DAVID TAYLOR DANCE THEATRE

HISTORY AND HIGHLIGHTS

The David Taylor Dance Theatre was founded by choreographer David Taylor in 1979 and remains Colorado’s original professional contemporary ballet company and one of the most innovative in the region. Mr. Taylor’s background and fascination with the metaphysical and ritualistic aspects of dance has created a stunning and thought-provoking identity for the 12-member Denver-based troupe. Critics have lauded the Company as being “polished and emotional” and as “the most ambitious troupe in town”. In 1989 the Colorado Council for the Arts and Humanities cited the DTDT for being “the number one dance organization in the state in terms of achieving success in its artistic mission.” In 1994, Music and Dance Critic Glenn Giffin of the Denver Post stated that “the DTDT has always been the most provocative of the area’s dance companies, tackling themes, subjects and music that no one else touches. It still does.” In March of 1997, Artistic Director David Taylor and his company were a recipient of the Governor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts. In 1999, the DTDT’s new company, culled from national auditions, presented their second annual “Contemporary Classics” program at Loretto Heights in Denver. Marc Shulgold, Music and Dance Critic from Denver’s Rocky Mountain News said, “The Teikyo Loretto Heights stage was filled with powerful performers, exquisite of line, drilled to near-perfection and quite comfortable with even the most extraordinarily demanding piece. Simply put, you have to see the new Taylor company to believe it.”

In 2006, James Wallace, former dancer and choreographer in residence with DTDT, took over as Artistic Director. Mr. Wallace had just returned from dancing with Company C Contemporary Ballet in San Francisco and was ready for a change of pace. His exciting and innovative vision matches that of David Taylor and yet brings a freshness to the company. David Taylor has said the company has never looked sharper and the repertoire is brilliantly put together. Mr. Wallace has been lauded as a “daring and original dancemaker” (Marc Shulgold, Rocky Mountain News) and his choreography has been described as “vibrant, innovative and richly diverse….. one of the brightest new choreographers on the horizon.” (Glenn Giffen, The Denver Post) He has also created works for the Colorado Ballet, American National Ballet, Boulder Ballet and Ballet Nouveau. The Ballet Builders award for new choreography was given to Mr. Wallace by New Choreographers on Point and his piece, Suspect Lines, was given a New York City premiere. Mr. Wallace’s dynamic vision is taking the company in an incredible direction and upcoming performances are not to be missed.

The Company has been presented and sponsored by such major Denver metropolitan entities as the Arvada Center, the Littleton Town Hall and Aurora Fox Arts Centers, The City and County of Denver, Norwest, Coors, the Denver Ballet Guild, the ArtReach Festival of Trees, the Rose Foundation, the Museum of Outdoor Arts, the University of Denver, KVOD Radio, the Colorado Performing Arts Festival, and First Night Colorado. In addition, the DTDT has performed through invitation at the Telluride and Colorado Dance Festivals, at the Colorado Choreographer’s Showcase, at the Golden, Lakewood, Douglas County and Cherry Creek Arts Festivals, at the Norwest Culture Fest, by Foothills Parks and Recreation District, the Norwest Arts on Stage summer productions, and at the Sacred Dance Guild’s 30th Anniversary National Convention held in Denver in 1988.

