Mount Holyoke’s Department of Dance promises three evenings of entertaining and emotionally riveting dance in its first presentation of the 2001-2002 season November 8-10 at 8 pm in the Kendall Hall Studio Theater. The 2001 faculty dance performance will include modern, jazz, and contemporary ballet styles performed by MHC faculty members, more than thirty students from the Five College Dance Department, and the visiting professionals who are sharing their talent and original works with dance students this year. Tickets are $7 for the general public and $5 for students and seniors. A reception will follow the Friday-evening performance. Call x2848 for reservations.

"The faculty performance is unique in that it is the first time in the six years that I have been with the department that each faculty member is presenting work," said Rose Flachs, associate professor of dance. "It is a concert brimming with creativity in which the diverse talents of the entire department are pooled together, resulting in an unforgettable evening of dance." Flachs will present "Pictures in Your Mind" with her husband, Charles Flachs, associate professor of dance. Their duet will be performed to two pieces of music, "Parlami D’amore," sung by Giuseppe Di Stefano, and "Panis Angelicus," sung by Luciano Pavarotti and Sting. "The duet is an expression of the imagination and the pictures that appear in your imagination when you listen to these great artists sing," said Rose Flachs. "‘C’ Space," a ballet choreographed by her husband to music by Wynton Marsalis, is a group piece that will feature fourteen dancers from the Five Colleges.

Jim Coleman, dance department chair, will present his own choreography in "Is This Desire?," a modern work representing six women in a ritual of communion. In her modern/jazz choreography "For Seven," Terese Freedman, professor of dance, will present seven students in a musical visualization of an arrangement by Jacky Terrason of Cole Porter’s "I Love Paris."

Guest artist Valeria Solomonoff will perform "Maria," a tango-based modern-dance solo. Trained in ballet, modern dance, and Argentine tango, Solomonoff has been studying and performing with the fifty top tango teachers of her native Argentina for the past twelve years. Her work has been featured in films, TV documentaries, and commercials, and her choreographies have been presented in such New York venues as Symphony Space, Town Hall, and Alice Tully Hall. In 1998 she performed for the former president of Argentina, Carlos S. Menem, at the Metropolitan Opera House. Solomonoff is director of Tango Mujer, the only all-women’s tango ensemble; with that troupe, she has toured both America and Europe. She will teach a tango course this spring at MHC.

Pamela Raff, a jazz/tap artist from Boston and currently a visiting artist at Mount Holyoke, will present the choreography of Fayard and Harold Nicholas as she dances with four students to the music of Jelly Roll Morton in "The Nicholas Brothers’ Shim Sham Jam." Raff will display her own choreography in a response to current events called "Starboard." A faculty member at Roger Williams University, Raff helped found the Rhythm Review and Collins and Company performance troupes, codirected Jazz Youth Project for the Boston Public Schools, directed the Leon Collins Dance Studio for seven years, produced the celebrated audio recording "Feet First", and received choreography awards from the Massachusetts Cultural Council, Boston Center for the Arts, and New England Foundation for the Arts. She has collaborated and performed with such jazz greats as Dizzy Gillespie, Alan Dawson, Tierney Sutton, Gregory Hines, Jimmy Slyde, and Patrice Williamson, and has worked venues throughout the United States, Germany, and Singapore.

Later in the year, the dance department will present internationally known choreographer Lila York, who will be creating a new work for students, and Valeria Solomonoff, who will be setting a repertory piece. The two works will be performed either at the Five College Dance Department concert in February or at the student concert in April. Stay tuned for information.