Success, Challenges and “Swan Lake”… in conversation with Lourdes López (part two)

Katia Carranza and Kleber Rebello, MCB Principal dancers. Photography: Gary James (courtesy)

The 2012-2013 season of Miami City Ballet’s 2012-2013 Season was the debut of Lourdes López as artistic director of the company.

On the special occasion of the announcement of the so-called “35th anniversary season” – Toby Lerner Ansin and Edward Villella founded Miami City Ballet (MCB) in 1985 – we spoke with López about what has been these eight years at the helm of the organization and the importance of the premiere for the company of Alexei Ratmansky’s “Swan Lake”.

What do you consider the biggest success?

It’s really not how I think, in terms of success, but I am proud of a few things. I am proud of our commissions, “Nutcracker” with Isabel and Ruben Toledo, “Midsummer Night’s Dream” (the very first ever re-imagined Balanchine ballet) with Michele Oka Doner and our “Firebird” (re-designed for the first time since 1949 and never seen outside of NY). I am proud of these projects and that we were able to bring them to our dancers and audiences.

What have been the biggest challenges?

The biggest challenge has been to get our audience to trust that when they come to a MCB performance, they will be transported, that they will leave the ordinary behind. We have now gotten to this point. Miami is trusting MCB, trusting that we put programs and performances on stage with tremendous care and thought. Right now, nothing has been as big as Covid-19 and I hope nothing ever will be again!

What is your vision for the future of the company?

I don’t necessarily have a specific vision, meaning, I want this to be a classical company, or a modern company. I don’t think that way. I just feel so strongly that dance is such a powerful art form, such a powerful tool to reach people, to communicate, to transport them, to unite, it’s how I have always felt while I was dancing. Every time that curtain came down after a performance, regardless of whether it was a good, or bad, performance, I was fulfilled. I always felt that I was in the right place, at the right time and that is what I want for the dancers and for our audience, to feel that they are in the right place, at the right time.

When I was young, had just entered NYCB, I asked Mr. Balanchine when I would dance like his ballerinas, what did I need to do? And you know what he said? “Every day you take class and work, and work, and work. Then one day you will wake up and you’ll be there. It’s work”. There’s a great quote by T.S. Eliot that a great friend of mine told me about: “Between the idea and the reality, between the motion and the act, falls the Shadow.” Basically, what it means is that vision is about having a goal and then getting to work.

“Vision is about having a goal and then getting to work”, says Lourdes Lopez, here in rehearsal with Katia Carranza and Carlos Quenedit. Photography: Alexander Iziliaev (courtesy)

Without a doubt, the main attraction of season 2020-2021 is the “Lake” of Ratmansky. This will be his fourth work in MCB repertoire, after “Symphonic Variations” (2012), “The Kiss of the Fairy” (2017) and “DSCH Concert” (2018). Why this version?

The short answer is, I was looking for a “Swan Lake” for MCB. The ballet is one of the most important ballets in the classical repertory and a ballet that really defines a classical ballet company and gives it a certain, artistic stature, a raison d’être. When I realized he had choreographed one in 2015, I thought, why not have the greatest ballet of all time “Swan Lake”, by the greatest living choreographer of our time.

Why now?

Balanchine always said, ‘we live in the present…there is no time like the present’. Why not now? But also, it’s our 35th anniversary and I wanted a work that would truly celebrate where MCB has gotten to. The level of artistry of its dancers, its productions its artistic strength, integrity and vision. I wanted something we could all celebrate together and be proud of how far we have come, in such a short time, together.

How difficult was the process to obtain the right to incorporate Alexei Ratmansky’s “Swan Lake” to Miami City Ballet repertory?

Alexei Ratmansky loves MCB and he has been very vocal about this, especially in the press. So, this part was not difficult. What was difficult was raising the funds for it. It had to do with educating individuals that “Swan Lake”, like our “Nutcracker” and our “Midsummer’s”, is an investment. “Swan Lake” is a ballet with a huge appeal for an audience and that appeal will be lasting. Audiences will always come to “Swan Lake”, and like “Nutcracker” it’s a narrative that resonates and then there’s that glorious score by Tchaikovsky, truly one of the great ballets of all time. “Swan Lake”, like “Nutcracker” and “Midsummer” is a gateway to the art form. If we put it on the stage, they will come!

There are a few things in this version that will make the ballet different from other very popular versions, like no dancing Rothbart, no jester, the absence of the swan arms, etc. In your opinion, what are the more significant changes?

The most significant one is that the humanity, the tenderness and betrayal of the narrative is more powerful in this one, than in any other version of “Swan Lake”, I’ve seen. This is not a love story between a bird and a Prince, this is a love story between a woman and the Prince who betrays her.

In a 2016 interview, Ratmansky said referring to the character dances in “Swan Lake” (Spanish, Neapolitan, etc.): “This is an art that disappears since modern choreographers do not use these styles in their works”. Do you agree?

Who am I to disagree with Ratmansky! What I do know is that the choreography for the divertissements in Act 3 (ballroom scene) all incorporate traditional ethnic steps from those cultural dances and perhaps this is what he meant.

The scenery and costume designs are by Jérôme Kaplan, based on those of the production Petipa / Ivanov. Are you ordering new sets and costumes or using those previously used by another company?

We are building sets and costumes – this is so we have the production available to us for touring when we need it and we do hope it will tour and a lot!

Miami City Ballet most definitely seems ready to add another blockbuster to their repertoire and show it off to the world. We’ll just have to wait.

Tickets for the Miami City Ballet 2020/21 season with performances at the Arsht Center (Miami), Broward Center (Ft. Lauderdale) and Kravis Center (West Palm Beach) are currently available only as part of a subscription. Individual tickets will go on sale later in the year. To stay up to date on dates, learn more about the works and programs mentioned here or purchase a subscription, visit miamicityballet.org or call (305) 929-7010.

ArtburstMiami.com is a nonprofit source of theater, dance, visual arts, music and performing arts news. Sign up for our newsletter and never miss a story.

MCB announces post-pandemic season… in conversation with Lourdes Lopez (part one)

So, knowing what MCB has prepared for its 35th anniversary season (“A love letter to South Florida” is the slogan) is a welcome palliative for the anguish of these days “at home”.  Even though it’s inevitable to begin our two-part conversation with Lopez by mentioning the pandemic.

How is coronavirus affecting the activities of Miami City Ballet?

 

For now, all MCB staff is working remotely from home. The dancers have been sent home but are expected back for the start of their new season on May 18, provided that the government mandate to stay home, or to limit any groupings is lifted. The school started to offer online classes, first as a pilot program, just last week to the Pre professional classes, with Arantxa Ochoa, the artistic director for Miami City Ballet School, teaching an online class to see how it would work. The students and the parents loved it so much and the reaction was so positive that Arantxa is creating an entire online curriculum for all levels.

