CLOSE QUARTERS
April 30, 2024
The Slipper Room
167 Orchard St, New York, NY 10002
Sokolow Theatre/Dance Ensemble
Choreography: Anna Sokolow
Artistic Director: Samantha Géracht
Associate Artistic Directors: Eleanor Bunker, Lauren Naslund
Dancers: Margaret Mighty Oak Brackey, Ilana Ruth Cohen, Samuel Humphreys, Krista Jansen, Brad Orego, Margherita Tisato
— with special guests —
The Bang Group
Choreography: David Parker
Artistic Directors: David Parker & Jeffrey Kazin
Dancers: Chelsea Ainsworth, Dylan Baker, Louise Benkelman, Jeffrey Kazin, David Parker, Tommy Seibold, Amber Sloan
Lighting: Edwin Lebron
PROGRAM
Max & Minnie (2024)
Choreography: David Parker
Music: John Philip Sousa, , “The Eccentric Bride”; J. S. Bach, “Prelude in C Major”
Costumes: Jeroen Teunissen
Dancers: Dylan Baker, Louise Benkelman, Jeffrey Kazin, Tommy Seibold, Amber Sloan
Ideas of an Acrobat — from Magritte, Magritte (1970)
Choreography: Anna Sokolow
Music: Eric Satie
Dancer: Margaret Mighty Oak Brackey
Speaker: Samuel Humphreys
Two Timing (2015)
Choreography: David Parker
Music: Steve Reich, “Clapping Music”
Costumes: Jeroen Teunissen
Dancers: Chelsea Ainsworth, Jeffrey Kazin
Poem III – from Three Poems (1973)
Choreography: Anna Sokolow
Music: Joel Thome
Costumes: Epperson
Dancers: Brad Orego, Margherita Tisato
Schlemiezel (2024)
Choreography: David Parker
Costumes: Jeroen Teunissen
Dancers: Jeffrey Kazin, David Parker
Youkali Tango — from Kurt Weill (1988)
Choreography: Anna Sokolow
Music: Kurt Weill
Costumes: Eleanor Bunker
Dancers: Margaret Mighty Oak Brackey, Ilana Ruth Cohen, Samuel Humphreys, Krista Jansen, Brad Orego, Margherita Tisato
INTERMISSION
Show Business (2004)
Choreography: David Parker
Music: Irving Berlin, “There’s No Business…” sung by Ethel Merman
Dancer: Dylan Baker
Poem I — from Three Poems (1973)
Choreography: Anna Sokolow
Music: Joel Thome
Costumes: Epperson
Dancers: Margaret Mighty Oak Brackey, Ilana Ruth Cohen, Krista Jansen, Margherita Tisato
Madame Sherry (2012)
Choreography: David Parker
Music: Karl Hoschna & Otto Harbach, “Every Little Movement” sung by Judy Garland and Mary Kent
Dancer: Louise Benkelman
Going — from Rooms (1955)
Choreography: Anna Sokolow
Music: Kenyon Hopkins
Costume: Eleanor Bunker
Dancer: Brad Orego
Escape — from Rooms (1955)
Choreography: Anna Sokolow
Music: Kenyon Hopkins
Costumes: Eleanor Bunker
Dancer: Ilana Ruth Cohen
Surrender Dorothy (excerpt) (2013)
Choreography: David Parker
Music: E.Y. Harburg & Harold Arlen, “If I Only Had a Heart” sung by Jack Haley
Dancers: Dylan Baker, Louise Benkelman, Jeffrey Kazin, Tommy Seibold,
Amber Sloan
Excerpts from Ride the Culture Loop (1975)
Choreography: Anna Sokolow
Music: Teo Macero
Costumes: Natasha Guruleva
High-wire: Margherita Tisato
Spectators: Margaret Mighty Oak Brackey, Ilana Ruth Cohen, Samuel Humphreys, Krista Jansen, Brad Orego, Margherita Tisato
Duet: Samuel Humphreys, Krista Jansen
Jumps: Margaret Mighty Oak Brackey, Ilana Ruth Cohen, Samuel Humphreys, Krista Jansen
Bios
Sokolow Theatre/Dance Ensemble
SOKOLOW THEATRE/DANCE ENSEMBLE is the living legacy company dedicated to presenting Anna Sokolow’s vast body of emotionally riveting work. Over a 70 year career, Ms. Sokolow continuously broke the boundaries of modern dance, focusing on the human experience and drawing upon whatever genre best served her artistic purpose. Her masterpieces remain relevant to our times and touch the hearts of all people as we struggle with the universal issues of living, regardless of differences in place and culture. The company’s projects include reconstruction, reimagination, deconstruction, historical performance, teaching, lectures, archiving, and partnering with contemporary choreographers—all modes through which we step inside Sokolow’s masterworks and draw from this perspective to better frame our future. ST/DE was founded by Sokolow protégé Jim May and is currently under the artistic direction of Samantha Geracht.
