Five Fenómenos From The Arts Umbrella Dance Company

Top left, Albert Galindo, Andrew Haydock and Tristan Ghostkeeper, sitting Charlie Prince & Jayson Syrette

Those who have gotten beyond just looking at the photograph above, might wonder what Jai-alai and bullfighting have to do with male ballet and modern dancers. You can opt out or persist and find out why.

In the late 50s and early 60s while living in Mexico I was an avid fan of La Pelota, or frontón which in English is  Jai-alai. Because my maternal grandfather had been Basque (my maternal surname is de Irureta Goyena) I thought I had a connection with this ultimate and very fast Basque sport. The only conditions imposed on allowing me to enter what was an unusual gambling establishment (in Frontón you can even bet during the game) was that I wear a coat and tie.

The best of the frontón players were called fenómenos, sometimes also a term reserved for very good bullfighters. The concept of the fenómeno is that somehow the person endowed can only answer to an unexplainable factor of a higher being and in the case of Spaniards (and Basques) that would make it a God given talent that does not have a rational explanation.

My other enthusiastic love was the bullfight, in Spanish a corrida de toros or fiesta taurina. Because my maternal grandmother had been born in Seville I felt that my Spanish heritage (Basques do not consider themselves to be Spaniards) allowed me to enjoy the art of bullfighting.

Before anybody stops reading right here let me explain. Bridge, the card game is never placed in the sports page of the NY Times but in the first editorial pages. Likewise in Mexico, bullfighting articles are always in the arts section and never in the sports section.

Bullfighting is not a sport. The bull never really has a chance although it is still dangerous for the bullfighter. Quite a few get gored and many have died on the field. Bullfighting is a dance sport. The bullfighter, very much like in ballet has certain steps that are steeped in ritual and history. Watching a male ballet dancer do the ballet walk is as lovely as it is to watch a bullfighter confront the bull and either walk forwards towards the bull or backward with nary a glance.

In short bullfighting is a dangerous version of dance. More so if it is a man (there have been a few women) on horseback. I have been lucky to have seen one of the best of all rejoneadores, Don Álvaro Domecq do his dance on a beautiful and prancing white horse.

I cannot ever watch a good man dance be it ballet or modern dance or my most favourite Gene Kelly in any American musical without thinking of being at the Plaza Monumental in Mexico City. It was there that  I witnessed the elegant Paco Camino fight dangerous Miura bulls, lineage to a Seville cattle ranch run by Eduardo Miura Fernández.

For me the male dancer dealing with a female dancer is in a situation that is almost as dangerous. Perhaps I may be exaggerating!

Until the advent of the 19^th century the male dancer was king. Ballet, as created by Louis the IV was a male dance art form. Fortunately for the upstarts, the ballerinas, kings were beheaded and liberal times brought them forward. Suddenly men were there to lift women and women were the new queens.

Perhaps that changed with the Russian Revolution and the exile of Russian dancers to the West. Three Russians, Vaslav Nijinksy, Rudolf Nureyev and Mikhail Baryshnikov were important in that change in the 20^th century. Suddenly men dancers had to do more than lift. Of late in Ballet BC performances I have seen that even change to women lifting men!

In my limited contact with male dancers I have been fortunate to have met and photographed, Todd Woffinden, Miroslav Zydowicz, Edmond Kilpatrick, Jones Henry and Donald Sales (all former luminaries of Ballet BC) – and of course Peter Bingham, John Alleyne, Jay Hirabayashi, Wen Wei Wang, Noam Gagnon, Byron Chief Moon, and AlvinTolentino.

I was lucky to meet and photograph, back stage, Rex Harrington dancing with Evelyn Hart. The interaction between them was electric,

At present I have watched all the new men of Ballet BC including four Arts Umbrella graduates, Connor Gnam, Alexander Burton, Christoph von Riedemann and Scott Fowler. And I must not forget the spectacular Ballet BC Darren Devaney, and Peter Smida.

In my early days (in the 90s) of going to dance performances I watched with interest men dressed in black (lots of leather) who discussed the boys they admired. I wondered why it was that these men could openly talk about the boys while I could not about the girls without feeling like a freak/fiend.  It was Arts Umbrella Artistic Director Artemis Gordon who set it straight for me when she told me that in dance we go to see beautiful, in shape, and graceful men and women with wonderful bodies dance. That sounded right to me. And most recently Gordon told her class of graduates students, “We must not forget as José Limón ( a famous and now dead Mexican born choreographer) said that choreography for men is simply men dancing.”

I remember going to an Arts Umbrella May Gala event at the Richmon Gateway Theatre some years ago (one this May 21, 22, and 23 at the Playhouse) and being asked by someone why I was there. I simply told them, “I am here to see the men dance.” You can imagine the reaction!

Now I have a new crop of dancers to admire, photograph and write about. There are five of them and they all dance with the Arts Umbrella Dance Company. Not only have I seen them in performance and in rehearsals  but I have also had chats with them. They are all different and have unique personal styles. They are precise in their dance technique but somehow ooze charm and are articulate in speech. I am not sure this is all a coincidence.  Dancers, be they men or women are all like that.  Your chance to see the five boys and all those girls will start this Thursday (see below).

Arts Umbrella Dance Company Season Finale May 21, 22 and 23 at the Vancouver Playhouse

Men/boys from the Arts Umbrella Dance Company
Boys! Boys! Boys! 

The Body Beautiful Alastair Macaulay

Myron- Diskobolus - Roman copy of a bronze original of the 5th century BC British Museum