Religion & the Arts: Alvin Ailey’s American
Dance Theatre
Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre started in 1958
as a place for black dancers and choreographers. Based in
Ailey, whose first ballets were about black roots,
was raised in
“I wanted a large, black company that concentrated
on southern material. It’s all about spirituals: folk, blues, and gospel songs.
I wanted to celebrate the Black Experience… the choreography is about the
beauty of black people.”
While Ailey wanted to showcase beauty, intelligence,
elegance, self-love, and the ability to “transmit [emotion] through discipline,”
his company is also a social statement.
“I am concerned with social statements because I am a black person who was growing up in a country which was intensely racist. Revelations is in its way a social statement; the very idea of having a company of primarily black dancers is a social statement.”
Revelations
AAATD’s highly-acclaimed signature piece, Revelations, was choreographed in 1960
and is still performed today. Ailey described the piece as “very personal,” and
credits that with the piece’s success. The piece uses ten songs throughout 3
suites to express three different experiences.
“The Pilgrim of Sorrow” is about “the black person’s
desire to get out of the situation in the South.”
Ailey describes “Fix Me Jesus,” one of the songs
used in the first movement, as “spiritual aspiration.” The section incorporates
two dancers, one as a searcher, and one in a Jesus-like role of the supporter:
“Take Me to the Water,” the second movement, is
about Ailey’s “intense memory” of his baptism.
The third, “Move Members Move” illustrates a Sunday
morning:
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view excerpts of this performance.