ANNA SOKOLOW (1910-2000) Known as one of the most dynamic and uncompromising of choreographers, Ms. Sokolow began her career as a dancer with Martha Graham. In the early thirties, she studied choreography with Louis Horst at the Neighborhood Playhouse and established her first dance company. The work of Ms. Sokolow has had and continues to have a profound effect on the course of contemporary dance throughout the world. She founded the first modern dance companies in Israel and Mexico and influenced such artists as Alvin Ailey, Pina Bausch, and Martha Clark. Ms. Sokolow also made important contributions to the theater. Her choreography for the Broadway stage included Street Scene (1947), Regina (1949), and Candide (with Leonard Bernstein, 1956); in 1967 she created the original dances for the off-Broadway production of Hair. She was a founding member of The Actors Studio, where she taught movement for actors. As a teacher of dance, Ms. Sokolow covered much ground, from the Juilliard School (prominently featured in a 2002 documentary) and the 92nd Street Y in New York City to the Rubin Academy of Music in Jerusalem. Anna Sokolow created a body of work that combines dance and music with theater, poetry and prose. Called the “Solzenitsyn of twentieth-century dance,” she consistently and uncompromisingly reflected the realities of society through her work.
SAMANTHA GÉRACHT (Artistic Director) performed with Anna Sokolow’s Players’ Project for eleven years and is a founding member of the Sokolow Theatre/Dance Ensemble. In 2017 Ms. Géracht was appointed the ensemble’s artistic director. She has toured and taught Sokolow’s repertory nationally and internationally, setting Ms. Sokolow’s works on professional companies, university dance programs, and solo dance artists, including the Centre de Danse Nationale de Paris, the Boston Conservatory, Williams College, The Ailey School/Fordham University, Loyola Chicago, Franklin and Marshall College, Barnard College, Clarence Brooks, Jennifer Conely, Sandra Kaufman, Kanopy Dance Company and Academy, Ellen Robbins Dance, and Christine Dakin.
Ms. Géracht studied technique and composition with Alwin Nikolais and Murry Louis, Humphrey/Limon with Jim May, Betty Jones, Fritz Luden, and Gail Corbin, and Weidman with Deborah Carr. She has taught in the Professional Studies program at the Limon Institute, the Herbert Berghoff (‘HB’) Studio, and is on the faculty of the Hoboken Charter School. Ms. Geracht performed the Humphrey/Weidman repertory with Deborah Carr Theater Dance Ensemble and Gail Corbin. She has appeared with Rae Ballard’s Thoughts in Motion, and as a guest artist with David Parker and The Bang Group. In 2016 she choreographed Shadowbox Theatre’s The Earth and Me, a critically acclaimed climate change puppet/dance opera created for NYC public schools and community centers. Ms. Géracht served as a panelist for the Library of Congress opening of the “New Dance Group” archives. She holds an MFA in dance from Montclair State University (NJ) and a BS in dance from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Ms. Géracht is committed to the preservation of early American Modern Dance, making the works of modern dance pioneers more accessible to dance education programs, young artists, and new audiences.