How do you anticipate the future of dance in Miami after this crisis?

 

I am a very optimistic person and strongly believe in the ability of humanity to persist and its innate desire to be communal. MCB is a social organization that is dependent on our human connection to others. Since, the arts are in essence, social, this is a crisis for us. At MCB we bring people together to create and those creations inspire and transform lives, for the better. The abrupt change has been devastating because we exist to bring people together.

Right now, many organizations are moving to an online presence by offering performances, or events online, including MCB. But, at MCB it is not about ‘just watching’, it’s about ‘engaging’. If all we do is put performances online, its entertainment, there’s nothing wrong with that, but the human connection is lost. The ability to change, or transform, is lost. We are in the process of thoughtfully curating our online presence and really thinking of how, when and why, we put something out to our audience that is meaningful.

A note to those interested: This is an especially complicated issue for a large company like MCB. For example, having presented “Firebird” with live music, MCB has no choice but to negotiate with the musicians’ union to broadcast the recording of the performance regardless of the circumstances – coronavirus included. For a small company using recorded music the process is simpler.

Lourdes Lopez and Katia Carranza during a rehearsal… before the coronavirus. Photo: Alexander Iziliaev (courtesy)

For me, human nature tends to remain constant, and I do believe that we will rebound from this and that people will want to be with people again and continue where we left off. However, hope is not a strategy and some changes will need to take place, especially if a vaccine is not available soon.

For the arts to start to re-imagine, or re-position themselves, a few things need to happen during these next few months, while the arts stabilize so that we can calmly and thoughtfully think of what the future might look like and what kind of changes might need to happen and what the new landscapes might be like. We cannot transition overnight and certainly when our revenue stream, people, is not available.

And city government to understand the economic impact of the arts in Miami. The Miami-Dade Cultural Affairs reported that Miami-Dade County’s nonprofit arts and cultural organizations represent a significant business industry in Miami-Dade County–one that generates almost $1.1 billion in local economic activity, an almost 17% increase over the last study released five years ago. This shows that the arts are an effective catalyst for a strong economy. The arts are a critical part of the economy.

Jordan-Elizabeth Long and Kleber Rebello in George Balanchine’s “Prodigal Son”. Photography: Gary James (courtesy)

López has been at the helm of the MCB since 2012, when the company had 42 dancers and now has 53. But the increase in the number of dancers is not the only thing different.

 

How has Miami City Ballet changed under your artistic direction?

 

I think the biggest change has been to the repertoire. I do believe it has increased, not only the number of commissions, but with new existing ballets added to the repertoire. This is what feeds our dancers and audiences. These new works entering our repertoire is what informs our dancers and audiences, it’s a journey of discovery that we all embark on together, it’s like growing together.

I also feel that MCB is now more visible in the community, we have been able to integrate ourselves into the fabric of this city. This has been done through our community engagement initiatives, through our school where we offer professional training for students and through our messaging- we are here to transform and change lives and at MCB every department, every dancer, every artist, every faculty member, every staff member believes in that and works towards that end. This is a powerful art form that we have dedicated ourselves to.

“The Nutcracker” will be back in December. Photo: Alexander Iziliaev (courtesy)

Judging by the information just released, the upcoming MCB season promises to be an ambitious and unique event: “Don Quixote” performances that were forced to be suspended just a few days ago will be added to their customary season format of four programs plus “The Nutcracker”.

What is the main idea behind the 35th Anniversary Season?  

 

First and foremost, it is a celebration of South Florida’s vibrant and richly diverse arts and culture scene, and the audiences that have been there throughout the company’s remarkable 35-year journey. It is also a celebration of the past (Prodigal Son/Afternoon of a Faun), the present (Ablaze program) and the future of ballet (Ratmansky being the future).

The “present” Lopez talks about is the world premiere of works created by Durante Verzola, Claudia Schreier and Jamar Roberts together in the same program and the “future” is the U.S. premiere of the acclaimed reconstruction made by Alexei Ratmansky based on the original 1895 “Swan Lake “ by Petipa and Ivanov.

All the above makes the 35th anniversary season of MCB an artistic offering designed to please the most demanding balletomane and the general public.

In the second part of our conversation with Lourdes Lopez she discusses challenges and achievements, the future of Miami City Ballet and reveals some of the secrets of Ratmansky’s “Lake”.

Tickets for the Miami City Ballet 2020/21 season with performances at the Arsht Center (Miami), Broward Center (Ft. Lauderdale) and Kravis Center (West Palm Beach) are currently available only as part of a subscription. Individual tickets will go on sale later in the year. To stay up to date on dates, learn more about the works and programs mentioned here or purchase a subscription, visit miamicityballet.org or call (305) 929-7010.

ArtburstMiami.com is a nonprofit source of theater, dance, visual arts, music and performing arts news.

Tango Out was set to expand into a festival – but now it’ll have to wait

Ray Sullivan, left, is co-founder of Tango Out along with his partner, Luis Vivas. (Photo courtesy of Ray Sullivan)

Ray Sullivan – Miami mover-and-shaker, director, innovator and trained professional dancer – believes in the art of the “milonga.”

To his thinking, a good milonga, which refers to both a style of tango music and the gathering where this type of dancing takes place, has the power to unite a community.

So he started Tango Out in 2016, a class and milonga where queer couples can socialize, learn to dance and feel a sense of belonging.

“In creating Tango Out, we wanted to do something slightly different. We didn’t want to create a separate community, so we decided to invite the LGBTQ community to come and dance and feel welcome with the traditional tango community in the same spaces,” says Sullivan, who is co-founder along with his partner, Luis Vivas. “That became our mission from the very beginning. It wasn’t just about creating a separate queer space.”

This April, he was taking that idea even further with the creation of the first Miami International Queer Tango Festival, titled “Conexion,” paying homage to the connections that tango initiates. Sullivan received a Knight Foundation Grant and had set the Miami Beach festival for April 2-6, during Pride weekend.

Now, it’s been rescheduled for this fall.

“We were fortunate to move the festival to Oct. 8-12. That it worked is a real blessing because we needed to move all of the artists, the plane tickets, the venues, everything,” he says. “Everyone has been fantastic. Cross our fingers, we have everyone.”

Looking back, Sullivan has strong thoughts on how tango and milongas have influenced his life, the community and the direction of his career.

“In the early ’90s, my career took me to Buenos Aires, where I danced with the contemporary ballet there,” says Sullivan, who is originally from New Haven, Conn. “I did all of these dance-related things in Argentina that were really beautiful and exciting.”

