The dance company will present a variety of performances set to excite, thrill, and instigate the mind.
On Saturday, September 16, Segerstrom Center for the Arts will present the premiere of COMPLEXIONS Contemporary Ballet (CCB) by Founding Co-Artistic Directors Dwight Rhoden and Desmond Richardson at 7:30pm at Segerstrom Hall.
“We’re really happy to be coming to Segerstrom, we’ve never been there before, this will be a first,” said Rhoden. “The audience can prepare themselves for a very eclectic, evening filled with physical beauty.
“We’ll also tackle some human issues.”
The program will feature five pieces, all choreographed by Rhoden which includes “Hissy Fits” (2006 excerpt) to music by Johann Sebastian Bach; “Choke” (2006) to Vivaldi: “Summer from The Four Seasons; Elegy” (2020) to music by Ludwig van Beethoven; and “Snatched Back From the Edges” (“Work it Out” 2021 excerpt) to music by Tye Tribbett.
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The first act sequence also includes a preview performance – “Untitled” (2023) – an excerpt from new ballet by Rhoden featuring music by U2.
“The program that we’re bringing to Segerstrom is a program where the first act is a lot of smaller works where you get to see individuals a little bit more up close and personal within the works,” said Rhoden. “You get to know the dancers a little different.”
CCB was established in 1994, in New York City by Rhoden and Richardson, both accomplished dancers with extensive resumes including the renowned Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater. The dance company came out of a desire to explore other things.
“We had both been in the Ailey company for a number of years and we were moving on and we did not want to start a company, we were just going to do a project,” said Rhoden. “We got together many of our friends from all the major companies and they were indeed pretty much friends and then there were some people that we didn’t know but, that we admired their dancing and we brought them together.”
Rhoden continued, “So it was kind of the first of its kind during that time where you put on stage, all together, classical dancers, contemporary dancers, improv artists, some hip hop dancers—just dancers from all around.
“It just was so powerful and beautiful, types of movement and types of artists, bodies, races and ethnicities. It just had an energy about it that really spoke to what our message is, which is unity.
“So, that’s when Desmond and I decided that we had to do something more with COMPLEXIONS and so here we are, almost thirty years later, still doing it.”
CCB is about diversity, multiculturalism, inclusion according to Rhoden as their not interested in seeing one type of people on stage. Their goal has been to have a dance company that reflects the world, bringing a variety of dancers forward no matter their background.
“We were doing diversity and inclusion but, we were doing it very authentically and it was the reason for the creation of the company,” said Rhoden.
Rhoden shared CCB comes to California quite often and receives a lot of love from the Cali audience.
“We seem to have some sort of connection to Californians,” said Rhoden. “I don’t know exactly why other than the fact that the company really does entertain you as well as make you think.”
The program, choreographed by Rhoden, will include the West Coast premiere of “Endgame/Love One” (2022) to music by Drake, Kendrick Lamar, Post Malone, Maneskin, Peter Gregson, Panic! At the Disco, and J.S. Bach. Richardson is the assistant choreographer of “Endgame/Love One.”
“Our second act is a ballet called ‘Endgame,’ that was choreographed last year in 2022 and this was the third piece in a trilogy of works that I put together,” said Rhoden. “This really is a group work, full company piece to the music of another very, sort of, varied score.”
He continued, “The work looks at how we move through our day now that we have been through what we’ve been through and helps us ask all the right questions about what is the purpose, what is the endgame to all of this, what are the lessons that we’ve learned from the pandemic and living in this time with all the different issues both political, social, all of those things.”
The company has appeared at major European dance festivals including Italy’s Festival of Dance, the Isle De Dance Festival in Paris, the Maison De La Dance Festival in Lyon, the Holland Dance Festival, Steps International Dance Festival in Switzerland, Łódź Biennale, Warsaw Ballet Festival, Kraków Spring Ballet Festival, the Dance Festival of Canary Islands/Spain, and the Festival des Arts de Saint-Sauveur/Canada. In addition, CCB has toured extensively throughout the Baltic regions, Korea, Brazil, Japan, Egypt, Israel, Russia, New Zealand, Bermuda, Serbia, Jamaica, and Australia.
Tickets, starting at $29, are on sale starting August 14 at scfta.org.
For more on COMPLEXIONS Contemporary Ballet, please visit www.complexionsdance.org
