Spring Back mesmerizingly beautiful and honest

Performance blurs line between theater and dance

The recent switch to daylight savings time has taken its toll on the Oberlin populace. Already bleary eyed students must now deal with one less hour of sleep. Spring Back, an annual dance and theater event going up this weekend, only compounds the confusion - do we really spring back? Or spring forward? Or fall back? It's not important. Regardless of the reality of daylight savings time, Spring Back is a reversal of the reality - we spring forward, in case you haven't yet mastered it. It will certainly not put you to sleep.

The evening is comprised of nine pieces, a blend of works by students and faculty, solo pieces and group endeavors, many of which blur the line between theater and dance, and run the gamut from intense and quiet to invigorating and moving.

The evening opens with See Me by junior Cara Perkins. The five able dancers begin with subtle movements, rocking almost in unison to the rich music. The subdued tone builds gradually into a more satisfying height, a strong opening for the program.

A Moment's Piece by junior Joey Rizzolo is by contrast quiet and focused. The spare lighting and absolute silence create an unusual air as the audience follows Rizzolo, the solo performer. The piece explores the movement of the body, guided by the movements of the performer's hands. Rizzolo manages to keep the audience rapt and interested as he calls attention to the actual movement of the body, which can often be overlooked when coupled with music and lighting.

The arrangement of the pieces was done very skillfully, each piece complementing each other. Senior Funmilayo Jack's Four in One features four female dancers and Nina Simone's powerful music. The piece communicates vibrancy without being distracting or bright, and is as strong and intense as Simone's voice.

First-year Dana Kotler's solo piece October, is next. Once again, the audience is led to focus on the solo performer and her explorations of movement. Kotler ends the piece with a rare interaction between the dancer and the musician, Brian Bartley, reminding audiences of the humor and lightness which even the most serious art can achieve.

The final piece in the first half of the evening is one of the most powerful. A performance by Associate Professor of Dance, Ann Cooper Albright, titled This ability, a reversal of the notion of "disability." The program contains no actual biographical detail of Albright's experiences, although she tells us candidly in voice-over and in person about her experiences with spinal problems and the frustrations of risking the loss of the tool she most needs for her art, her body.

Albright is angry and hurt, honest and intense. The piece opens with a moving passage from Maxine Hong Kingston, which is likely to haunt the audience as much as it affected Albright herself. Some in the audience were moved to tears by the personal problems which Albright addresses with such candor and courage.

Albright's Contact Improv class follows the intermission, doing what it does best: improvising clever interactions between the bodies of the dancers. Albright herself participates, as if to extend what she said in her previous piece - that disability can be turned into ability. Seeing the smile on her face as she performed an act of love was very affecting.

First-year Ellie-Jo Leonhardt's Blue Eyes Swallowing ( I Contact with a Memory ) follows. Exploring a range of emotion, the work begins quietly and runs the range to full exhilaration. It is uplifting to see dancers move and fill a space.

Merrill Traux's Chorus 42 is quiet and very humorous. Traux is the solo performer, and he stays in the shadows for most of the time, emerging now and then to play with the spare light and also manipulate his own voice to create a unique music for his movements.

The evening closes with the Air Supply, choreographed by senior Erica Litke. Five dancers move to the unusual and powerful music of junior TIMARA major Ray Sweeten. The use of lighting in this piece compliments the dancers so well that the light itself takes on the role of a dancer. It is cohesive though, and not distracting.

Overall, the evening is very impressive. The able dancers and choreographers are the most visible, but technically the show holds together very well. It is not surprising that events such as this one tend to sell out. There is much to see and appreciate.