A ballet dancer there invited him to a milonga in order to meet people and become a part of the Buenos Aires community.

“I didn’t know what a milonga was,” Sullivan says, laughing. “That was in 1993, I think, and basically I never stopped. The social dancing of tango, just going out and dancing socially, has been in my life since then.”

Ray Sullivan is originally from New Haven, Conn., but has spent the past 20 years in Miami. (Photo courtesy of Dina Levinson)

The milonga (meaning “many words”) originated in Argentina and Uruguay and was popularized in the 1870s as a social event. As a dance style, milonga refers to a fusion of many cultural dances but tends to be faster-paced and less complex.

Soon after arriving in Miami in late 1999, Sullivan began teaching at Miami City Ballet. He also became director of the now-closed Miami Contemporary Dance Co. and was involved in various dance-related endeavors throughout Miami.

One of the first pieces Sullivan choreographed for Miami Contemporary Dance was titled, “Tango Undressed.”

“At that time, it wasn’t common, globally, to have contemporary dance pieces or ballets with tango that used same-sex couples,” Sullivan says. “This was a full evening, and it had two duets with same-sex couples, one with two women and one with Luis Vivas and myself …

“I remember thinking, right before the first performance at the Jackie Gleason Theater to a pretty packed house, ‘What is the reaction of the audience going to be? I’ve created this work and am dancing one of the couples?’ I didn’t allow myself to think about that in the creative process. I just made this work.”

The piece went well, he says, and the audience was accepting and enthusiastic.

“‘Tango Undressed’ became a work that we performed quite a bit here, as well as on tour,” he says. “It really marked a part of both my career and my experience with what tango is like, mixing it with contemporary dance for stage.”

While “Tango Undressed” was concert dance, it opened the door and the thought process for Sullivan and Vivas to create something in the social dance arena that would begin to invite the LGBTQ community to come in and feel embraced.

For him, authentic tango dance has always been a social experience.

“Luis and I would go out dancing socially, and we could dance together. Even though it wasn’t always well looked upon, no one would tell us to get off the dance floor because we’re dancers,” he says. “We realized it wasn’t like that for everyone. There were people, just everyday people, who were feeling there was no way they could walk into this society and just appear.”

Through Tango Out, queer couples can socialize, learn to dance and feel a sense of belonging. (Photo courtesy of Ray Sullivan)

So they started Tango Out specifically with that mission: to be inclusive.

Sullivan says he feels really fortunate and blessed that his dance career has allowed him to be well-connected in the arts community with funders, supporters and people who work at the county level.

“Maybe four years ago, people didn’t know exactly what I was doing, and now they’re beginning to understand it. It speaks volumes about the strength of our community here in Miami,” he says.

Since its creation, Tango Out has offered more than 300 community classes, used a number of different venues, and presented a long list of artists, many of whom are internationally known in the tango world. The artists perform and teach, and students get to meet them, talk with them, and share a moment with them. It’s more intimate, more social – and it gets to the roots of tango.

Sullivan and Vivas decided the next step would be to create a queer tango festival in Miami.

“Luis and I have spent the last three or four years either participating in or attending queer festivals around the globe in order to prepare Miami to have our first queer tango festival here,” he says. “Everything in tango is about the connection you feel with the person you’re dancing with. You dance with people from all over the world. There are people from everywhere who dance tango that come and visit. You might be dancing with someone who doesn’t even speak your language, but you’re still connected.”

Being that Miami is a city that is such a connector, it was time for this festival to be here.

“It is so important that there are these social projects that are embracing the LGBTQ community along with the traditional tango community in the same spaces. It gives people the ability to actually share time together socially, dance together and get to know each other.  I think it’s extremely important in the world today. If we want to have inclusion, tango and the dance space is a great way to begin that inclusion. Creating something with someone improvising on a dance floor together is so powerful, and it’s really difficult to exclude someone from your existence once you’ve embraced them.

“I think it’s important visually that there might be 40 couples on a dance floor and, within that, some of the couples are same-sex couples. If the eye becomes accustomed to it, sees it, becomes familiar with it, then that’s what causes inclusion, and that kind of knowledge and that kind of love is what gets rid of hate.”

Sullivan was pensive. “When there’s a problem, you address it and do something about it.  This is our way of doing something.”

Because of social distancing, Tango Out has canceled its activities. Stay up to date with the group’s activities on Facebook and Instagram. For more information on Conexion in October, visit miamiqueertangofestival.com.

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Amid uncertainty, Dimensions Dance hopes to unveil cutting-edge works later this year

Ryan Nicolas DeAlexandro and Trisha Carter rehearse with other company dancers in the background. (Photo courtesy of Andrea Spiridonakos)

Dimensions Dance Theatre of Miami’s March Lab series has become known for “out-of-the-box” works by local, up-and-coming and cutting-edge choreographers.

And, true to form, the company was set to present innovative new works about Miami’s distinctive histories and architectures during its 2020 Lab Series at the South Miami-Dade Cultural Arts Center’s Black Box Theatre on March 21 and 22. Then the virus hit.

Still, the preview serves as a tantalizing snapshot of the company’s work in progress. The pieces are expected to appear in the company’s July and November 2020 performances.

The centerpiece of the hourlong program was to be a new work by choreographer Kevin Jenkins.

South Florida audiences adored Jenkins’ “C’est La Vie,” which the company debuted in 2017.  In “C’est La Vie,” gorgeous, quirky vignettes – set to French crooner Marie Laforet – showcased fickle, young love at its mercurial best. That was three years ago.

Since then, Jenkins has made the Magic City his home, and his newest work, “DECO,” takes its inspiration from Miami’s neighborhoods and its tradition-rich people.

“Audiences will probably see the art deco shapes and lines in the movements,” Jenkins said.

The choreographer layered multiple meanings within the work. Some passages, for example, reflect the resistance of the Miccosukee Indians to the advancing federal army during the Seminole Wars.

As the dancers prepared to rehearse on a recent afternoon, the choreographer reflected on his choice to set the work to Mexican composer Arturo Marquez’s dramatic 1994 orchestral composition, “Danzon No. 2.”

“This is the only company that could do this piece justice based on the passion and spirit DDTM brings to the performance of it,” Jenkins said.

During rehearsals, six dancers in a line faced the back wall and posed – hips cocked, arms overhead as a svelte Miranda Montes de Oca and Ryan Nicolas DeAlexandro (both dancers new to Dimensions Dance this year) strode to the front. As the two soloed to the side, the remaining dancers formed couples for a series of lifts.

