Modern Dance

Sophia and I stumbled upon- ok, well more like snuck our way into- the most amazing dance performance I have seen in a while.

Part of the Uitmarkt, we saw a breathtaking, raw, modern dance performance by a large group of young people. I still can't find the name of the piece or the choreographer, but I stopped one of the dancers after the performance to ask who they were. He said they were all first year students at some university or another that I couldn't quite understand. I was shocked to hear that they were so young/early on in their training! The pure energy running through their movement and collective body was amazing.

The performance was in a small room in Paradiso, a famous nightclub/cultural venue in Amsterdam. They weren't letting anyone else in, but Sophia and I snuck in when one of the guards left. The room was absolutely jam packed, as well as nice and hot and sweaty. I climbed up onto a small table with some other random girl to be able to see the dancers.

The music was blasting from one corner of the room and the audience was shoved to the walls to make room for the dancers. From the silence and stillness of the crowd, I could tell that everyone was captivated. If not by their movement (some of which reminded me of the vibratory movement from the Seán Curran Company performance I saw at ND last year), by their energy and dedication to the performance.

It was awesome. I felt like I had fallen into a room with a wonderful secret to share. It's that moment when you're not sure if something so captivating really happened or not.

Monteverdish

One amazing performance I saw at the Uitmarkt was - get this - a hip-hop breakdance opera! It was called Monteverdish.

Based on the opera L'Incoronazione di Poppea by Monteverdi, it was performed by the dance/theater/music company ISH ("the name comes from the suffix ‘ish’, which is added at the end of a word when something cannot be precisely defined because it’s both one thing and another") and an "international atelier for innovative music theatre," VocaalLAB.

A hip-hop breakdance opera sounded like a crazy combination, but I wanted to see as much dance as I could at the Uitmarkt. It did not disappoint! There were about 4 opera singers and 4 dancers, who all interacted with each other-the dancers dancing around the singers, the singers joining in the movement... so neat. The storyline involved love and war, of course.

There was such passion in both the singers and the dancers, which might have been what brought it together so well: both opera and (break)dancing involve PASSION. Which is something I definitely learned while dancing at SMC- you have to have passion, and you have to be into your movement, music, performance, whatever, if you want the audience to buy it... and love it as much as you do! These two groups combined had that down. Very professional. Especially the lead female singer (in black & white)- she was amazing, and participated the most in the dance portions.

What an awesome mixture of art. You can actually see the whole thing here (about a minute in)- but it's not nearly as good as in person.