DANCE REVIEW: Triple Bill, Liverpool Empire Theatre

Feb 4 2008 by Philip Key, Liverpool Daily Post

Shobana Jeyasingh Dance Company _320

THE four-day gathering of the international dance world in Liverpool – the British Dance Edition 2008 – ended appropriately on Saturday, with three of Britain’s most acclaimed contemporary dance companies on stage at the Liverpool Empire.

As with the previous triple bill at the Empire, the evening offered some stark contrasts in style.

For Faultline, the Shobana Jeyasingh Dance Company, (pictured), used every theatrical trick in the book, film, recorded music, live song, lighting and dance that merged classical Indian movement with Western contemporary.

It was an intriguing 30 minutes with hand and fingers often combined with body movement to produce some quirky choreography.

Richard Alston is the veteran of British contemporary dance and his company’s Gypsy Mixture was almost classical in its approach despite the use of remixed gipsy music from the Balkans adding an appealing mixture of old and new.

This was dance for sheer pleasure with solos, duets and ensembles interpreting the music in a variety of ways, from twisting bodies to leaps and runs.

The hit of the evening, however, was undoubtedly Israeli-born Hofesh Shechter’s company with its dramatic Uprising.

It began with seven males dancers striding towards the audience to an industrial beat and then retreating for a series of dances that were often aggressive, sometimes tender but always dramatic, even when the dancers appeared comically to drop through sheer exhaustion.

This was a highly physical piece, but they were soon back in action when a series of slaps got the energy moving again.