SPRING RISE UP: A Dance Sensorium
Spring Rise Up: A Dance Sensorium will consist of four dance pieces for the Harry J. Elam, Jr. Theater. Choreography by TAPS Lecturers Ronnie Reddick and Raissa Simpson, TAPS Artist-in-Residence amara tabor-smith, and TAPS Senior Lecturer Aleta Hayes.
Promotional Illustration by Jasmin Zazaboi
ABOUT THE PIECES
Show Up to Show Out!
Director and Choreographer Ronnie Reddick
Show Up to Show Out! opens like a popstar concert with elements of drama and underground trending lyrics, its sexy and hard-hitting choreography makes it very appeasing to the eye. The piece transforms into an Afro Beats segment; 3 soloists will display their individual moves derived from African dance styles and moves. To continue with this African vibe, the piece journeys to an immersive jungle, complete with jungle ambiance and dancers dancing as animals of the jungle to Beyoncé’s “Move feat. Grace Jones”. The jungle morphs into a powerful lyrical segment that is both powerful and emotionally driven. The closing segment of the piece is a fun upbeat dance number filled with joy and a bit of contiguous energy.
EMSEMBLE
Jasmine Agyepong
Zion Asemota
Emmanuel Balogun
Amanda Campos
Marc Cunanan Chappelle
Clément Dieulesaint
Jasmine Gonzalez
Mia Kanter
Kate Kingsley
Kat Kornegay
Heidi Kwong
Julia Leal
Gabriella Mesa
Ayanna Minnihan
Yahaya Ndutu
Chinazom Okafor
Madison Quig
Victor Ragsdale
Nadia Svanidze
Karina Ting
Beau Tse
Kelechi Uhegbu
Kaela Verner
Felix Zhan
Show Up To Show Out! consists of five sections
1 — THE COUNTDOWN
Song
Pure Honey
Performers
Guys
Yahaya Ndutu
Victor Ragsdale/Marc Cunanan Chappelle
Beau Tse/Felix Zhan
Ladies
Jasmine Agyepong
Zion Asemota
Amanda Campos
Julia Leal
Mia Kanter
Kate Kingsley
Chinazom Okafor
Madison Quig
2 — THE ARRIVAL
Song
Din Daa Daa – Afro Freestyle
Performers
Emmanuel Balogun
Jasmine Agyepong
Yahaya Ndutu
3 — DISEMBARKATION
Song
Move – The Urban Jungle
Group 1 — Snakes
Choreography by Ronnie Reddick
Performers
Mia Kanter
Kat Kornegay
Chinazom Okafor
Nadia Svanidze
Beau Tse
Victor Ragsdale
Group 2 — Zebra
Choreography by Jasmine Agyepong
Performers
Jasmine Gonzalez
Heidi Kwong
Karina Ting
Kelechi Uhegbu
Felix Zhan
Group 3 — Leopards
Choreography by Marc Cunanan Chappelle
Performers
Clément Dieulesaint
Julia Leal
Kate Kingsley
Yahaya Ndutu
Group 4 — Birds of Paradise
Choreography by Zion Asemota
Performers
Amanda Campos
Gabriella Mesa
Ayanna Minnihan
Madison Quig
Kaela Verner
4 — EMERGER
Song
Lift Me Up
Directed by Ronnie Reddick with Solos Choreographed by the Dancers
Performers
Amanda Campos
Chinazom Okafor (Thu&Sat)/Julia Leal (Fri)
Marc Cunanan Chappelle
Emmanuel Balogun
5 — THE CESSATION
Song
BOOTY
Performers
Entire Cast
FALL/FLIGHT
Conceived and Directed by Raissa Simpson with input from the students of TAPS
FALL/FLIGHT is a post-disciplinary dance depicting the visible and invisible struggles of equity and access for women in today’s 21st-century world. The creation of the dance included a dialogic process by incorporating the voices of six women who then embodied their stories into an Aerial dance. Later, the cast added members to help assist the Aerialists fly in the air through the usage of set pieces. The exploration of feminism and modern-day womanism are key components to FALL/FLIGHT’s ongoing theme.
