December 7, 2016
In a thorough review of hip-hop dance competitions, Racked’s Stephie Grob Plante gathered insights from USC Kaufman faculty member and hip-hop thought leader E. Moncell Durden.
“Hip-hop is now a mainstream dance form, not just across the US, but internationally as well. And once something gets that big and that ubiquitous, the end result is similar to a game of telephone: a mashup that constantly evolves with each new interpretation… Durden, the USC dance professor, who is also a member of the trailblazing hip-hop dance group Mop Top Crew, explains how much the form has grown since he first started dancing,” writes Grob Plante.
Read the article on Racked.
November 17, 2016
PBS Rewire featured USC Kaufman faculty member William Forsythe, in an article about Celebrate Forsythe and the choreographer’s teaching philosophy at USC Kaufman.
“Forsythe is a legend in dance. As such, his resume is as uniquely varied as it is lengthy. He danced with the Joffrey Ballet. He developed dance software in the ’90s, and he’s created short films about dance throughout his five decades working as a choreographer and dancer. He’s pushed ballet toward modern dance and vice versa. Securing him to spark the dancers at USC was ingenious,” writes PBS Rewire’s Henry Cherry.
Read the article on Rewire.
November 10, 2016
KUSC’s Sheila Tepper talked to USC Kaufman’s vice dean and director, Jodie Gates.
“As the school’s first director, Gates was given unprecedented responsibility for implementing the artistic vision and creating a dance curriculum and faculty from the ground up. The resulting curriculum called The New Movement is a new hybrid model for dance,” noted KUSC.
Listen to the interview on KUSC.
November 3, 2016
USC Kaufman faculty member Jackie Kopcsak explains her dance philosophy and her history background, and how she brings them together in her classes at USC Kaufman.
October 28, 2016
Why does the orchestra tune to the oboe? Why doesn’t the audience clap between movements at a symphony performance? Why is Tchaikovsky’s “1812 Overture” played on the Fourth of July?
Dean Robert A. Cutietta has been answering puzzling and persnickety questions like these on Classical KUSC’s “Ask the Dean” weekly radio feature on its Arts Alive show since 2006. He now has compiled and tweaked some 140 of his favorite questions from the show for his new book, Who Knew?: Answers to Questions About Classical Music You Never Thought to Ask, from Oxford University Press.
October 26, 2016
The USC Choreographic Institute presented a lecture the evening of Oct. 14 in the performance studio at the Glorya Kaufman International Dance Center featuring the research of Norah Zuniga Shaw and William Forsythe, co-creators with animator Maria Palazzi of the award-winning interactive web project Synchronous Objects.
October 26, 2016
Faculty member Achinta S. McDaniel joined the USC Kaufman School of Dance this fall, introducing Bollywood dance to the school’s curriculum. A pioneer in contemporary Indian dance style, McDaniel is proud to create “truly American” dance works, which she defines as the product of hybrid multicultural references.
October 25, 2016
USC Kaufman professor William Forsythe was recently highlighted in Dance Informa, in an article that discussed his involvement in Los Angeles: at USC Kaufman, the Music Center, and LACMA as a part of Fall for Forsythe.
“Active in the field of choreography for more than 45 years, Forsythe has been acknowledged for reorienting the practice of ballet from its identification with classical repertoire to a dynamic 21st century art form. His deep interest in the fundamental principles of organization has led him to produce a wide range of projects including installations, film and web-based knowledge creation,” Dance Informa notes.
Read the full story.
October 23, 2016
USC Kaufman and Celebrate Forsythe appeared Oct. 21 in the Los Angeles Daily News. Writer Sandra Barerra discusses the school’s founding and the Music Center’s Celebrate Forsythe, as well as professor William Forsythe and his involvement with USC Kaufman.
“By graduation, students will have interacted with dance luminaries, many of whom are on the faculty. Did we mention William Forsythe is an esteemed professor here?” she writes.
Read the full story.
October 19, 2016
LACMA presented Site-Specific Forsythe on Oct. 15 and 16, displaying fresh adaptations of two pieces by acclaimed choreographer William Forsythe. Staged at different spaces, “Stellentstellen” and “Acquisition” generated new dialogues between visitors, dancers and the museum itself.
