About 60 dancers from the five undergraduate Claremont colleges will perform in the annual Pomona Spring Dance Concert, opening in Seaver Theatre (300 E. Bonita Ave., Claremont) on Thursday, April 27. The concert features a range of new and reconstructed choreography by students, faculty members and guest artists, set to music from contemporary composers, pop stars, jazz singers and folk musicians.
Performances include “Floor Plastique,” created by Ruth St. Denis and Ted Shawn, founders of the Denishawn School and known as the “mother and father” of modern dance. Laurie Cameron, dance program director, reconstructed the dance, which is an historic classroom exercise that challenges the dancers to master complex weight shifting while embodying stylistic elements of many diverse cultural dance forms.
The Pomona College theatre and dance faculty choreographed five of the nine performances, including “Company of Orbs” by John Pennington, artistic director of the dance program. Pennington, who spent 14 years with the Lewitzky Dance Company, chose music by 20th-century composers William Duckworth and Philip Glass for the performance.
The dances also include works by seniors from Pomona and Pitzer colleges. Willa Hevly PO’17, a public policy major and veteran of 12 dance productions, created “Monolith Duets” mixing standards by Billie Holiday and Etta James with the Super Mario “Game Over” theme by Harris Cole. Lancelot Yulin Liu, PI’17, a double major in quantum economics and dance, choreographed and performs in “Vicissitudes” to music by Xiaopei Li.
In addition to the dancers, more than 70 students from all the colleges worked in various roles such as stage management, costume design, lighting design and box office administration to bring a vibrant and kinetic concert to life.
Performances of the Spring Dance Concert will be held at 8 p.m. on Thursday, April 27 through Saturday, April 29, and at 2 p.m. on Sunday, April 30 at the Seaver Theatre (300 E. Bonita Ave., Claremont). Tickets are $11 general admission and $6 for students, faculty, staff and seniors.