“DECO” shows off Jenkins’ distinctive style – furious upper-body work with arms, wrists, hands and fingers ceaselessly in motion in a kind of kinetic pantomime reminiscent of Bollywood dancers. Below the torso, everything stays calm. The footwork is simple but grounded.

Chloe Freytag is a veteran of Dimensions Dance Theatre of Miami. (Photo courtesy of Andrea Spiridonakos)

When the tempo slowed, company veterans Fabian Morales and Chloe Freytag took the spotlight with jazzy rolls of the hips and s-rolls of the upper torso. Salsa movements peppered their sequences.  

In another vignette from “DECO” – titled “Amanhecer” – the cello laid down successive long notes, and Morales lifted dancer Claudia Lezcano through a series of splits that crossed the room. In one sequence, the two played a game of hide-and-seek among the other dancers, who stood motionless like totems. The segment closed with a sequence of lifts and Morales supporting Lezcano.

The piece titled “Olimpico” forms part of the full-length “DECO” but was intended as a stand-alone work for the Lab. “Olimpico” featured Montes de Oca and DeAlexandro in a fiery, lightning-fast pas de deux set to the driving rhythms of flamenco guitar.

Especially notable here was DeAlexandro, who not only supported Montes de Oca in deep back-bends and lifts but also snapped out combinations as complicated as hers.

Jenkins said he likes to make the guys work: “I wanted to do a fun piece, and I’m a big believer that the guys have got a free pass in dance for a long time.”

Another work scheduled for the Lab was “Preludes” by South Florida choreographer and Miami City Ballet dancer Ariel Rose. Dimensions Dance has frequently showcased his works, including 2017’s “Esferas” and last July’s “Equus.

In “Preludes,” the pas de deux featuring DeAlexandro and Lezcano started slow, with each dancer turning alone. As things heated up, the two snapped out sequences that criss-crossed the floor repeatedly. As the piano wound down, they completed turns as a couple, DeAlexandro lifting Lezcano repeatedly.

Carlos Guerra and Jennifer Kronenberg – both former Miami City Ballet principal dancers and now the company’s co-artistic directors – coached the two dancers during rehearsal.

Kronenberg shed light on the choice of the music, explaining that the piano work comes from the 2015 “Preludes” album by Jorge Mejia, president of the Latin division at Sony/ATV Music Publishing.

Mejia is a product of Miami’s New World School of the Arts, Kronenberg said, and she got to know him while dancing with Miami City Ballet. A chance Lincoln Road re-connect led to Dimensions Dance performing a set of “Preludes” for the Lab.

For now, Dimensions Dance is on hold. But with the pieces now hopefully debuting in July and November, the company is giving audiences something to look forward to.

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Miami dance artist Dale Andree’s National Water Dance aims to inspire unity amid crisis

The National Water Dance performance on Key Biscayne at the beach near the Biscayne Nature Center on April 14, 2018. (Photo courtesy of Mitchell Zachs)

Dale Andree created National Water Dance as a way to unite dance artists and communities in a creative response to a global crisis she’d become acutely conscious of after nearly four decades in Miami: climate change, sea-level rise and the powerful, essential nature of water.

Now the dance artist is re-shaping her project to respond to a new world upheaval: the coronavirus pandemic.

Andree is calling on dancers in Miami and across the nation to join National Water Dance in “dancing for our lives” online on April 18, creating hope and togetherness through movement at a time of growing isolation.

“There’s always that question of, ‘What’s the point?’ There’s a huge point. We’re not giving up. Being in our bodies is the one thing we have and have to try to protect,” says Andree. “We’re dancers, and moving, and made of water. What are we saying with the movement we create? How do we send that out into the world?”

This year was slated to be the biggest yet for National Water Dance, which has taken place every other year since Andree launched it in 2014. More than 100 dance ensembles, university dance departments and other groups from 36 states and Puerto Rico were prepared to simultaneously dance outdoors at 4 p.m. April 18, at water sites ranging from Miami’s Virginia Key Beach to mountain streams to the Great Lakes.

For the first time, Andree was set to stage a dance around the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., creating a potent physical and symbolic metaphor for bringing the country together around a crucial environmental issue. All the performances were going to be livestreamed on the National Water Dance website, in a gorgeous panoply of dance and American natural beauty.

All of that changed early in March, as Andree was in D.C. to plan the Reflecting Pool performance with area dance companies and universities. Like the rest of the world, Andree has been adjusting continually as the coronavirus pandemic has escalated, closing parks, universities, beaches and gatherings across the country. (Although her permit for the National Mall has not been pulled, Andree does not know whether they will be able to perform there.)

Decades of living in Miami and dealing with tropical storms have helped Andree to deal with this fluid new disaster.

“It’s that hurricane energy – you can’t do anything about it, so you improvise,” says Andree, a longtime dance mentor and creator who launched her first Miami dance troupe in 1985 and taught at the New World School of the Arts for 20 years. “You have to deal with the immediate.”

Like so many other artists, she is turning online. Since groups can’t perform together, individual participants are being called to dance in their backyards or kitchens or wherever they can at 4 p.m. EST on April 18.

The Jubilation Dance Ensemble from Miami Dade College’s Kendall Campus performed in 2018. (Photo courtesy of Mitchell Zachs)

To unite them choreographically (if not physically), they’ll incorporate specific dance combinations they can learn from a video on the project’s social media accounts. Everyone will film themselves on Facebook Live or Instagram Live. Afterward, participants will upload the videos to their social media accounts, tagging National Water Dance and using the hashtags: #nationalwaterdance, #nationalwaterdance2020 and #dancingforourlives.

“I feel like I’m on an internet highway,” Andree says, jokingly, of her accelerated education in online performance and social media.

In Miami, Andree’s NWD Projects troupe, plus regular collaborator Michelle Grant-Murray, coordinator of dance at Miami Dade College, and her Olujimi Dance Theatre, will perform and livestream separately. Andree is reaching out to other local companies, schools and arts organizations to join them.

She and project social media director Elsa Roberts hope that, as they spread the word virtually, more and more people will join in dancing together in a moment of national and creative unity – like drops of water streaming together into a giant virtual pool.

Roberts, who lives in Seattle, says working on National Water Dance has been inspiring. A freelancer whose roommate was just laid off from a restaurant, Roberts has been reeling from the changes of the last several weeks.

“People need a sense of connection, and this is providing that,” Roberts says. “It’s really nice to be involved in a production so grounded in people and the planet.”

Andree hopes National Water Dance will inspire not just dancers but everyone who watches to contemplate some basic questions: What unites us? What is essential for us as human beings? As communities?

