© 2019
Choreography by Reggie Wilson
Costumes by Naoko Nagata and Enver Chakartash
Lighting Design by Jonathan Belcher
Cast: Hadar Ahuvia, Rhetta Aleong, Paul Hamilton, Lawrence Harding, Michel Kouakou, Clement Mensah, Gabriela Silva, Annie Wang, Michelle Yard, Miles Yeung, with Reggie Wilson
Music: The Staple Singers; John Davis, Bessie Jones & St. