The Plain Dealer – GroundWorks DanceTheater performers are tireless in program at Breen Center (Review)

By Donald Rosenberg, The Plain Dealer

The members of GroundWorks DanceTheater often go far beyond the call of duty in concert. This weekend’s program of three strenuous works at the Breen Center for the Performing Arts, for example, keeps the five GroundWorks dancers busy all night long.

And are they ever busy. Along with revivals of Amy Miller’s “Valence” and Lynne Taylor-Corbett’s “Hindsight,” the Cleveland modern-dance company is presenting the world premiere of Ronen Koresh’s arresting “CoDa,” a work of urgent physicality and emotional extremes.

The title – suggesting the concluding section of a piece – is as mysterious as much of the dance. In seven episodes set to haunting and exuberant music by French composer Rene Aubry, Koresh explores a spectrum of human interactions, some of them teasing, others brooding and defiant.

The dancers, dressed in various black-and-white costumes (by Koresh), introduce “CoDa” with a series of unison passages sparked by tummy rubs and mouth gestures. It’s festive and hip, with arms flying, bodies jiggling and smoke wafting in, as if this is a Parisian cabaret.

But playfulness is only a sometime thing in Koresh’s conflicted world. Although Sarah Perrett and Damien Highfield engage in frolicsome kicks, Felise Bagley and Gary Lenington perform a duet of torrid intensity, Kathryn Taylor tries to rid herself of demons in a spasmodic solo and Perrett returns alone as another troubled soul.

There are touches of jealousy and violence in the relationships, as well as folksy respites, and “CoDa” ends with the cast downstage staring blankly into the audience. It’s a work of ferocious energy that the GroundWorks dancers performed Friday with their special brand of focus and flexibility.

The same qualities are required in “Valence,” a juxtaposition of movement and music centered on the idea of breath. To Peter Swendsen’s intriguing amalgam of sounds, artistic associate Miller’s angular and quicksilver choreography embraces a panoply of entrances and exits, subtle responses and atmospheric resonances.

An otherworldly aura pervades “Valence,” whose musical elements (waves, trains, electronic effects) are rhythmic and kinetic complements to Miller’s chain of solos, duets and ensemble sequences. Dennis Dugan’s horizontal lighting enhances the work’s austere personality. The results are both rigorous and fluid, and the dancers were alert to the abrupt changes in phrasing and mood.

On a completely different (and unbuttoned) note is Taylor-Corbett’s “Hindsight,” a tribute to Chrissie Hynde and the Pretenders. Adam Larsen’s videos – photos of Akron and Ohio, postcards of smooching cows and pigs, collages of flickering candles – are key to the work’s whimsical and soulful character. Taylor-Corbett’s inventive melding of Broadway, ballet and modern allows the GroundWorks dancers to be sassy, sexy and even sacred.

Bagley was a standout in “Hymn to Her” enveloped in or released from long, black fabric. Perrett registered understandable surprise in “Love’s a Mystery” when Highfield and Lenington sauntered off arm in arm.
With Hynde’s music supplying a flourish of contrasting feelings, the company was as fresh and communicative at evening’s end as they were when the Breen Center’s slow, droning curtain rose nearly two hours earlier.