“When something like this happens, you’re stripped down,” she says. “How am I connecting to other people? What am I feeling? How do I say it? People are slowing down, thinking about how we fill our time and what does that mean. This is the time to look around us with a lot more reflection, that will give us a deeper understanding as we move forward.

“We’re all in this together.”

What: National Water Dance

When: 4 p.m. April 18 

Cost: Free

More information on the performance or how to participate: nwdprojects.org

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Dance NOW! Miami hopes to present Isadora Duncan tribute as part of Program III

Dance NOW! Miami’s Program II “Contemporanea 2020” was to include company works as well as pieces by Isadora Duncan such as “Ave Maria” (1914). (Photo courtesy of Isadora Duncan Dance Ensemble)

Dance NOW! Miami was all set for its tribute to modern dance pioneer Isadora Duncan.

The company’s Program II: “Contemporanea 2020” was to take place March 21 at the Aventura Arts & Cultural Center and star special guests, members of Italy’s Opus Ballet.

Of course, Program II was canceled as a result of the coronavirus outbreak. But the company’s hope is that much of the performance can be presented as part of its Program III: “20 Years of NOW!” at the Broward Center for the Performing Arts in Fort Lauderdale on May 29 and the Colony Theatre in Miami Beach on May 30. If travel bans are lifted by then, the Opus Ballet could still be part of the program, according to the company’s website.

Before the cancellation, Artburst Miami had a chance to witness a rehearsal for the performance, which  was to feature pieces by Duncan as well as company works. Program II intended to juxtapose the power of the individual with the power of the group – and to show how dance resonates with these themes as much today as it did 100 years ago.

The rehearsal began with Duncan’s 1924 masterpiece, “Dubinushka.” Dancers reached and pulled in two long lines as a deep Russian baritone belted out a chant. The dancers’ tight coordination was awesome; they seemed to be guiding a warship into dock.

They repeated the sequence as dancer Benicka Grant broke from the group. Arms crossed on her chest, she snapped one arm in a right angle, her fist pointing upward, revealing a muscled upper arm as she lunged to the side. She looks snatched from a 1960s Soviet propaganda poster promoting proletarian internationalism.  

When the piece ended, the dancers flowed right into “Varshiavianka,” the second of Duncan’s “Russian revolutionary dances,” which were created while she lived in Russia. Duncan expressed communist sympathies and had her U.S. citizenship revoked in the 1920s.

Dancer Anthony Velazquez strode to the center, carrying a massive red flag. In time to the march, he ran to the corner, did a lunge and defiantly swept the flag from side to side. He fell back and gripped his chest as if struck. Before he collapsed, Grant rushed forward, took up the flag and cradled him to the ground. She then repeated the sequence and also collapsed, as another dancer cushioned her fall and took up the flag.

“They are getting shot,” explained Dance NOW! Miami’s co-artistic director, Hannah Baumgarten. “We don’t often think these days about those times when people died for a cause that way.”

Dance NOW! Miami co-artistic director Diego Salterini, who is Italian, locates the power of Duncan’s work in its simplicity.

“In the ’60s, we kind of lived communism in a friendlier way [in Italy] than they did here in the U.S.,” he said. “There is a kind of charm to those pieces – the power of the people. It’s important we take that power and rise up when we go to vote.”         

Dance NOW! Miami’s Isabelle Haas and Matthew Huefner. (Photo courtesy of Dance NOW! Miami)

Dancer Isabelle Haas, who’s in her first year with the company, shared the challenges she experienced connecting with Duncan’s Soviet choreographies.

“The whole Isadora thing is emotion before motion. It was challenging to get to the emotion of the piece,” Haas said.

Andrea Mantell-Seidel – who is associate professor of religious studies and professor emeritus of dance at Florida International University and past artistic director of Miami’s Isadora Duncan Dance Ensemble – coached the company on Duncan’s technique for the performance.

“[Mantell-Seidel] continued saying, ‘Oppression, oppression,’ and asking us to think about what makes us feel oppressed,” Haas added.

The other pieces in the company’s “Duncan Suite” included “Ave Maria” (1914) and “Harp Etude” (1917), set to Chopin’s Op. 25, No. 1.

As the dancers set up for “Harp Etude,” Baumgarten said, “In these earlier works, like ‘Ave Maria’ and ‘Harp Etude,’ you see how Duncan discarded the tricks of ballet for a deep experience of human emotion.”

As an innovator, Duncan (1877-1927) broke with classical dance technique and returned to the ancient Greeks for inspiration. That Greek influence shines in “Harp Etude.”

As the piano music started, dancer and rehearsal director Allyn Ginns Ayers floated forward, wearing a semi-transparent white robe, a light mantle attached at her wrists pulsing like wings. During the piano’s arpeggios, she held her arms in front and pushed forward as if swimming.

Baumgarten leaned over and observed, “You can imagine how Duncan must have shocked audiences …  being almost naked underneath that robe.”

In addition to the Duncan revivals, the company was to perform a Baumgarten-Salterini collaboration titled, “One, No One, Everyone.” Temporarily substituting for dancer Anthony Velazquez, Baumgarten danced the principal role during the rehearsal. She soloed, executing a series of turns before being lifted by dancers David Harris, Joshua Rosado and Matthew Huefner.

Crossing the floor, the dancers repeatedly placed hands to hips, paused off-balance, then dominoed forward. The group moved beautifully, both in couples and as an ensemble.

“One, No One, Everyone,”  Baumgarten later said, “is made up of stories of longing, where the dancers repeatedly attempt to escape the grind of their lives but predictably fall back into their soul-grinding routines.”

Program II also was to include Angela Gallo’s “Those Things,” Baumgarten’s “Unburden,” and Salterini’s “Chronicles.”

To find out when Dance NOW! Miami will continue performing, keep checking its website, dancenowmiami.org.

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Piano Slam 12 highlights socially conscious young poets

The evening’s poetry touched on powerful topics, including the environment. (Photo courtesy of Cristian Lazzari)

Young poets had the chance to shine as they reflected on socially charged themes at the Dranoff International 2 Piano Foundation’s Piano Slam 12.

The event, which blends classical music performance, poetry and spoken word competition, took place Feb. 28 at the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts and featured 17 poets, selected from more than 4,000 Miami-Dade County public middle- and high-school students.

Speaking before a packed house at the Knight Concert Hall, Miami-Dade schools superintendent Alberto Carvalho emphasized the value the district places on the arts as well as the success of Piano Slam, which is now in its 12th year. About 83,000 county students have participated in the program’s outreach activities since 2009, he said.

