Beth Soll & Company Present Dances Of Passion And Peace This Month
By: A.A. Cristi Nov. 19, 2019
Choreographer Beth Soll will present her Beth Soll & Company, an ensemble of dancers and musicians in Dances of Passion and Peace, A Concert of New Dance, Music, Poetry, and Translation, an evening of all premieres, set to new music by composers Thomas Addison, Nuria Divi, Wendy Griffiths, Josh Rosen, and Stan Strickland, and poetry, both sung and spoken, of Robert Frost, Lin Haire-Sargeant, Langston Hughes, Rumi, and Walt Whitman. Poems will be recited in English, French, Catalan, German, French, and American Sign Language. Performances November 22 & 23 at 8 PM at University Settlement, 184 Eldridge Street.
Inspiration for Dances of Passion and Peace came from Hermann Hesse's The Glass Bead Game, and his interest in spiritual enlightenment within the context of contrasting, potentially transcendent ways of life: in this case, a life of power, love, and conflict versus a life of supremely quiet meditation.
The program:
Twilight Strategies (premiere), a reworking of a 2016 solo for Soll, characterized by a blending of a familiar modern dance vocabulary with idiosyncratic, original, and gesture-based movements, set to music by Wendy Griffiths;
A Wild Dance (premiere), a highly energetic, virtuosic dance for four women who repeatedly catapult themselves through the space and shifting moods. Music by Thomas Addison;
A Quiet Dance (premiere), a dance which, in its mood of ineffable serenity, exists in strong contrast to the dynamic storms of A Wild Dance. The tranquil atmosphere is enhanced by the delicacy of new music by Wendy Griffiths.
Generations: Telling...Listening (premiere), a trio to music by Thomas Addison, Josh Rosen, and Stan Strickland, inspired by Soll's observation of the power of adolescence, and the necessity for careful listening within relationships that are challenged by the sensuality, conflicted insolence, and the tenderness of young people;
Beth Soll began her dance training in the U.S. and continued abroad in Germany and Switzerland. She received a degree in modern dance from the U. of Wisconsin and has taught there and at the The Harvard Summer Dance Center, Boston Conservatory, Boston U, UC Santa Barbara, Hofstra U, the New School and Manhattanville College. In addition, she directed the Dance Program at MIT for 20 years.
As a performer, Beth has appeared with many dance companies and has collaborated with several independent choreographers including Bill Evans, Ze'eva Cohen, Martha Gray, Rosalind Newman, Wendy Perron, and Mel Wong.
In 1977, she founded Beth Soll & Company in Boston, where she presented her company in regular seasons. In 1999, she earned a Ph.D in the History and Theory of Modern Dance from the University Professors Program at Boston University. In 2000 she moved to New York City, where she continues to teach and choreograph. Her work has been supported by numerous grants and awards from State and corporate agencies and from the National Endowment for the Arts.
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