Japan Society Concludes 2023-2024 Performing Arts Season With 'Beyond Ballet, Beyond Hip-Hop'

Japan Society’s 2023-2024 Performing Arts Season will culminate with a contemporary dance program titled Beyond Ballet, Beyond Hip-Hop, consisting of two North American premiere pieces: Dying Swan & Its Cause of Death, by Japanese prima ballerina Hana Sakai and cellistUdai Shika, in a work conceived and created by internationally acclaimed experimental theater director Toshiki Okada; and Encounter, by the hip-hop-centered dance group MWMW led by Moto Takahashi.  This double-bill features genre-defying works breaking new ground in Japan's contemporary dance scene, with two performances only at Japan Society (333 East 47th Street) taking place on Friday, May 10 and Saturday, May 11 at 7:30 pm.  Performance running time approximately 70 minutes including an intermission.

The evening begins with Encounter, which challenges the conventional perception of the dance genre invented in the 20th century, hip-hop.  Performed by the all-female dance group MWMW (pronounced as “mow-ee mow-ee”), Encounter is a hip-hop piece that defies gender and generational norms.  Consisting of five dancers ranging in age from their 20s to their 40s, led by Moto Takahashi, MWMW members skillfully show off jaw-dropping, bouncy and kinetic movements -- they are indeed a hip-hop group.  However, their uniqueness is evident in the atmosphere that they deliver -- delicate and sincere. The workimparts a sad sweetness: the complex emotion of frustration in a human relationship, the humble pleasure of building friendship, and a modest expectation of the future.  

The second piece in the evening’s lineup, Dying Swan & Its Cause of Death, was conceived and created by internationally sought-after experimental theater director Toshiki Okada, and is it performed by Japanese prima ballerina Hana Sakai (a former principal ballet dancer at The New National Theatre in Tokyo) and cellist Udai Shika.  Sakai dances Mikhail Fokine’s famous piece, “The Dying Swan,” while Shika plays “Le cygnet (The Swan),” by Camille Saint-Saëns.  As she finishes this short but elegant masterpiece, Sakai then starts to speak (in Japanese with English subtitles) -- playing the character of the "Swan" -- all while dancing gracefully and sometimes moving whimsically.  The Swan delivers a monologue and engages in exchanges with the cellist on the stage, ultimately revealing to the audience “her” true cause of death.  While plot twists and dry humor demonstrate Okada’s masterful style, the piece’s exquisitely layered nuance arrives through the dancer’s adept performance, in this striking collaboration.  Dying Swan & Its Cause of Death defies the conventional notion of classical ballet and upends the context of the original work with a sharp and darkly humorous combination of movement and script.