The performance began with Daniel Strange, director of contemporary keyboard studies at the University of Miami’s Frost School of Music, and Rachel Ohnsman, a post-graduate student and teaching assistant for the Frost’s Creative American Music Program at Frost, taking their places at the pianos, accompanied by Argentine vocalist/songwriter Roxana Amed. Strange and Ohnsman played throughout the program, mainly as accompaniment to a deejay.

Participant Shemar Canty, from Ponce De Leon Middle School. (Photo courtesy of Cristian Lazzari)

In the first of several numbers choreographed by Miami dancer Rosie Herrera, 20 students carrying flashlights circled four young soloists who freestyle-danced at the front of the stage. As the number came to a close, Miami Norland Senior High 12th-grader Anaisa Tate stood at the center, gently swaying as she laid down the lines of her poem, “Crossroads.”

Tate spoke of Miami as a city of “new tempos/flowing in with the movement of people/the hymns of runaway slaves,” then shifted focus to Coral Gables, a city “built on the base of thick coral/and the broad backs of Bahamian accents.”

As Tate wrapped up, four young women joined her on-stage and, as a group, they swayed, sweeping arms into pivots in a second Herrera-inspired choreography.

Student poems touched on powerful themes: the potential effect of a climate crisis on Miami and their personal futures, the effects of gender and racism on self-esteem and a sense of belonging.

Brenis Bostick, a junior from Miami Norland Senior High, presented, “Mother Miami,” invoking concerns with resource depletion, air and water pollution and the changing climate.

“Mother Miami cries to me/hear her sad harmony/’help me to be what I once was.’”

As he spoke, students backlit in scarlet littered the stage with sheets of paper.

Participant Ariyelle Dickson, from Everglades Preparatory Academy. (Photo courtesy of Cristian Lazzari)

Eighth-grader Vivian Diep from Southwood Middle School carried the climate theme forward with her poem, “Strong Winds.” She expressed her struggle with Miami’s deepening urbanization.

Other students criss-crossed the stage, fanning scattered papers into the air, as she delivered lines like, “This city is getting grayer and grayer/with its advanced machinery/my green leaves try to keep the atmosphere healthy/aiming to keep the air clean and fresh.”

Then one student executed a series of backbends that closed with her facedown in the middle of the mess.

Ponce De Leon Middle’s Shemar Canty celebrated his same-sex orientation in “My Truth.” Carefully pacing his delivery, the eighth-grader pronounced a string of ringing self-affirmations: “With my sassiness and jigs/with my over-the-top personality/I am a vivacious, infectious song.”

As he finished, the hall exploded with applause, and the stage transformed into an all-out dance party.

At the close of the performance, Carlene Sawyer, creator and producer of Piano Slam and executive director of the Dranoff foundation, announced the evening’s winners.

These included:
Alisha Gay, SLAM North, Middle School English
Azul Girola, South Miami Middle, STEM
Ariyelle Dickson, Everglades Preparatory Academy, High School English
Brenis Bostick, Miami Norland High, STEM

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brigid baker wholeproject goes ‘All the Way’ in March program

Amy Trieger and Isaiah Gonzalez in brigid baker wholeproject’s “All the Way.” (Photo courtesy of Oui Collective)

Eight-foot, fluorescent tentacles stretch from the floor. A gold-lacquered ballgown hovers in the corner among gold chainlinks the size of an arm. Every corner of brigid baker wholeproject’s Little Havana studio suggests an alternate reality seeping through.

On the dance floor, the company hones “Persian Love,” the final number of its March program, “All the Way,” which runs March 5 to 8 at the Miami Dade County Auditorium’s On.Stage Black Box Theater.

As they rehearse, the dancers form a line then sashay back, right legs kicking, fingers snapping.  They skip sideways and pop into a lunge before spinning forward on the diagonal, arms punching forward.

They alternate between quick walks and sprints, complicated group rhythmics giving way to a solo as dancer Liony Garcia flails his arms over back-snapping backbends. The sequence wraps up with the dancers coupling up in a merengue grind to a recording of Holger Czukay’s 1979 “Persian Love” – a wild adventure in sampling that mashes a calypso beat with steel drums and the chant/lament of Farsi lyrics the composer captured on short-wave radio.

The dancers collapse, gulping air, and Miami choreographer Brigid Baker exclaims, “It’s great! It’s like a washing machine.”

“The whole thing is about hope in the darkness and what it is that permits connection,” Baker tells the reporter. “I’m not interested in the problems that are out there, but I am interested in the solutions.

“As Mr. Rogers used to say, ‘Look for the helpers!’”

She explains the new program’s main prop: an ottoman-sized, anatomic heart, the arteries and veins constructed from purple, yellow and scarlet velvet.

“In the middle of ‘Persian Love,’ the heart floats to the middle then hangs over the floor,” she says.

The program opens with one of Baker’s signature home-made film clips, set to Frankie Knuckles’ uptempo, “Take Me Higher.” The clips show sequences of people climbing a steep staircase or rocketing past the Statue of Liberty with jetpacks before ending with a full-sized killer whale kite-sailing above the beach.

Acting as counterpoint to Baker’s self-described “hack job” videos are slick, highly engineered media clips by Justin Trieger, New World Symphony’s director of new media.

In one Trieger-engineered segment – “All Night Long” – a black orb floats in a starry sky. During the Czukay-contrived soundtrack a voice scats/talks, “Got to keep moving ‘til the break of day,” and a sharp-heeled walk marks time. The orb gradually brightens on one edge to reveal the bright side of a gorgeous moon.

Baker’s choreography accompanies the segment. The dancers walk stiffly, straight legs on demi-pointe, then suddenly melt, bodies jazzy, arms swaying to each side accenting hip rolls, arms circling. Baker scats out the rhythms as the recording closes with poet Charles Bukowski reciting his poem, “All the Way.” As the poet repeats, “If you’re going to try, go all the way,” the dancers’ movements pick up the pace, the sequence half-walked, half-pantomimed to Bukowski’s intonations.

At the end of the segment, a gorgeous choir erupts with composer Thomas Ades’ Arcadiana 6: “O Albion” for string quartet. Forming two lines, the dancers reach, spin and drop, arms sweeping out. They couple up and briefly melt in an embrace. As a group, their weight shifts to the side and they float to the back of the room. Here, a video will show everyone, “getting it together,” Baker explains.

When asked where “All the Way” fits in with the company’s other recent programs – such as  2017’s “Big Beautiful” and 2019’s “Remain in Light” –  dancer Garcia emphasizes the similarities: “I think there are different fields she likes to move in.”

Dancer Amy Trieger continues, “In this program, we are being asked to move between the fields and to take the audience with us each time.”

“That’s right,” Baker interjects. “Once the field has arisen, it’s my responsibility to practicalize it.”