COMPOSER
Miles Lassi
AERIAL DANCERS
Nicole Corso
Ishita Gupta
Katelyn Kramer
Julia Leal
Arantzazu Ramos
Dawn Royster
GROUND DANCERS
Marc Cunanan Chappelle
Caroline Dee
Natalia Linn
Erik K. Raymond Lee*
Ameia Smith*
Karina Ting
*Professional artists courtesy of PUSH Dance Company
Glory
Direction and Choreography by amara tabor-smith in collaboration with the performers
Glory celebrates and remembers the life, work and legacy of writer, teacher, and cultural critic bell hooks. bell hooks (1952-2021) was born Gloria Jean Watkins in Hopkinsville, Kentucky, the daughter of Veodis Watkins and Rosa Bell. She was a trailblazing cultural theorist and activist, public intellectual, teacher and feminist writer, and author of over 40 books. Her writing passionately explored the intersecting oppressions of gender, race and class, reflecting her concerns with issues related to art, feminism, psychology, spirituality, community, home and love. With her first publication, she began to use the pseudonym bell hooks — a name she adopted in honor of her maternal great-grandmother, written in lowercase so as to keep the focus on her work rather than on her own persona. She produced radical writings that shaped popular and academic discourse utilizing storytelling as effectively as social theory. bell hooks died December 15, 2021 from Kidney Failure.
This piece received funding and support from Stanford Institute for Diversity of the Arts.
VIDEO DESIGN
Alisha Wormsley
SOUND AND MUSIC DESIGN
Ricardo Iamuuri
TEXT
bell hooks
PERFORMERS
Marc Cunanan Chappelle
Clément Dieulesaint
Julia Leal
Suhaila Meera
Nate Ramos
Kennedy Reed
Tuesday Utz
SPECIAL THANKS
Stephanie Hunt
Weather Simulator
Choreography by Aleta Hayes in collaboration with The Chocolate Heads Movement Band
The Chocolate Heads Movement Band presents Weather Simulator, a site-specific dance event, the final iteration of the ongoing 2022-2023 Chocolate Heads’ “Weather Simulator” Project. Through this poetic simulator, we are exploring the relationship between weather, emotion, and human social life. In an unpredictable world of climate catastrophes, how can we inspire hope and creative agency through our collective imagination?
DANCERS/CO-COLLABORATORS
Sala Ba
Marielle Burt
David Fox
Dakota Gelman
Hannah Heigold
Indigo Holt
Robert Igbokwe
Iliana Jaiteh
Kendall Johnson
Chhavi Nahata
Isadora Passos
Nate Ramos
Chinemere Uche
Journey Washingtonhigh
Sid Zhang
Music Supervisor
Patrick Lotilla
Visual Design
Sasha Sokolova
Hair Designer
Destiny Shango Kelly
Choreographic Consultant
Karin Moriarty
Special Thanks
A-lan Holt, Stanford Institute for Diversity in the Arts
PRODUCTION DESIGNERS & CREW
Choreographers
Aleta Hayes, Ronnie Reddick, Raissa Simpson, amara tabor-smith
Set Designer
Nina Ball
Lighting Designer
Allen Willner
Costume Designer
Becky Bodurtha
Projection Designer/Audio Engineer
Ryan Yu
Props Artisan
Stefanie Manno
Stage Manager
Grace Ortega
Assistant Stage Manager
Kiki Hood
Assistant Set Designer
Lainy Ross
Assistant Costume Designers
Catherine Sarca, Elzi Thomas
Light Board Operator
Sam Howell Petersen
Sound/Video Operator
Priscilla de la Rosa
Dresser
Naomi Gong
Deck Crew
Diana Gonzalez
ADMISSION
$5-$20 | Advanced Purchase Required
SOLD OUT?
There’s still a (very good) chance to see the show! CLICK HERE to see how our waitlist policy works.
WHEN
THURSDAY through SATURDAY
MAY 25-27 at 8PM
There will be no late seating or re-seating while the performance is in progress.
WHERE
HARRY J. ELAM, JR. THEATER IN ROBLE GYM
375 Santa Teresa Street
Stanford University Main Campus
RUN TIME
This production runs approximately 90 minutes and is presented without intermission.
SPONSORS
This production was made possible in part by Stanford’s Institute for Diversity in the Arts, the Pigott Fund for Drama, the May Ellen Ritter Production Fund, and the Drs. Ben and A. Jess Shenson Fund
IMPORTANT INFO
LATE SEATING / RE-SEATING
For safety reasons, we cannot accommodate late admission OR re-seating while the performance is in progress. Please plan on arriving with ample time to find parking, locate the theater, move through the box office, etc.
SPECIAL EFFECTS
This production makes use of strobe lighting effects and water-based haze.
ACCOMMODATIONS
Electronic Assisted Listening Devices will be available for pickup at the Box Office on performance nights.
For disability-related accommodations, please contact: tapsinformation@stanford.edu. Requests should be made by May 18.
COVID-19 POLICY
Patrons should not attend events if they are experiencing symptoms of upper respiratory illness. If patrons should test positive for COVID-19 within ten days of being on campus, they should report using the General COVID-19 Case Reporting Form.
FILMING NOTICE
The Saturday, May 27th, performance will be recorded for future public viewing. Cameras in the theater may incidentally capture audience images and audio in the background. Ticket Purchasers must alert all members of their party to this possibility, and refrain from purchasing tickets before receiving their Party’s consent.