ELEANOR BUNKER (Associate Artistic Director) holds degrees from Hartford College for Women and SUNY Empire State College. She began her modern and ballet training at the Hartford Ballet where she studied with Enid Lynn, Lisa Bradley, and Michael Uthoff. She was a soloist and rehearsal director for eleven years with Rondo Dance Theater, a repertory company which featured masterworks of the American Modern Dance genre under the artistic direction of Elizabeth Rockwell. She continues to perform the repertory of Isadora Duncan, and is dance faculty at Dominican Academy in NYC. Eleanor was a member of Anna Sololow’s Players’ Project for 14 years and is a founding member of Sokolow Theatre/Dance Ensemble. Eleanor reconstructs Anna Sokolow’s repertory and directs rehearsals for the company and for schools and professional dancers. She also oversees costuming for the company.
LAUREN NASLUND (Associate Artistic Director) began her modern dance studies in Chicago with Frances Allis. She holds degrees in biology from the University of Chicago and Harvard. She danced in Cambridge, MA with the Performing Arts Ensemble and the Massachusetts Dance Ensemble and in New York with the theater/dance company Plath/Taucher Productions. She has performed the works of Charles Weidman and Doris Humphrey with Deborah Carr’s Theatre Dance Ensemble, and under the direction of Gail Corbin. She also works with Rae Ballard’s Thoughts in Motion and Andrew Jannetti & Dancers. She was a member of Anna Sokolow’s Players’ Project for 15 years, and is a founding member of Sokolow Theatre/Dance Ensemble. Lauren reconstructs and stages Anna Sokolow’s repertory for the company and for schools and professional dancers.
MARGARET MIGHTY OAK BRACKEY (dancer) is an NYC-based dancer/choreographer/artist. Originally from Madison, Wisconsin, she grew up studying Graham Technique and composition at Kanopy Dance Academy. In 2022, Margaret graduated with Honors and a BFA in Dance from Adelphi University. She currently also performs with the Equus Projects. If not in the studio, she is likely birding, biking, or baking. This is Margaret’s first year with Sokolow Theatre/Dance Ensemble.
ILANA RUTH COHEN (dancer) is from Portland, Oregon, where she grew up dancing in the rain. She graduated from Pomona College with a BA in Modern Dance and Chemistry and is currently a PhD student at the City University of New York where she studies how aquatic plants help to clean our water resources. She has studied at the Limón Institute and the San Francisco Conservatory of Dance. Ilana has performed in works by Anna Sokolow, Doris Humphrey, Jose Limón, Isadora Duncan, Matthew Nelson and John Pennington in New York, California, Oregon and Wisconsin and is a performer with Shadow Box Theater. In 2021, Ilana assisted in setting Anna Sokolow’s Rooms, working both virtually and in person, and has taught modern dance to children at Bay Ridge Ballet and through the Limon4Kids program. Ilana has been a member of the Sokolow Theatre/Dance Ensemble since 2018.
SAMUEL HUMPHREYS (dancer) received his initial training from Brynar Mehl, and then from Larry Ensign, Lori Belilove, the Gelsey Kirkland Ballet Conservatory, and the Martha Graham School. He currently dances with Lori Belilove & The Isadora Duncan Dance Company as well as Shadowbox Theatre. Sam performed with the Sokolow Theatre/Dance Ensemble in 2007 and 2008 and rejoined the company in 2019.
KRISTA JANSEN (dancer) is a dancer and choreographer born, raised and based in New York City. She is one half of the duet company Jansen & Holm, where she performs and choreographs alongside CJ Holm. Her own choreography has been performed at Dixon Place, Triskelion Arts, the Flea, STUFFED! at Movement Research, Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, the 92nd street Y, and for award-winning film with director Bat-Sheva Guez. She was an original cast member and Assistant Rehearsal director for the critically acclaimed “Doug Elkins & Friends’ Fraulein Maria”, and for seven years performed and toured with that production around the United States and Canada. Krista is also a teaching assistant with Ellen Robbins, and choreographs for the Theater program at Beacon high school. Krista joined Sokolow Theatre/Dance Ensemble in 2022.