Dancer Isaiah Gonzalez points out that 8-foot tentacles were a main prop of “Remain in Light,” while the centerpiece of “All the Way” is the velvet heart.

“In ‘Remain in Light,’ it was about the extremities, while in ‘All the Way,’ it’s about the actual organs and going to the core.”

What: brigid baker wholeproject presents “All the Way”

When: 8 p.m. March 5-8

Where: On.Stage Black Box Theatre at Miami Dade County Auditorium, 2901 W. Flagler St., Miami

Cost: $25

More information: 305-547-5414; miamidadecountyauditorium.org

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Prepare to be surprised with Jérôme Bel’s ‘Company, company’ at ICA Miami

Jérôme Bel’s “Company, Company,” in 2015 at Museo de Arte Moderno de Buenos Aires, Argentina. (Photo courtesy of Josefina Tommasi)

If you’ve ever sat in a theater watching a dance performance and thought, “I’ve seen this before,” a production by Jérôme Bel might cure your artistic ennui.

The renowned French dancer and choreographer – whose works have been performed in collaboration with esteemed institutions such as the Opera National de Paris, the Theatro Municipal do Rio de Janeiro, and New York’s Museum of Modern Art – aspires to challenge both his dancers and viewers with a fresh, ever-changing approach to the art form.

“I want to offer new ways,” Bel says. “I hate tradition when they alienate bodies and mind. My aim is to use dance in order to emancipate the dancers, but also the audience.”

Bel makes his South Florida debut from Feb. 27-29 at the Institute of Contemporary Art Miami (ICA Miami) with his new work, “Company, Company,” which imagines choreography as a “flexible framework.” In other words, if you think you know what will unfold onstage, prepare to be surprised.

“In the contemporary arts field, the audience shouldn’t expect anything,” Bel says. “That’s the ‘contract’ it requires. As a spectator myself, I like contemporary arts because I don’t know what I will watch, experience. As a choreographer, I try to produce a performance that the audience has never experienced. ‘Company, Company’ doesn’t look like anything you have seen already.”

The work features a cast of locals, both professional and amateur, with vastly different backgrounds, body types and skill levels, and it aims to celebrate the joy of expression while downplaying judgment.

“I realized that professional dancers are very standardized, their bodies, their way to dance,” Bel says. “I thought that I could think about different bodies. And I found many different ones who were dancing in so many different ways that I have decided to show the diversities of dancing. That is why this performance gathers very different bodies, cultures, ages, ethnicities.”

It’s a bold statement, and a refreshing break from tradition.

“Company, Company” features a cast of professional and amateur locals with different backgrounds, body types and skill levels. (Photo courtesy of Josefina Tommasi)

“I think it articulates the complex balance between community and diversity, group and singularity – how to be together, keeping the singularity of each individual,” he says. “Usually, dance produces community and ensemble through the uniformization of the dancers. I think this policy is not relevant anymore. Some dance companies sometimes make things [seem] like an army.”

“Company, Company” has been performed all over the world, and while it remains constant conceptually, its players change from city to city.

“The cast is local for ecological reasons,” says Bel, who answers, “to save the world,” when asked to sum up his artistic mission. “I didn’t want to put performers on planes anymore. I was thinking local to reduce the carbon footprint of the performance.

“People are hired in every city and, of course, they produce a totally different show from one cast to another, from one city to another. And each cast is closer, then, to the culture of the audience. The cast represents the audience, more or less.”

Bel is one of a handful of choreographers, mostly French, who have been linked to the “non-dance” movement of the early ’90s, which has been described as approaching performance art. He vehemently rejects this affiliation, however.

“I don’t use this term,” he says. “[A reporter] from ‘Le Monde’ wrote this once, and then I [was] stamped with this term, which is ridiculous. I push forward the dance, but I am not against dance. And especially not with this production, ‘Company, Company.’ It is a total misunderstanding of my work.”

Perhaps to emphasize his love of dance, Bel lists an incredibly diverse group of his idols, names that include Vaslav Nijinsky, Isadora Duncan, Josephine Baker, Trisha Brown, Tatsumi Hijikata, Lucinda Childs, Merce Cunningham, Anna Halprin, Pichet Klunchun and Bob Fosse.

Bel’s unique style is a perfect fit with ICA Miami, which strives to be “a platform for the exchange of art and ideas in the broadest possible sense,” according to its associate curator, Stephanie Seidel.

“I think Jérôme Bel is an extremely important example of a choreographer who bridges the world of dance with the world of visual artists,” she says. “We really feel that his interdisciplinary approach to dance is something that is really relevant and also is something that we really value. I had seen his work personally in dOCUMENTA (13) in 2012 [in Kassel, Germany], which is one of the most important art exhibitions, so it’s a real honor to be able to bring him here to Miami.”

What: “Company, Company,” by Jérôme Bel

When: 7 p.m. Feb. 27 and 28; 1 p.m. Feb. 29

Where: Institute of Contemporary Art Miami, 61 NE 41st St.

Cost: $15 general admission; $10 for members

More information: icamiami.org/program/jerome-bel

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Review: Street dance confronts realities of structural racism in ‘Love Heals All Wounds’

“Love Heals All Wounds” used street dance, poetry, film and live music to discuss subjects such as social injustice, racism and environmental destruction. (Photo courtesy of Amanda Smith Photography)

“Love Heals All Wounds” – the latest collaboration from South Florida’s Jon Boogz and Memphis-based Lil Buck – combined theater and poetry, dance and film to address issues of racism, police violence, mass incarceration and gender oppression in its Feb. 8 presentation at the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts.

The program, at the Arsht’s intimate Carnival Studio Theater, offered an exciting and smart mix of street dance, spoken word and visual projections and extended the vocabulary of street dance to embrace activist narratives and social commentary.

It opened to a backdrop of pulsing stars, and Jon Boogz and Lil Buck stretched side by side on the floor as violinist Jason Yang spun out a mournful, adagio melody.

Boogz and Buck slowly stood while, at center stage, poet Robin Sanders – in a full-length, white-and-gold dress – chanted verses to the sound of flowing water.

“Hydrants spray water as brown as their skin,” Sanders chanted, introducing the theme of environmental racism.

In silky blue shirts, the two dancers sent waves rippling from shoulders to fingertips and back, while scenes flashed behind them showing hurricanes flooding city streets and citizens from low-income neighborhoods struggling to rebuild.

Five other dancers formed a pyramid around Boogz and Buck. The group cycled through patterns of snap pivots and re-directions, torsos rippling, arms and hands fluttering. Projected behind them, a man held high the sign, “Flint Lives Matter.”