The DTDT has been presented on tour in Colorado in Glenwood Springs, Steamboat Springs, Vail, Estes Park, Gunnison, Pueblo, Boulder, Sheridan, Crested Butte, Battlement Mesa, Trinidad, Walsenburg, Canon City, La Junta, Beulah, Lake City, Ouray, Ridgeway, Montrose, Holyoke, Yuma, Fort Morgan, Brush, Colorado Springs, Sterling, at the Riverwalk Center in Breckenridge, at the Vilar Center in Avon, and Fort Collins, and through the Rural Artist Series project in Wray, Wiggins, Leadville, San Luis, Nederland, and Creede. Out of state bookings have included Cheyenne, Sheridan, Gillette, Rock Springs, Powell, Riverton, Cody, Rawlins, and Casper, Wyoming; Billings, and Great Falls, Montana; Aberdeen, Vermillion and Sioux City, South Dakota; Boise and Moscow, Idaho; Price and Cedar City, Utah; Lexington and Kearney, Nebraska; Fish Creek and Baraboo, Wisconsin; Alamogordo, Gallup, Taos, Socorro, Silver City, and Farmington, New Mexico; Phoenix and Safford, Arizona; Houston, Corpus Christi, Del Rio, San Antonio, and El Paso, Texas; Lake Charles, Monroe, and Lafayette, Louisiana; McLean, Virginia; Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania; Dubuque, Iowa; Long Beach and Costa Mesa, California; Oklahoma City and Tishomingo, Oklahoma; and Bemidji, Minnesota. Musical collaborations have included performances with Opera Colorado, the Colorado Symphony Orchestra, the Boulder Philharmonic, the Denver Chamber Orchestra, the National Repertory Orchestra, the Colorado Wind Ensemble, the Premiat Trio, the Lamont School of Music, the Wyoming Symphony, the Billings Symphony, the Fort Collins Symphony, the Colorado Wind Ensemble, the Up Close and Musical Ensemble and the Denver Balinese Gamelan Orchestra.

In May of 1987, the DTDT became the first local dance company ever to be presented by the City and County of Denver under their groundbreaking “Denver Presents” Series at the Auditorium Theatre. Artistic Director and choreographer David Taylor became the first dance recipient of the Mayor’s Individual Artist Fellowship award for the creation of “Anasazi Dream” within the context of this project, which received national attention in Dance Magazine. In 1989, the DTDT presented the innovative “Bali Agung” production in the unique indoor-outdoor setting of the MCI Plaza. Co-sponsored by the Museum of Outdoor Arts, the collaborative project involved the David Taylor Dance Theatre, visual artist George Peters, and composer Mark McCoin in an exploration of Balinese culture that noted Denver theatre producer Henry Lowenstein called “one of the best theatrical events I’ve seen in years”.

In the summer of 1991, the company became the first Colorado dance company to be presented on the Fiddler’s Green Summer Pops Series, reaching over 3,500 people with their original multi-media production of “Planets”. In 1992, David Taylor received his first out-of-state commission as a choreographer from the Dayton Ballet, where his new work, “Antahkarana”, received glowing reviews during a four performance run. Also in 1992, Mr. Taylor was commissioned to choreograph the ballet sequence for the Ascot Dinner Theatre’s new production of “Phantom of the Opera”, which featured seven DTDT dancers appearing in a 20 week run. Other theatrical collaborations have included the 1989 success of the dance/drama “Cosima” and the production of “Jesus Christ Superstar”, both produced with the Littleton Town Hall Arts Center.

In 1991, Rocky Mountain News Music and Dance critic Marc Shulgold lauded the company’s strikingly original new production of “The Nutcracker” as the “Critic’s Choice” for holiday entertainment, saying “Taylor’s bright, bold ‘Nutcracker’ (was) a treat for the eyes”.

In 1994, Glenn Giffin of the Denver Post commented that “in the competitive world of rival ‘Nutcracker’ productions, the David Taylor Dance Theatre has a sure bet”, and that “There can be few productions of ‘The Nutcracker’ quite so visually arresting as that of the David Taylor Dance Theatre.” The production is represented by Gary Lindsey Artist Services out of San Francisco, one of the nation’s foremost agents for dance attractions. National recognition in Dance Magazine has been received for the DTDT’s innovative staging of “The Nutcracker” (1991), the company’s 1996 Spring Season, and for their acclaimed multi-media production of “Rainforest” (1997). The DTDT’s full-length production of “Rainforest” has become the most successful regular-season event in the company’s history. After five years of record-breaking performances in Denver, the multi-media collaborative production has toured throughout the United States.