ABOUT THE CHOREOGRAPHERS
ALETA HAYES
Weather Simulator
Aleta Hayes, Senior Lecturer and Coordinator of the Dance Concentration in TAPS, is a performer, choreographer, and teacher between the worlds of dance, theater, and music. She has performed in New York and around the world with Robert Wilson, Ping Chong, Jane Comfort, and Martha Clarke. Now teaching at her alma mater, Stanford University, Hayes has performed, choreographed, and collaborated with directors including: Harry Elam (In the Blood, Spring Awakening, Rent, and Raisin in the Sun), Rush Rehm (Sophocles’ Electra, Africa Onstage-Les Blancs, Deianeira, Hecuba (performed at Stanford and Athens, Greece), Samer Al-Saber (Traveling in Place), Michael Rau (Everybody), amara tabor-smith (Revival) and Jamie Lyons (Riot of Spring). Her campus collaborations in dance and teaching include the Institute for Diversity in the Arts, The Memorial Church, the Committee on Black Performing Arts, Medicine and the Muse, the Clayman Institute, the Knight-Hennessy Scholars, and the d.school.
In 2009, Hayes founded the Chocolate Heads Movement Band, an interdisciplinary, dance and movement-driven, prototypical performance troupe that has performed on campus at the Cantor Arts Center (Being Scene, Fashion Fable), The MacMurtry Art and Art History Building (Space Launch); Anderson Collection (Scene in Action, Figures in a California Landscape-Manuel Neri)), The Bing (Xocatl), Memorial Auditorium (Spring Charette), Green Library (Chocolate Ball for Polymaths), the Windhover (Flower- A Moving Meditation), and Roble Gym (Ghost Architecture).
RONNIE REDDICK
Show Up to Show Out!
Ronnie Reddick is a San Francisco-based choreographer and dancer known for his explosive style, combining hip hop, jazz, fashion, and theatrics. With over two decades of experience, Reddick has worked with a diverse range of artists and corporations, including Michael & Janet Jackson, Snoop Dogg, Coca-Cola, and Microsoft. Along with his busy career, Mr. Reddick is also the choreographer and Show/Creative Director at AsiaSF San Francisco which just recently celebrated 25 yrs of performing for over a million people. This unique restaurant/dining experience is taking the world by storm and features the most beautiful transgender women in the world.
Reddick teaches at TAPS and Santa Clara University, and has conducted masterclasses around the world, including Princeton University, Japan, South Korea, Mexico, and Canada. He continues to work with, train, and inspire dancers that are now dancing around the world. Reddick also teaches dancers about the business of dance and how to work in today’s world as a professional, commercial dancer.
RAISSA SIMPSON
FALL/FLIGHT
Raissa Simpson is a scholar and artistic director of PUSH Dance Company. She has performed and choreographed across major U.S. venues such as Jacob’s Pillow, Dance St. Louis, Joyce SoHo and the Ferst Center for the Arts at Georgia Tech. A graduate of SUNY Purchase with an MFA from UC Davis, Simpson had an extensive performance career with Robert Moses Kin and Joanna Haigood’s Zaccho Dance Theatre. Her artistic residencies include Montalvo Arts Center, Aspen Fringe Festival, among others. She has published numerous articles about the body as a site for racial discourse alongside new media and technology. Portrait by Scott Horton.
amara tabor-smith
Glory
amara tabor-smith is an Oakland, CA based choreographer, performance maker, cultural worker, and the artistic director of Deep Waters Dance Theater. She describes her work as Conjure Art. Her interdisciplinary performance making practice utilizes Yoruba Lukumí spiritual technologies to address issues of social and environmental justice, race, gender identity, and belonging. amara recently completed a multi-year project, House/Full of Blackwomen created in collaboration with Ellen Sebastian Chang and a collective of artists and activists, which addressed the displacement, well being and sex-trafficking of black women and girls in Oakland. Her work has been performed nationally and internationally. She is a 2021 Rainin Fellow, a 2019 Dance/USA Fellow, 2018 United States Artist Fellow, 2018 recipient of KQED’s “Bay Brilliant” award, and a 2017 Urban Bush Women Choreographic Center Fellow. At Stanford amara is an artist in residence through TAPS and IDA and is the artistic director of Committee on Black Performing Arts (CBPA). Portrait by Jean Melesaine.
THE CREATIVE PROCESS
TABLEWORK
TAPS’s video series TABLEWORK, hosted by PhD student Marina Johnson, is a behind-the-scenes look at the scholarly and artistic efforts behind each production. These episodes feature Spring Rise Up choreographers Ronnie Reddick, Raissa Simpson, amara tabor-smith, and Aleta Hayes.