Jon Boogz, left, and Lil Buck in “Love Heals All Wounds.” (Photo courtesy of artist management)

Then Sanders returned, and the group formed a tight line behind her. As they swayed gently, she asked the audience to “breathe deeply” and “inhale the stench of inequality,” marking the shift from water to the element of air.

Of the four opening vignettes featuring elements, “Fire” was especially effective.  As four dancers in red formed a cross on the floor, Sanders’ verses played with associations of fire to anger, with phrases such as “ashes of destruction,” before centering on a message of renewal, “I can tame them. I can restore them.”

With that, the four dancers stood and began a complicated sequence of moon walks, floating forward and to the sides as images of fires raging through Baltimore minority neighborhoods appeared on the screen behind them. The scene ended with the dancers huddling around the poet.

“Love Heals All Wounds” consistently resisted the temptation to soften the harsh social realities it framed. From vignette to vignette, talk of the power of unconditional love or faith in social progress consistently shifted to show the violent realities of structural racism for many African-Americans in the United States.

In one instance, Sanders introduced the next piece with the half-sung, half-chanted refrain, “Black boy, you bring so much joy,” as dancers in street clothes circled the floor, clapping and stomping. Forming a tight group at the front of the stage, they took turns rapping lines and snapping out athletic dance sequences.

As the audience joined in a call-and-response, the theater morphed into a neighborhood street corner. One dancer explained to the audience how he managed to add a twist to his flip.  Another riffed on Sanders’ opening lines, strutting to the center with, “Black boy, black joy, I’m talking about me.” The audience burst into applause.

The warmth and camaraderie of the scene vanished with the wail of police sirens. The dancers scattered as the vibe shifted instantly from joyful to dark.

This performance was followed by a brilliant examination of the contemporary crisis of mass incarceration and its roots in the history of American slavery.

“What’s going on?” questioned Sanders, as she opened the segment spinning out lyrics that forged potent links with the visuals.

As she spoke of “power as the new narcotic,” and being guilty “by simply breathing while being brown or black,” black-and-white images of chain gains and prison yards full of African-American men flashed on the screen.

Four dancers in prison suits stood at the center of blocks of light on the floor, crisscrossed with shadows reminiscent of prison bars. The men shed their shirts, framing startling choreographies that ran the gamut of the penal experience from the hammer strikes of forced labor to impacts received from beatings.

One dancer in street clothes bobbed and feinted like someone locked in argument, half pantomiming, half dancing. Exasperated, he raised arms in surrender, then kneeled and placed his hands behind his head as a voiceover described the meteoric rise of U.S. incarceration rates during the past 50 years.

It was the evening’s most powerful piece.

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Miami Sunshine Tango Festival to meld Buenos Aires with the beach

Alejandra Hobert and Adrian Veredice will be featured in the Miami Sunshine Tango Festival. (Photo courtesy of Michele Maccarrone)

Some of the world’s best Argentine tango dancers and musicians will converge on Sunny Isles Beach over three nights to recreate the flavor of an authentic Buenos Aires “milonga” (dance gathering) – but with a Miami twist.

“If we were doing this in Buenos Aires, we would hold the festival in the middle of the city,” says Mariano Bejarano, organizer of the Miami Sunshine Tango Festival. “To bring tango to Miami has to be done in the Miami way. We want to mix in the beaches and Miami’s Caribbean vibe.”

The festival, from Feb. 21-23 at the Ramada Plaza By Wyndham Marco Polo Beach Resort, will feature tango classes, poolside practices and beachside milongas.

While growing up in Argentina, Bejaraon hated tango, he says, but was immersed in its culture.

“Tango in Argentina is something which, since you’re a kid , you listen to it whether you like it or not,” he says. “Subliminally, whether you like it or not, you hear it everywhere. I never liked tango, but my blind grandfather would sing the lyrics, so when I started to get into tango, I asked myself, ‘How come do I know these lyrics?’”

He caught the tango bug after moving to Miami where he started to dance, teach and organize events promoting the art form. With the large number of Argentines that call South Florida home, Bejarano holds high hopes that tango could really take off here.

“Because of the Latin culture here in Miami, Miami could be one of the main cities outside Argentina where tango is danced and performed,” he says.

But first, he has to attract new audiences and young people to an art form that presents itself as foreign, stiff with tradition and out of touch. For that reason, Bejarano has invited performers with a proven track record for connecting with young people and international audiences.

Among them is La Juan D’arienzo orchestra, whose name recalls one of the most famous Argentine tango composers. As a band leader, D’arienzo’s music energized night halls from the 1930s until his death in 1976.

As the orchestra’s band leader and principal bandoneonista (bandoneon player), Facundo Lazzari learned the accordion-style instrument from his grandfather, Carlos Lazzari, who originally performed with the famous D’arienzo.

Lazzari took up the instrument, “because I fell in love with this style of tango.” He had the chance to play with his grandfather for a year, and their time together was enough for him to forge a link with tango’s authentic tradition.

“It is a big responsibility to take care of our music and our legacy,” Lazzari says. “The name of Juan D’arienzo itself acts as bridge with the past and makes our sound unique.”

While dedicated to keeping this past alive, Lazzari also recognizes the need for tango to grow by connecting with new audiences, many of whom don’t speak Spanish.

“Our audience is not only Argentinian now, but from everywhere in the world, so this time we are going to play one tango in English for the very first time in Miami during our U.S.-Canada tour,” he says.

Of course, the immersive Buenos Aires experience also requires the world’s most prominent practitioners of the dance. Among those showcased in the festival will be Gustavo Naveira and Giselle Anne; Virginia Gomez and Christian Marquez; Manuela Rossi and Juan Malizia; and Alejandra Hobert and Adrian Veredice.

Hobert and Veredice call Miami home. When they are not traveling internationally to teach and perform, the couple live in Weston, where they raise their two young daughters and offer a tango class. They have been dancing together for 23 years, having first met in Buenos Aires.

“My [guitarist] brother plays in San Telmo, the neighborhood where we lived in Buenos Aires which is rich in tango tradition,” she says. “Though he’s two years older than I am, we both started playing and dancing at the same time.”

Meanwhile, Veredice started dancing tango while studying architecture – but it was not his first dance.

“I did folk-dancing before tango. But while I was at the university, I began listening to tango all the time,” he says. “Once I started to learn the dance, I transitioned to only tango pretty quickly.”

What: Miami Sunshine Tango Festival

When: Feb. 21-23 

Where: Ramada Plaza By Wyndham Marco Polo Beach Resort, 19201 Collins Ave., Sunny Isles Beach

Cost: Milongas, performances and classes range from $10-$385

More information: miamisunshinetangofestival.com

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