Akron Beacon Journal – GroundWorks at UA

By Kerry Clawson, Akron Beacon Journal

This weekend, GroundWorks DanceTheater will reprise its Ghost Opera, set to Tan Dun’s 1994 dramatic musical composition, at two performances at E.J. Thomas Hall at 7:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday. The program also will feature the world premiere of a yet-to-be-named dance by guest artist Loni Landon.

She created the work in collaboration with the Shaker Heights company, and describes it as a work about tension and connections/disconnections.

“My intention is to explore the human connection and bring a certain realness, sense of humanity and honesty to the stage,” she said.

At a rehearsal Tuesday at Guzzetta Hall, artistic director David Shimotakahara and his five dancers worked with live musicians in a string quartet as well as a pipa (Chinese lute) player on the dance, in which the musicians play key roles vocalizing, singing and moving about the stage in carefully choreographed fashion.

As they walked and played, he asked them to become more connected to the floor, cushioning the weight of each step a bit to create the illusion of being “a little bit out of reality, like dream time.”

“Now I don’t want you to become ballet dancers,” he teased the musicians.

Water and its rippling sound effects play a key part in Dun’s composition. Shimotakahara’s dance is the first choreographed version of the piece.

GroundWorks last performed the mystically beautiful dance in 2014, outdoors as a celebration of the 175th anniversary of Glendale Cemetery.

Musicians this weekend will include pipa player Yihan Chen of Connecticut, returning from her 2014 performance in Akron, and local strings players Erica Snowden (cello), Andrea Belding Elson (violin), Aaron Mossburg (viola) and Solomon Liang (violin).

The ethereal musical work, based on 4,000-year-old ghost operas in Chinese peasant culture, includes otherworldly percussive effects created by rubbing rocks together, using Tibetan bells, and drawing a violin bow against the top part of a gong, whose bottom half is then dipped in a bowl of water to amplify the sound.