The Rockford Dance Company closes its current season with performances this weekend at the Coronado Performing Arts Center. It also finishes the company’s first season under its new artistic director.
On a Monday night, under the watchful eye of Artistic Director Wayland Anderson, a half-dozen members of the Rockford Dance Company practice a number from his interpretation of William Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”
Rachel Hackler has been with the company for four years. She’s stoked.
“I’m really excited about this performance. I hope people will come and see what we’ve been working on, because we’ve been working very hard, and it’s amazing, it really is.”
Anderson says his challenge was to take Shakespeare’s classic story and 19th century composer Felix Mendelssohn’s music, and make something fresh and new. The answer, he says, was to strip away the familiar trappings.
“So I took away the lush greenery, and put it in a white sphere. I trimmed down the costumes. And in a comical way, I gave all of the lead characters urbanized names. So instead of Puck, we call him ‘P-Bo.’ So I just took some liberties that would try to make the work represent who we are and what we are today.”
Hackler says Anderson’s impact goes far beyond this performance. To begin with, Hackler says, he’s raised the level of dancers’ training with his attention to detail.
"Which is hard, in some ways, because you feel like you’re going back to the basics. You know, doing things we’ve been doing since we were little. But the difference is amazing. From this summer when he came, it’s just leaps and bounds of what we can do, and the details and what we can do has grown so much.”
Hackler says the hard work has paid off in the audience response to what Anderson has done. She points to his version of the traditional holiday classic ‘The Nutcracker.’
“My dad’s not a ballet person, he comes in top watch me dance. But he really loved this ‘Nutcracker’ and was engaged. And I talked to family that don’t usually come to dance, and they felt like for the first time they could really connect to ‘The Nutcracker,’ and it was a story that they could be interested in. It wasn’t just some far-off ballet thing, you know.”
Anderson says that’s been his intention with everything the company does. He says he’s mindful of the perspective today’s audience brings to the work that he is creating. In fact, he embraces it.
“It’s really an opportunity for us to just as a community open our eyes and look at dance in a different way. So I’m kind of taking classics and twisting them. Using classics because we’re comfortable with them, we know the story, but taking them and manipulating them and allowing us to see them again for the first time.”
But it’s not just about updated classics. The spring concerts feature a newly commissioned work by a guest choreographer called “Everything Changes.” It’s a message Anderson says resonates strongly with what he sees ahead for the company.
“Part of that future will be the home of new work. And that will allow our students to grow, but it will allow out community to grow as well. We’ll still maintain the classics. It’s a part of our history, and a part of who we are. But I definitely see us as a place where we cultivate and create partnerships with local musicians and other outside community members to create new works.”
Which may not be as serious as it sounds. For example, Anderson uses the music of John Philip Sousa to finish the spring program.
“It’s fun, with a little bit of ham. And it’s just an opportunity for me as a new member of the Rockford community to celebrate Rockford in a way that’s completely American.
All of which thrills dancer Rachel Hackler. She says she knows many people think of ballet as an old and dying art. But the Rockford Dance Company’s new Artistic Director has shown otherwise.
“And I think that’s what Mr. Anderson is bringing to Rockford. It’s still very much alive, and very brand-new, in everything we do.”
The Rockford Dance Company gives its Spring Concert Saturday night and Sunday afternoon, March 14 and 15, at the Coronado Performing Arts Center.
