Usually I meet choreographers before I interview them, or at least I have seen a concert or two of theirs. But having heard plenty of positive buzz and watched some captivating clips on YouTube, I was sufficiently intrigued about Andrea Miller to set up a Skype conversation with the New York-based choreographer this summer.
Unlike most of the artists I’ve interviewed in the last two years, Andrea isn’t Israeli. However, she’s no stranger to the Israeli contemporary dance scene. Prior to taking Manhattan by storm with her three-year-old company, Gallim Dance, Andrea lit up the stage as a member of the Batsheva Ensemble. I couldn’t help but wonder if and how her fresh aesthetic had been affected by her time here in Israel.
Video: A trailer for Gallim Dance in Andrea Miller’s Blush, which will be performed at Jacob’s Pillow from July 8-12.
What’s a New York-based dance company doing with a name like Gallim, which means “waves” in Hebrew?
Gallim Dance wasn’t founded by an Israeli, but its director and choreographer – Andrea Miller – was once at the center of Israeli contemporary dance as a member of Ohad Naharin’s Batsheva Ensemble. Now Miller is generating buzz of her own with Gallim, which has attracted the attention of presenters, critics, and audiences since its inception in 2006.
It was Miller’s I Can See Myself in Your Pupil which first caught the eye of Ella Baff, the director of the famed Jacob’s Pillow in Massachusetts. Baff invited Gallim Dance to perform the work at the festival’s Inside/Out outdoors stage last summer, and she called the concert “a big hit.” “People really, really loved it,” she told me in a phone interview. “It was absolutely one of the most popular things that we presented on Inside/Out last season.”
Gallim Dance is poised to be another hit at the Pillow this year. From July 8-12, Gallim Dance will perform Miller’s latest work, Blush, in the Doris Duke Theatre.
Video: The Batsheva Ensemble in Ohad Naharin’s Seder.
Last year I had the privilege and the pleasure of accompanying the Batsheva Ensemble on a trip to the town of Kiryat Shmona for two school shows of Ohad Naharin’s Seder. My photo journal and account of the day – originally titled “A Day in the Life: The Batsheva Ensemble in Kiryat Shmona” – was initially published on The Winger on May 18, 2008. I’m re-posting it here so that you can get a behind-the-scenes peak into the company’s workings.
But before you read about the company’s activities last year, here’s some fresh news: the Batsheva Ensemble will be touring this month to Rwanda. They’ll be performing and doing workshops with children – and, to give something a little more tangible, they plan to donate sneakers.
Help the Batsheva Ensemble Help Teenagers in Rwanda
If you’re in Israel, you can help by donating sneakers (used but in good condition), sizes 37-45. The sneakers will go to teenaged orphans whose parents died in the genocide. Visit the Facebook page for this event to learn more, and drop off your old sneakers now through June 16th at Batsheva’s offices in the Suzanne Dellal Center.
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Now read on to learn more about the Batsheva Ensemble!
Posted on 27 January 2009 by Deborah Friedes Galili
(Video: The Batsheva Dance Company in Deca Dance)
Whenever possible, I try to publish my writings from last year in conjunction with a related event that’s happening now. As the Batsheva Dance Company embarks on an extensive North American tour and takes Ohad Naharin’s Deca Dance on the road, it seems like the right moment to re-post my writing on the work.
I first published this article as “A Cycle Completed: Deca Dance in Israel” on The Winger on July 11, 2008.
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It’s fitting that I saw the Batsheva Ensemble perform the latest version of Ohad Naharin’s Deca Dance at the Suzanne Dellal Center last week. You see, Deca Dance is the piece that drew me here to Israel. I wrote my Fulbright grant proposal having only seen the Batsheva Dance Company perform an earlier incarnation of this work (albeit 3 times). I hadn’t seen any of Naharin’s other dances, nor had I seen any other Israeli companies. Now – 4 years after I last saw Deca Dance, 9 and 1/2 months after landing in Israel, 2 days after finishing the term of my Fulbright grant, and 90-some dance concerts later – I feel I have come to the end of a cycle.
Posted on 05 January 2009 by Deborah Friedes Galili
(Video: Dancers from the Batsheva Ensemble and from Sweden in Ohad Naharin’s Kamuyot)
I had every intention of taking Gaga class on November 18, 2007. My dance clothes were in my bag, my water bottle was filled, and I made it to Suzanne Dellal with time to spare. But outside the studio, I ran into Eldad Mannheim, the manager of the Batsheva Ensemble. As part of a collaboration with Sweden’s National Riksteatern, members of the Ensemble were about to perform Ohad Naharin’s Kamuyot along with Swedish dancers – and Eldad invited me to join the audience of school children in Studio Varda for the show.
That was the first time I had the pleasure of seeing the Batsheva Ensemble, the second company of the Batsheva Dance Company. Since then, I have accompanied the Ensemble as they have toured to Be’er Sheva, Kiryat Shmona, and Kfar Saba, and I have attended their performances at the Suzanne Dellal Center in Tel Aviv. Many of the dancers who were in the Ensemble last year are now in the Batsheva Dance Company, and I’m happy to note that they will be touring throughout the U.S. from late January to early March. I hope you too will have the pleasure of seeing them perform!
I first wrote about the Batsheva Ensemble after joining them for a trip to Be’er Sheva, in the Negev desert, and I published a version of the article below on my own blog on January 10, 2008. Expect more accounts of my experiences with the group in the coming months.
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I am not a morning person.
These days, it takes multiple alarms to get me out of bed, and more often than not, the snooze button takes a beating. But at 5 a.m. on Thursday morning, I successfully arose after a single ring of my alarm. It takes something special for me to get up before the sun rises – something like the chance to accompany the Batsheva Ensemble on their trip to perform for students in Be’er Sheva. Continue Reading
