Make time during this holiday season for dance! At the Joyce Theater, performer and choreographer Ephrat Asherie and her company Ephrat Asherie Dance, with pianist and composer Arturo O’Farrill, come together again, Dec. 3-7 for their newest creation “Shadow Cities.” “A contemplative and multifaceted reflection on the beauty, vastness, and joy of the in-between, “Shadow Cities,” with a cast of six dancers and four musicians, explores the myriad ways they feel split between cities, memories, and generations, encountering their most enlivened selves in unexpected moments,” notes the release. With live music by Arturo O’Farrill and Friends, “Shadow Cities” becomes a conversation between O’Farrill’s compositional voice and Asherie’s idiosyncratic movement language. For more information visit ephratasheriedance.com and joyce.org.
ALSO THIS MONTH:
Dec. 3- Jan. 4: Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater returns to New York City Center for its annual multi-week engagement under newly appointed artistic director Alicia Graf Mack. This year’s program will include world premieres by Maija García (“Jazz Island”), Fredrick Earl Mosley (“Embrace”), Matthew Neenan (“Difference Between”), Jamar Roberts (“Song of the Anchorite”), and Jawole Willa Jo Zollar, Samantha Figgins, and Chalvar Monteiro (“Holy Blues”), along with company premiere, “Blink of an Eye”, by Medhi Walerski, a new production of Judith Jamison’s “A Case of You,” and a repertory works, including Ronald K. Brown’s “Grace” and Alvin Ailey’s timeless “Revelations.” For more information visit ailey.org.
Dec. 3-7: Leslie Cuyjet’s “For All Your Life,” a multi-layered solo performance, interrogates the value of life and death through a screening, a sales pitch, and a deep look into the life insurance industry’s historical ties to slavery, revealing how systems of power have long monetized human lives — particularly Black lives. This is a debut performance for Cuyjet. For more information visit bam.org.
Dec. 4-6: At TRISK, featured will be new works by early-career movement artists Ariana Speight in “PSA,” and Cristina Moya-Palacios in “All Immerican Dream Girl!” For more information visit triskelionarts.org.
Dec. 5-6: For CPR’s Fall Movement program, where artists present new, fully-produced works, featured will be Justin Allen, Kaye Hurley, Nadia Khayrallah, Ibuki Kuramochi, Marie Lloyd Paspe, and Sylvain Souklaye. For more information visit cprnyc.org.
Dec. 9-14: LaTasha Barnes joins Caleb Teicher and collaborators Evita Arce, Nathan Bugh, and Eyal Vilner in “A Very SW!NG OUT Holiday” at The Joyce. For more information visit joyce.org.
Dec. 11 -13: Dominica Greene and Malcolm-x Betts share an evening of new dance works at Danspace Project. Greene’s new work “endlessend” considers all the variable outcomes in a game of life endings, while Betts’ “fly baby fly” is for his older cousin Michael, who died of AIDS. For more information visit danspaceproject.org.
Dec. 12: Princess Lockerooo’s “The NutWAACKer” is a Works & Process presentation at the Guggenheim that reimagines the holiday classic with the energy of New York City’s underground dance culture. For more information visit worksandprocess.org.
Dec. 12: For the celebration of the life and music of jazz legend Duke Ellington, the Duke Ellington Center for the Arts, in association with the American Tap Dance Foundation, brings together a lineup of dancers, musicians, and vocalists at Symphony Space. For more information visit symphonyspace.org.
Dec. 14: The “Sundays on Broadway” series curated by Cathy Weis at WeisAcres closes the season with new and in-process works by Katrina Reid, Vicky Shick, and Demetris Charalambous & Quique. For more information visit cathyweis.org.