UNITED KINGDOM: CHICAGO'S CONTEMPORARY JOFFREY BALLET COMPANY REHEARSE IN LONDON FOR THEIR SHOW SET TO MUSIC BY PRINCE

Record ID: 336556

  • Title: UNITED KINGDOM: CHICAGO'S CONTEMPORARY JOFFREY BALLET COMPANY REHEARSE IN LONDON FOR THEIR SHOW SET TO MUSIC BY PRINCE
  • Date: 28th August 1996
  • Summary: JOFFREY BALLET PERFORMING "SLIDE" (CHOREOGRAPHED BY MARGOT SAPPINGTON)
  • Embargoed: 12th September 1996 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM
  • Country: United Kingdom
  • Reuters ID: LVAD2OKESXSDUOH0AKCLK006OQ77
  • Story Text: Classical ballet it isn't. Purists may be horrified at a raunchy dance set to music by Prince, but the Joffrey ballet company claim their performance has attracted an unlikely following.

    "Billboards", a show which has grossed more than 10 million dollars in its first year, is transporting its success to Europe.

    Artistic director and co-founder of the Chicago-based Joffrey ballet, Gerald Arpino, welcomes his new audience to a show which took the dance world by storm when launched in 1993.

    "With Billboards, being Prince's music, it is the first time I've embraced the young people and said to them come and look at the classic dance...and it's turned the men on to dance. I always say if you want to make out with your girl, just buy her a ticket to Billboards." The set includes sensuous, provocative, sometimes aggressive dances set to Prince's Purple Rain, Thunder and Slide, among other tracks. The artist waived royalties and has reorchestrated some hits, including "Thunder", to adapt to the dance steps.

    All the Joffrey dancers are classically trained, although the performance contains only one piece which approaches classicism.

    The ballet company, now in its 40th year, has long held the mantle of representing the cutting edge of American dance. Even in the early days, Arpino and the late Robert Joffrey were setting contemporary ballet to music from the Beach Boys and Aretha Franklin.

    "Billboards" has proved to be an 11th-hour salvation for the formerly-impoverished company. Since its launch in 1993, it has toured extensively in the United States, Australia and Asia and continental Europe. The show will be performed in Portugal and Edinburgh in September and early October.

    Several of the dances explore tensions and triangles between men and women. "It's the 1990s. Men are relating to women, men are relating to men and women are relating to women," explained dancer John Sheaffer, who has performed with "Billboards" since February.

    Dancer Beatriz Rodriguez, who performs an intense "pas de deux" set to Prince's "Slide", sees it another way. "We're all equal, we're just a little more equal than men." Described as a "rock-pourri" or pure disco by some critics, widely acclaimed by others, "Billboards" continues to lure unlikely audiences unfamiliar with traditional dance.

    "The generation that hears this music, the concert goers...get to see their music much more dimensionally. I's one thing to hear it and feel it and another to see it," Rodriguez said. "The audience reaction brings another level of energy to the whole evening, it's just spectacular."
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