Stewards of Modern Movement

State Street Ballet (SSB) was just a little bit ahead of the curve when it premiered an evening of modern dance called Women’s Work just two years ago, shortly before the marches began following the presidential election and the revelations of rampant sexual harassment leading to the #MeToo movement. But by last year, it had already turned into Modern Masters, a non-gender specific showcase of works new and old.

“Generally, there are many more male choreographers in the dance world, so we wanted to give a platform for the female voice,” explained Cecily Stewart, one of the company’s veteran dancers and founder of its outreach educational program Library Dances. “But it evolved into a way of having a more intimate experience of dance at the New Vic, where we can experiment with new choreographers and get up close and personal with the audience.”

One of the new works among Modern Masters’s seven pieces is already paying dividends for SSB and Kevin Jenkins, whose poking-fun Flirting has led to an upcoming choreographic collaboration with Soleau, an innovative work about Charlie Chaplin that the company will premiere at the Granada next season.

The varied program gives the dancers the opportunity to move beyond the classical ballet style, Stewart said.

“It’s expanded both our repertoire and our dancer’s abilities,” she said. “They’re challenged by a different way of moving than what we typically do for the rest of the season, working in a more contemporary approach, which you have to be able to do now to survive as a dancer. The pieces are really different from each other.”

That would include Stewart’s own Reverie, which explores what goes on in our minds while we sleep. The work was created for an ensemble of nine dancers and is unlikely to send anyone into slumberland.

“I tend to be a bit of insomniac, with the monkey mind going on,” Stewart admitted. “And this piece sprung out of the concept of how we lead our really busy lives and then try to go rest, so we’re also so busy in our dream life that sometimes we wake up and think, ‘Whoa, what just happened?’ It’s about what our brains explore when we let our bodies rest.”

Stewart said she drew on several different dreams she’s had repeatedly over her life, with each portion of the dance work reflecting a different experience. There’s a central character, the one who is having trouble falling asleep, who meanders through the place between wakefulness and sleep, she explained. “That’s when everything is in shadows. The concept comes together as a story of her dream life.”

Reverie was also inspired by her collaboration with Santa Barbara composer, dancer, and pianist Stephen Kelly, who created and arranged the music based Leonard Cohen’s famed song “Hallelujah”. “He takes it to places you wouldn’t expect,” Stewart explained. “That was a challenge to choreograph, though, because the music mostly doesn’t have a meter. That can be an issue count-wise for the dancers.”

Just as long as they don’t lose any sleep over it.

(State Street Ballet’s Modern Masters performances take place at 7:30 pm Friday and Saturday, May 11-12, at the New Vic, 33 W. Victoria St. Visit www.StateStreetBallet.com or call 965-5400.)