The Sedona Dance Project held its two fall concerts on Thursday and Friday, Nov. 2 and 3, selling out the Posse Grounds Hub for a second time.
The Friday concert led off with a pair of violin solos by Tyler Carson, known as the Fiddler on the Rock from his sunset airport shows, who was originally scheduled to perform Johann Sebastian Bach’s “Air on the G String” as accompaniment to a duet by Eric Lindemer and Jessica Phillips.
As Phillips had withdrawn from the performance due to injury, Carson opened the show with two sets of his own variations instead. The first set, which will appear on one of his forthcoming albums, took as its point of departure the main theme from “Pirates of the Caribbean.” Using looping pedals, Carson built his harmonies in layers, taking some lines out and adding others with very catchy and compelling results.
For his second piece, Carson offered a set of variations on “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” interlaced with motifs from “The Lion King.” As he fiddled, he lured the audience into singing the chorus along with him, almost to the point where he was conducting them Danny Kaye-style. It also gave him a chance to show off the booming tones that his Stroh violin was capable of producing.
The dance portion of the concert opened with a reprise of company founder Danielle McNeal Strabala’s “Thread That Binds Souls” from the spring concert, performed by Strabala with eight other dancers ranging in age from 8 to 70. Well-coordinated and energetic in the first section, it slowed and became more intense in the second half as what began as a dance of the generations coalesced into an ensemble finish giving the impression of a flight of butterflies. They were succeeded by Shayna Da Cruz in “Mirage,” a fascinating choreographic fusion of ballet, modern, belly dance and voguing styles, complete with veil and bells.
The evening’s standout star was undoubtedly Sedona Dance Academy student Phoebe Jones, who appeared in a solo, “Rising Phoenix,” choreographed for her by Strabala. Every serious dancer and musician reaches a stage in their professional development where they are no longer playing catch-up with the music, but instead are finding the time and the comfort within it to inhabit it, varying their interpretation and adding personality to the structure; Jones is now reaching that point. She was able to enter into the spirit of the music while smoothly integrating her acrobatics, successfully conveying a sense of bold adventure and exploration. Her vivid dancing was capable of making the audience believe that they were standing with her on the bow of a galleon about to discover new worlds.
“Here As One,” arranged by Varshana Davis, began with a slow section drawing on Morris dance — shades of Dick Van Dyke in “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang” — and bodybuilding poses. The five dancers showed good rhythm and picked up the pace as the dance progressed, finishing with a lineup of sinuous serpentine gestures that wowed the crowd.
Intermission was followed by an accomplished solo, “Cage Unnamed,” by Arizona State University dance student and breakdancer Angelo “Vo Vera” Sapienza. It was a tale of struggle set to mournful techno, with strained gestures and abrupt exaggerations. Vera impressed not just with his remarkable physical control but also with his ability to combine harsh movements into a smooth, continuous line. The character didn’t get anywhere, but the dance itself was eye-opening.
Another of the evening’s highlights was a quartet danced by Sedona Dance Academy’s more advanced students to the tune of Hayley Westenra’s cover of “I Feel Pretty.” Garbed in neat, colorful little 1950s dresses and armed with hand mirrors, the four girls switched back and forth between preening for themselves, the audience and each other — and being as physically snippy to one another as possible. At times their would-be formality even degenerated into girlish grappling, with a glove flying like a striptease was going on. It was striking, it was funny and it did a superb job of getting the central idea across, and Strabala’s conceptualization of the piece is to be commended as well as her dancers’ execution of it.
SDA instructor Eric Lindemer was up next to solo to The Animals’ “House of the Rising Sun.” He gave an effective visualization of the story within the lyrics, almost swimming through the emotions, while also capturing that midcentury New Orleans feel and winding up with a vivid and literal illustration of leaving one’s baggage behind.
Sabina Malinalli then made her choreographic debut with “Through the Veil,” a piece similar to those in which she had performed during the spring concert, and to which she lent a special grace. Not fast or complex, it was more forceful for its simplicity. A three-cornered veil passed from dancer to dancer, each of them taking on its attributes with its physical possession, and a trio of women is always a potent mythological symbol. As they left the stage, the music kept playing and the lights stayed up, making the audience think about what was coming next.
Finally, Carolin Hauser closed the concert with a superficial solo with spoken word accompaniment before a good portion of the audience migrated onto the dance floor to gyrate to ABBA’s “Dancing Queen” for a big collective finish.
