Alvin Ailey died 21 years ago, on Dec. 1, the very date that his namesake company opened its annual season at City Center this year. He would surely have been astounded and delighted to see the by-now ritualized Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater opening night: the red carpet, the photographers, the stars, the speeches, the money.
Alvin Ailey fetes 'Revelations,' its singular masterpiece, all season long. Turning 50 is not always cause for outright celebration. Many of us are too depressed. And then that AARP card comes in the mail.
In 1976, Alvin Ailey paid homage to Duke Ellington in a season that produced a particularly majestic dance: 'Three Black Kings'. The work - depicting King Balthazar, King Solomon and Martin Luther King Jr. - hasn't veen seen in its entirety in more than 30 years.
Watching Matthew Rushing and Renee Robinson in Revelations, I was laughing and crying at the same time. I could weep because of his soft undulations in "Wade in the Water," and laugh with the way she flutters her fan at the other women in the last section.
When I was ten in Jacksonville, Florida. My family moved there for a short period of time after Hurricane Andrew in 1992. Everything in Miami was demolished, and that's when I started. There was a young lady that lived next door, and she needed guys to basically lift girls at an afterschool dance program. I said, "Sure," because I lived right down the street.
Members of Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater perform 'Revelations' nearly as often as ordinary people brush their teeth. This magnificent work, created by Alvin Ailey in 1960, is a dance on land and in water, a journey through African-American spiritual music and, for dancers, an act of reverence for the generations that came before.
This Wednesday, the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater kicks off it's holiday season at City Center in Midtown. The Theater is considered on of the world's greatest dance companies.
In her 10 years as chairman of Alvin Ailey Dance Foundation Inc., Joan Weill has raised $75 million for the organization's state-of-the-art building; helped to more than double its annual operating budget, to $29 million; and more than tripled the amount of funds brought in at its annual opening-night gala.
For someone who doesn't dance anymore, Judith Jamison turns up onstage with surprising frequency. That's because her colleagues at the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater can't let her retire without acknowledging the key role she has played both as a flamboyant star of the 1960s and '70s and as the company's artistic director since 1989.
If you prefer to cut a more modern rug, you can try a free class at the Ailey Extension. It's Ticket-to-Dance program allows anyone with an Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater or Ailey II ticket stub purchased this season to participate in one of 80 classes offered at the Midtown Manhattan studio.