Achi news desk-
Jazz Danceworks decidedly threw a very catchy party on Saturday night.
Calgary dance company’s new show Party time is kind of a celebration of spring and it was hard not to watch the company’s dancers retrace their steps for a night on the town and feel a little spring in your step, no matter how close we are to the tax filing deadline (day March! ).
In fact, at DJD 12th Avenue SE’s beautiful dance theater, when a piece gets the audience going, you can feel the singers moving in time to the music on stage – and that’s what was happening in the first act Saturday night.
That’s when company member Sabrina Naz Comanescu, dressed a bit like a 1920s flapper, evoking the turn of the 20th.ed century New Orleans, acting as a sort of choreographed emcee for the evening, slowly drawing us into a dreamy, drifting world of Party time.
What makes a DJD show special is that they have always combined their unique dance with live music.
Jazz Danceworks’ new show Party Time is set to open Thursday night in Calgary at the DJD Dance Theatre
In Party Time first half, Andre Wickenheiser’s trumpet dominates the soundscape, providing an almost elegiac soundtrack for the company as it gathers for a house party.
There is Hugo Barry (Thys Armstrong), a mustachioed man prone to misconceptions. There is Fifi (Mara Liao Esnard), an animated presence who dreams of becoming a flying squirrel one day. There is Zeus (Catherine Hayward), whose Van Dyck beard looks carved from a Rembrandt painting that moves like a panther.
Roshanak (Shahrzad Ahmadi) is a Persian powerhouse whose presence shrinks everyone around her.
David Kizzy Wisdom of the 3rd (Shemar Herbert) brings the street dance to the party and a pretty wicked sense of mischief.
There are others too, the same way there are at every party: people you see across a crowded room, smoking a cigarette or laughing in a way that makes their head tilt back and display their molars and makes you write a life story for them in your head.
It all unfolds rather dreamily, led by Wickenheiser’s lone trumpet which made me think of city life, the kind of way it’s depicted in Billy Wilder’s Oscar-winning classic. The Flat or even an Edward Hopper painting Nighthawk at the Diner.
Living in the city, as shown in Party timeis a strange gumbo of loneliness and the sudden intimacy that sometimes happens between strangers who happen to be in the same place one night, listening to the same jazz ensemble tunes when a little magic happens.
Choreography by DJD artistic director Kimberley Cooper, Party time poignantly acknowledges the two strands of city life – it bounces between celebration and reflection, between youthful exuberance (Esnard’s jubilant flying squirrel fantasy) and Hugo’s awkward attempts to fit in with a crowd he doesn’t quite fit in with. .
The second half of Party time pumped it up, replacing Wickenheiser’s lone trumpet with something a little more funky, allowing Kizzy Wisdom the 3rd and Roshanak among others moments to shine, as the party goes deeper into the night and everyone starts to think and move and feel as one.
It all benefits from Hannah Fisher’s sublime costume design and Scott Reid’s evocative sets. In addition to Wickenheiser’s wicked trumpet playing, there are great musical chops from Carsten Rubeling (keyboards/trombone), Jeff Gammon (bass) and Luis ‘El Pana’ Tovar on drums.
The DJD Dance Center is not to be overlooked either: walking out of the theater, you’re greeted with a gorgeous, glassy tableau of downtown Calgary and on Saturday, a few young women were standing there taking selfies against the backdrop of the bright the city skyline – and I thought it fit right in with what Party time explore.
I used to live in Los Angeles and one time someone asked what it’s like to live in Los Angeles and I said, “I’ve never lived anywhere where I met so many people for the first time.”
Party time makes you feel like you’ve known the dance company and even the people sitting next to you forever.
At DJD Dance Theater until May 5.
For tickets, go here.