BRAD OREGO (dancer) hails from Buffalo, NY. He comes from a diverse background in sport, martial art, and dance. His formal dance training began at the University of Rochester, where he earned the University’s first Minor in Dance, along with degrees in Computer Science and Psychology. In 2011, he moved to Madison, WI, where he has danced with Kanopy Dance Company since 2013. Brad moved to NYC in 2017 and continues his training at the Martha Graham Center for Contemporary Dance. He has performed classic works by Anna Sokolow, Charles Weidman, and Martha Graham as well as contemporary work by Lisa Thurrell, Robert Cleary, Corrine Soum & Steven Wasson, Pascal Rioult, Martin Lofsnes, Lonny Gordon, and Stanley Love among others. Brad joined Sokolow Theatre/Dance Ensemble in 2017.
MARGHERITA TISATO (dancer) started studying dance in Italy at the age of 8. Her background is in Humphrey-Limón, contemporary and dance-therapy. She counts in her roster of practices a variety of movement techniques including dance and yoga, but also Butoh, somatic movement, and recently the exploration of body suspension. In New York since 2006, she is also a principal dancer with Dances We Dance and the Vangeline Theater. Margherita has presented her own work in New York and abroad. She is a teacher for the New York Butoh Institute and teaches Butoh workshops internationally. Margherita lives in Brooklyn, teaching meditation, yoga and mindful movement in studios, jails, and substance abuse recovery facilities, and coaching individuals in finding embodiment and recovering from PTSD. In 2019 she joined forces with some chosen family to start Templenewyork, a space dedicated to community and the exploration of bodily potential through education, Shibari, and suspension. Margherita has danced with Sokolow Theatre/Dance Ensemble since 2008.
The Bang Group
THE BANG GROUP is a rhythm-driven, theatrical dance company based in New York City which spans contemporary and percussive forms. The company, founded and directed by Jeffrey Kazin and David Parker in 1995 tours widely throughout North America and Europe and is best-known for its comic/subversive, neo-vaudeville Nutcracker entitled Nut/Cracked, now in its 22nd season. The Bang Group performs regularly in New York City at Arts On Site, 92YNY, New York Live Arts, Danspace Project, The Flea, Symphony Space, and many other venues. TBG has a second home in Boston which it developed through sustained partnerships with Summer Stages Dance, The Institute of Contemporary Art and The Dance Complex. It has also enjoyed 9 seasons at The Yard on Martha’s Vineyard and 16 years in residence at The West End Theater on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. TBG also supports a wide range of New England artists through its DANCE NOW|Boston initiative which enters its 9th season in May 2024. www.thebanggroup.com
DAVID PARKER is a 2013 Guggenheim Fellow for choreography and is, with Jeffrey Kazin, Director of The Bang Group. In addition to his creation of The Bang Group’s repertory, Parker is an educator, writer, dancer and curator. He has served on the faculties of The Juilliard School, Marymount Manhattan College, Princeton University, Hunter College, SUNY Purchase, The Alvin Ailey School, Barnard College, and The Bates Dance Festival. He has created over 60 works on commission for ballet and modern dance companies, soloists, university groups and festivals and has been curator for Arts On Site, 92YNY, The Flea, The West End Theater, Danspace Project’s Platform series, Gibney Dance Center’s Double Plus, and DANCE NOW Boston. He continues to perform in his own work and as a guest artist with Catherine Tharin, New York Theatre Ballet, Sara Rudner, Doug Elkins, Christopher Williams, Caleb Teicher and Sara Hook. His choreographic work is dedicated to aesthetic liberty, creative diversity and craftsmanship.
