ROBERT BATTLE'S BATTLEWORKS MODERN DANCE COMPANY
MONK MOVEMENTS
Friday, 10/19/07, 8 pm
Reynolds Industries Theater
$32 • $26 • $5*
As a significant standard-bearer of modern dance, Battle’s tastes run to unconventional rhythms and in-your-face arrangements. Here his BATTLEWORKS company brings its renowned precision to a program that turns musical inspiration into movement.
A Juilliard grad and ADF veteran, Battle returns to Durham for the first time since his successful ADF run in the summer of 2005 to present Monk Movements, a program of short pieces created in the spirit of Monk’s singular vision and devised especially for Duke.
In this original combination of new and time-tested work, Battle’s breathtaking company plunges and dips, extending silences into physical pauses and underscoring Monk’s complex compositions with subtle, polyrhythmic gestures. Bodies rise and fall, twisting and turning using a vocabulary of movement inspired by the North Carolina legend.
“Monk was a musical genius,” Battle says. “He’s known for his offbeat, dissonant, humorous and complex style. His usage of space and time is unparalleled. These qualities have inspired and influenced every aspect of my work. And, might I add, this man could dance.”
“Mr. Battle makes an audience sit up and take notice, marvel, even laugh. His work reaches over the edge of the stage and communicates with people.”
--New York Sun
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