergenerational project for those involved was
aptly expressed in the interview snippets that played as they danced.
"I've been dancing since I was four"
"I'll
be dancing when I'm a very old lady". For another dancer, with
the all the normal life pressures of jobs and children, dancing
was "the only time I can be spontaneous". Like children,
or maybe like adults.
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