JEFFREY KAZIN is a founding member and director with David Parker of The Bang Group. He has created and performed signature roles for TBG throughout North America and Europe, working also as David Parker’s assistant creating new works and setting TBG repertory for companies, colleges and universities throughout the U.S. Additionally, he has danced for Doug Elkins (creating the role of the Captain in Fraulein Maria), New York Theatre Ballet (Cinderella), Amber Sloan, Sara Hook, and Monica Bill Barnes. He was the producer of the thrice yearly dance festival, Soaking WET (2003-2018) on NYC’s upper west side and currently produces the series “The Bang Group presents…” at Arts on Site in NYC. Mr. Kazin, a graduate of Connecticut College and the National Theater Institute, has served on several granting panels for the NYC Department of Cultural Affairs, and is a board member of the Peculiar Works Project theater company in New York City, Group Lightening, a health and wellness organization in Boston, MA, and the Renegade Players Theatre Company in Huntsville, AL.
CHELSEA AINSWORTH is a graduate of the Dance Department of The Juilliard School. After graduating she worked with Johannes Wieland/StaatstheaterKassel in Germany, Lorena Egan, Flexicure, Amber Sloan, Bryn Cohn + Artists and was on the modern/ballet dance faculty at Cap21 musical theater school and Chen DanceCenter. Currently she is dancing with The Bang Group, as well as ZviDance. She’s also the co-founder and Executive Director of Arts On Site, a non-profit organization dedicated to supporting artists of all disciplines by offering affordable studio space and hosting monthly events to encourage community collaboration. She also built and curates residencies at a retreat and residency center in the Shawangunk mountains in upstate New York. In 2020 she joined the Dance Advisory Board of Marymount Manhattan College. She is currently on faculty at The Juilliard School, Gibney, Peridance, and SUNY Purchase.
DYLAN BAKER is celebrating his 15th season dancing with The Bang Group and he couldn’t be happier! A New York City based dancer, choreographer, and teaching artist, Dylan is originally from the boondocks of Wisconsin where he acquired a BFA in Dance at The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Apart from dancing with The Bang Group, Dylan can often be found on stage and screen in works by Matthew Westerby Company and Boink! Dance & Film. Behind the scenes, Dylan is the associate producer for the WestFest Dance Festival. When not rehearsing, performing, or producing Mr. Baker wears his teaching hat at The Steffi Nossen School of Dance in White Plains, NY.
LOUISE BENKELMAN originally from Helena, Montana, graduated magna cum laude with honors from Roger Williams University, attaining a BA in Dance Performance. She has created work for Judson Memorial Church, the West End Theatre, Actors Fund Arts Center, Gibney Dance, Arts On Site, Fusionworks Dance Company, RWU, and American College Dance Association Gala. Louise is currently dancing and touring with The Bang Group, exploring solo choreographic ideas, and creating and performing with fellow TBG artist, Tommy Seibold.
TOMMY SEIBOLD, grew up dancing at his mother’s neighborhood studio in the suburbs of Boston. He went on to receive a BFA in Dance from the University of Massachusetts Amherst, part of the Five College Consortium. He is currently celebrating his 9th season with The Bang Group.
AMBER SLOAN, originally from Northern Virginia, has been dancing with The Bang Group since 2002. She is an original cast member of Nut/Cracked, performing in the production every year since its premiere in Italy in 2003. Amber is a 2023 New Jersey Council on the Arts Choreography Fellow and her work has appeared in various venues throughout the US and in Mexico City. She teaches dance composition at The Ailey School, co-directs Women in Motion, and is the Assistant Executive Director of Arts On Site. Amber received a BFA in Dance from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign where she was honored with the Beverly Blossom/Carey Erickson Alumni Dance Award.
Artist turned designer turned creative JEROEN TEUNISSEN has been working in fashion, art, teaching, food and forecasting since 1995. His nonconformist, chaotic yet conceptual approach has led him to various positions over the years, from head design at fashion houses to teaching creative thinking and trend forecasting at art schools, and creative chef at a design museum. He is currently enjoying leisure time, and working on assignments and art projects.
Contact Us
We hope you enjoyed Close Quarters II.
For more information about our special guests The Bang Group, visit their website at www.thebanggroup.com.
For more information about The Sokolow Theatre/Dance Ensemble, please explore the rest of our website (go to home page).
Sign up below for our email list to get notices of upcoming performances and events.