The right steps

Workshop provides deeper knowledge of choreography

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UNLV dance students had the opportunity to create music for fellow students during a weeklong workshop with members of the New York City-based Erick Hawkins Dance Company.

One group of dance majors performed alongside the professionals while another group acted as musicians in a live performance, the culmination of the workshop.

The performance, offered on April 1 in Dance Studio 1 on UNLV's campus, was free to the public. Titled "Mountain With Shadow," the piece was created during the sessions with the professional dancers. Drummers in this case were UNLV dance majors who built an accompaniment out of a series of sounds. Some students ripped paper, others drummed on trash cans, and others used their voices.

The professionals also performed and taught some of the pieces from their repertoire, including a work called "Radical Ardent."

Beth Mehocic, music director and composer for the UNLV dance department, led her students through the process. They were all dance students studying accompaniment.

"We could call it an orchestra of junk, or industrial items," Mehocic said.

A total of 25 students formed the orchestra. They were divided into five groups or sections -- paper, wind, glass, metallic, and voice.

"It's really great because they are dancers so when they see the dance phrase, they can relate to the movement, whereas the musician can't," said Mehocic. "These kids can come up with unusual sounds to support the movement rather than the traditional meter, for example a waltz."

Heather Harper, a dance major, was part of the vocal group in the orchestra. She said she enjoyed the experience with the Erick Hawkins professionals, although creating music was new to her. Studying music in the first place was not something she anticipated.

"It's not anything you would expect out of a dance department, but it has made it so much easier as far as choreography," Harper said.

Dance department chairman Louis Kavouras, who also dances professionally with the Erick Hawkins company, said he set up the workshop because he felt he had students who could appreciate it.

"I kind of dreamed up this chaotic, crazy event to see if we could develop a piece of choreography to show an audience in a week and at the same time develop music for it, sounds for it," Kavouras said. "They came up with beautiful sounds."

He also wanted students to have the opportunity to dance right next to professionals.

"Art is art. It doesn't matter whether a 6-year-old plays Bach or Yo-yo Ma. Each of those things can be just as brilliant," Kavouras said. "I also think that if you put a student in the right environment, they are a professional. They will just rise to it."

Kavouras said local dance audiences are fairly sophisticated, but even for them, the presentation might have caught them off guard.

"It might not be something they're used to," he said. "But part of our mission at the university, I believe, is not only to expose students to it, but to expose the Las Vegas public to it. It's kind of like going to the buffet and trying the thing you never try."

Audiences might not be familiar with the free-flow technique espoused by the Erick Hawkins Dance Company, but it was recognizable to dancers, especially those who have studied with Kavouras.

"It's really technical, but at the same time, easy on the body," said Jeff Howell, a dance major who worked with the professionals during their time at UNLV.

Katherine Duke, artistic director for the Company, said Hawkins is well known in the dance world. He was the first American trained by dance legend George Balanchine.

He also was the first male dancer in modern dance pioneer Martha Graham's company and really loved modern dance. Married to Graham for a time, Hawkins eventually branched out from her style and formed his own school and company in 1952.

Duke said Hawkins' technique is modern but less restrictive than Graham's.

Duke, Kristina Berger, and Douglas Andresen, all with the Erick Hawkins Dance Company, instructed UNLV students in achieving Hawkins' style of movement.

Unique, live accompaniment is a big part of any presentation of the company, whether in New York or Las Vegas. Duke encouraged students in the "orchestra" to create unfamiliar sounds so audience members could have a truly fresh experience.

"I told the ones working with voice that they can't make it sound like a sigh because then the mind's going to think, 'Oh, they're tired,' " Duke said.

Even though the movement is modern, everything is very planned, she said.

"Usually, everything is very conscious. The idea is to give as much as possible so the audience is just inundated with consciousness," she said. "You don't get that a lot in the world. Most people want to be unconscious."

The goal is to create a beautiful experience for the audience and the dancers.

"Erick felt that art should be beautiful. He did not think that art should reflect life," Duke said.

For information on upcoming presentations by the UNLV Dance department, call 895-3827.