Lackluster Dancing for a Flavorful Culture

About the picture: http://blog.oregonlive.com/ent_impact_performance/2008/04/large_ubw_jant-bi2.jpg

Probably the most incomprehensible life to us city people is the life of bush women. It is no surprise then that audiences of Les ecailles de la memoire (The Scales of Memory) are still left confused about what they’ve seen in the performance.

The work addresses the rich history and culture of African-Americans and is supposed to explore elements of slavery through dance movements. In addition, one easily comes to deduce that most of the performance touches on nature and culture.

All of the dancers wear African dress while on stage, a wonderful display that sadly fails to smudge over their mediocre choreography. The first dance on stage is a single woman who moves her feet and hands in a zigzag pattern and hisses softly at the audience. Her movements are similar to that of a snake and at a few moments, she strikes at the audience. Her act is followed by a man who annoyingly stomps his feet around as if smashing bugs.

The dances get more complex after the first two acts pass. The third act features women calling out to and trying to find one another. The end of the act is strong, as the lighting director uses a box of light to enclose the women, using it as a metaphor for slavery. This contrasts with the fourth act, which displays a less serious mood by introducing an enjoyable couple dance.

The audience is immersed in a taste of African culture by the end of Les ecailles de la memoire. The fifth performance incorporates beat-boxing techniques and hip-hop-like dancing all to show the influence of African rhythms on current music. Furthermore, it throws sounds of Soca into the mix, which is a genre carried out in the Caribbean (another area African slaves were taken to). The end of the dance presentation is akin to a party on stage; several couples are revealed while they dance and make merry. It seems to focus on the positive side of love while a previous theme announced during the performance displayed love as “torture.” Torture is the cause of love allowing relatives and friends to care and worry about those who have been taken as cargo abroad.

While you might think you have understood the contents of this review, seeing the dances of Les ecailles de la memoire might be a completely different experience. Personally, if I did not have any knowledge of African history, I would have been lost as to what connected all the dance routines present in the entire performance. I wouldn’t recommend this dance presentation to anyone who is oblivious to African history and to anyone that looks for amazement in dance. You could notice similar movements in a club or party. The simple choreography (e.g. foot-stomping, hand gestures, and non-creative partner dances) featured here just fails to blow your mind.