Variety-Packed Roster Touted for UCSD Dance Series

The nationally acclaimed Lewitzky Dance Company heads the variety pack of attractions in UC San Diego’s five-part dance series this year. The 1990-91 roster, up one concert from last year, includes three interdisciplinary (music and dance) events for the first time.

“We want to stimulate a new way of looking at dance, and we’re trying to develop more crossover audiences,” said director Lynne Peterson in an interview this week. “It’s ironic that it all happened at once. We didn’t set out to have three crossovers this year. We’re interested in (sponsoring) what other people don’t have--emerging companies--not just the tried-and-true commercial groups. That’s not our reason for being.”

The only brand name in the university events program is the Lewitzky troupe. Led by Bella Lewitzky (the outspoken iconoclast who recently rejected a $72,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Arts to protest a proposed obscenity pledge), the Los Angeles-based company is the foremost modern dance troupe on the West Coast. And its leader is one of the strongest choreographic voices in the country.

Lewitzky and her dancers will make their one-night stand at Mandeville Auditorium on April 20, their first at the university since 1979. Like all five one-night-only events in the season, the Lewitzky concert will start at 8 p.m. On this long-awaited visit, the company will explore relationships and rituals.

Kicking off the series on Oct. 5 is ISO and the Bobs, a two-part group that combines “new wave a cappella and theatrical acro-dance.” ISO--the zany movers in this combo--is an outgrowth of Momix. Four of the founding members of that inventive ensemble now constitute this off-the-wall company of dancing illusionists and neo-vaudevillians.

The Bobs, an a cappella quartet from San Francisco, will provide the madcap musical inspiration for ISO’s kinetic clowns when the group makes its local debut.

DanceBrazil follows close on their heels (Oct. 14), but the two offerings are worlds apart in style and content. For this whistle-stop performance, DanceBrazil brings the exotic ethnic forms of Brazil into bold relief, including the gutsy capoeira , a form of martial arts fused with Afro-Brazilian cultural expressions.

Although DanceBrazil is an unknown quantity in San Diego, it has garnered national attention from a PBS “Alive From Off Center” appearance and numerous concerts in major dance centers.

On Nov. 16, the tinkling sounds of the gamelan will permeate Mandeville Auditorium, and life-sized shadow puppets will be among the featured performers. This unique performance will turn the spotlight on Keith Terry, an American rhythmic dancer and body musician and his kindred spirit, Indonesian dancer-choreographer I Wayan Dibia. They represent the backbone of Keith Terry & Body Tjak, a 24-member, multimedia, multi-ethnic company.

The variety-spiced season will conclude May 18 with San Jose Taiko, a dance and percussion troupe in the tradition of Japan’s KODO drummers. The Taiko performers, however, add Asian-American and African beats to the blend to achieve their throbbing effects.