The David Taylor Dance Theatre was also accepted onto the prestigious Western States Arts Foundation Tour Guide roster for the 1993-94 and 1994-95 Seasons and was selected to be a Showcase performing company at the 1994 Western Alliance of Arts Administrators (WAAA) Conference in Phoenix, Arizona in September 1994, at the Pacific Northwest Booking Conference in Boise, Idaho in January of 1995, and at the Rocky Mountain Theatre Association’s Festinvention in Greeley and Price, Utah in 1995 and 1996 respectively

The company has also continued to acquire major contemporary works by nationally acclaimed choreographers. James Clouser has set new works on the company over the past ten years. In recent years, the DTDT also acquired New York choreographer Lynne Taylor-Corbett’s “Appearances”, “Wingbourne”, the signature work of Minnesota Dance Theatre Director Loyce Houlton, “Lark Ascending” by Bruce Marks, Artistic Director of the Boston Ballet, and “The Element In Which It Takes Place” and “Variation #2” by Philadanco resident choreographer Milton Myers.

In 1998, the DTDT presented the Colorado premiere of Oregon Ballet Theatre’s James Canfield’s “Anais”, in 1999 the company performed “Mythical Hunters” by international dance legend Glen Tetley to rave reviews on their “Contemporary Classics” program, and in 2001 the DTDT acquired “Nine Person Precision Ball Passing” by Oakland choreographer Charles Moulton. Other recent accomplishments include performing “The Nutcracker” on tour in Long Beach, California, and Victoria, British Columbia, “Rainforest” at the Kennedy Center Imagination Celebration in Colorado Springs and at the Orange County Performing Arts Center in Costa Mesa, California, and a mixed repertoire program in collaboration with the National Repertory Orchestra in Breckenridge.

The DTDT’s Community Outreach Program is one of the most active of its kind in the state of Colorado, with upwards to 85 performances, lecture/demonstrations, hands-on workshops, and career days presented annually to elementary, middle, and high school students throughout the metro area and in and through agencies that serve the disadvantaged, disabled, and other audiences with limited access to the arts. In addition, the company presents six free public performances annually each summer t the City Center Englewood amphitheatre.
Elementary School activities include on-site performances along with hands-on workshops.

In addition, the DTDT Community Outreach Program now includes the PEAK (Progressive
Education with Arts and Academics) and ARK (Arts Reaching Kids) Projects, extensive residency and performance programs in collaboration with five Englewood Elementary Schools. A new addition to the DTDT’s Elementary School activities for 2005/06 includes classes, performances, workshops and internships in cooperation with the Swansea Ballet of northwest Denver, serving disadvantaged and low income Hispanic children.

Elementary school performances continue to make up the majority of the company’s outreach activities. The DTDT presents three acclaimed performance programs in elementary schools: “The Nutcracker In A Nutshell” - eight major dance excerpts in full costume along with an educational narrative of the history of the world’s most famous ballet and a “behind-the-scenes” look at what goes into the creation of such a large production; “A World of Dance” - a multi-cultural journey “around the world”, featuring eight dances that represent the artistic expressions of various peoples in different countries and their unique cultural heritage; and “A Children’s Rainforest Odyssey” - four excerpts from the DTDT’s nationally acclaimed production of “Rainforest”, featuring incredible costumes and props by Boulder visual artist George Peters and a stunning original score by Jesse Manno, supplemented by and educational/environmental narrative by Artistic Director David Taylor.

Middle and High School students are engaged through the DTDT’s new “Romeo and Juliet Rocks!” project. This innovative program brings a contemporary adaptation of the Shakespearean classic to teens in a language they can relate to. Through coordination with school principals and literature faculty, “Romeo and Juliet Rocks!” deals with important social issues such as drugs, alcohol, pre-marital sex and violence. The educational component also includes participation by Police D.A.R.E. units, PTO representatives and medical personnel as well as providing an interactive web site for student feedback.

Fees: 1 50 minute to 1 hour performance: $700.00 2 performances, back-to-back: $1,000.00 DTDT must have a flat surface, minimum 40’ long x 30’ deep, gymnasium preferred, with dressing areas as close to the performing space as possible. School must provide sound system that plays both CDs and cassettes.Availability: “A Children’s Rainforest Odyssey”