SDT @ the edinburgh fringe

Wednesday, August 18, 2004

Seductive Steps

Festival Dance: Scottish Dance Theatre - Dance Base until August 22

Reviewed by Elizabeth Schwyzer
Sunday Herald Edinburgh Scotland

It’s not just hype – Scottish Dance Theatre really is on top form, and this Fringe programme shows off its delectable dancing. In utterly distinct styles, both Didy Veldman’s Track and Sean Feldman’s Moment explore themes of competition and seduction, and the interplay between desire and rejection.

Moment is wonderfully evocative, full of aggressive slashes and great lunging grasps executed with startling fluidity and set to Tim Motzer’s pulsating, percussive soundscape. Track takes a more literal tack, contrasting Victoria Roberts tottering on blood-red heels with Philippa White in her panties going to extreme lengths with a roll of masking tape. In an intimate space like this, detail is everything, and these dancers really hold up under close scrutiny, because they know how to dance with one another. It’s the moments of recognition between them that makes Scottish Dance Theatre such a joy to watch.

SDT @ the place, london

Sunday, August 15, 2004

Scottish Dance Theatre, The Place, London
By Zoe Anderson
06 April 2004

Scottish Dance Theatre is a small company with a growing reputation. Since Janet Smith took over as director seven years ago, the company has been touring more widely, in larger venues and with a more ambitious repertoire. The current tour shows works made for the company within the past year; two have commissioned scores. New choreography is a gamble, and these works are patchy. But it's a direct, lively performance.



The strongest piece is Sean Feldman's Moment. Seven dancers run in and out of solos and group dances, tilting and swinging. Tim Motzer's new score moves from electronic bleeps to gasps and voices. Feldman gets more imaginative as soon as the human voice comes in. A long section of laboured breathing and speech is set as a duet for Philippa White and Baptiste Bourgougnon. They circle around each other, closing and separating. As White steps towards Bourgougnon, she tips right over into a fall. Each time, he catches her and turns, swinging her round with him. It's a lurching, dipping spin, a fall that starts to look like a waltz.