Jose Limon Dance Company 2003-04

LMCtech · **Posted:** Mon Jan 26, 2004 2:01 pm

Why didn't I know about this? I would have gone.

Quote:

A strong celebration of love from Limon dance troupe

Janice Berman, Special to The Chronicle

The Limon Dance Company is at Fort Mason's Cowell Theater tonight. That's right. It's a Monday, but somebody's dancing. These particular somebodies are wonderful, and seeing them is likely to blow you away. Limon, to borrow a title from the program, is undeservedly unsung.

The Limon company, which presented the same program at the Mexican Heritage Plaza Theatre in San Jose Friday night, is the last of the true believers -- oh, maybe we could add the Graham and Cunningham troupes. True believers carry the spirit and the work of a great leader forward, through repertory, revivals and new works. The Limon Dance Company bill mourns injustice, celebrates love, rails against fate. Irony, that staple of contemporary performance, is refreshingly absent.

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<small>[ 27 January 2004, 04:46 PM: Message edited by: Azlan ]</small>

djb · **Posted:** Tue Jan 27, 2004 12:27 am

It was wonderful. I loved "Unsung." I told Azlan at the intermission that I wished they were doing a comparable piece for the women, and he told me that "Unsung" was set on women somewhere, but I didn't catch where. Azlan...?

It's fascinating how different choreographers use the arms. Limon's way is one of the more interesting ones I've seen.

Wouldn't it be wonderful to be able to perform works by all the choreographers you like? (And to be an accomplished dancer in many different techniques?)

Azlan · **Posted:** Tue Jan 27, 2004 3:37 pm

DJB, here are my notes from an older thread of a performance in April 2002 at the Mexixan Heritage Plaza in San Jose:

Quote:

Marie, thank you for your impressions. I saw "Psalm" Friday night in San Jose, as part of the "Dance Around the World" night put together by Gary Masters, AD of Limon Dance San Jose [See the <a href=../../../ubb/Forum5/HTML/001248.html target=_blank>Gary Masters (Limón) and Modern Dance in San Jose</a> thread]. According to Masters, Carla Maxwell had to use a different score because the original tape was damaged, the score is lost and the composer has died.

I was very moved by this piece, having not seen it before, especially by its references to suffering and heroism.

It was also a big night for Masters. Besides premiering a new work, "Falling Into Fertility/Women's Stories," on the University Dance Theatre of SJSU, where he and his partner Fred Matthews are on the dance faculty, he also set Jose Limon's "The Unsung" on a local amateur company, IndepenDance.

Although the dancing wasn't the cleanest for "The Unsung," this naturally rythmic work, danced almost entirely by women (it was originally choreographed for all men), was hypnotic and mesmerizing.

IndepenDance is actually the dance company affiliated with Independence High School in the South Bay. As I recall, there were five girls and one boy in the performance.

<small>[ 27 January 2004, 04:40 PM: Message edited by: Azlan ]</small>

Azlan · **Posted:** Tue Jan 27, 2004 3:42 pm

LMCtech, why is it that you (and others) did not hear about the program? The company is notorious for not spending very much on advertising and promotion in the SF Bay Area. A few years ago, I recall sitting in a theater in San Jose with only a handful of other enthusiasts -- no one else knew about it!

Azlan · **Posted:** Tue Jan 27, 2004 3:45 pm

Originally posted by Corrival:

<hr>
HighlightDance
Washington Post
Sunday, October 12, 2003; Page M06

Artists discuss the life of Mexican American dancer and choreographer Jose Limon and his influence on modern dance in "Jose Limon: Mexican Roots/American Branches." Monday at 7:30 p.m. Arts Club of Washington, 2017 I St. NW. Free. 202-275-0570.

Washington Post

djb · **Posted:** Tue Jan 27, 2004 6:18 pm

Thanks, Azlan.

loribay · **Posted:** Wed Mar 17, 2004 12:22 pm

Limon Dance Company

A newbie's view of Limon

by Mary Ellen Hunt

January 26, 2004 -- Cowell Theater at Fort Mason Center, San Francisco

The 57-year old Limon Dance Company brought a historical whiff to an appreciative audience at the Cowell Theater in San Francisco with a program of works spanning some 37 years that ranged from classics such as "Psalm" and "The Unsung" to the more recent "Phantasy Quintet."

I have to say right up front that I don't have a long experience of Limon-watching to draw upon. It's not at all that I dislike the company -- it's only that, for whatever reason, I haven't gotten to see them much. So it is with a bit of hemming and hawing that I note that while the Cowell performance had its interesting moments, it didn't make the hairs stand up on the back of my neck, so to speak.

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Jose Limon Dance Company 2003-04

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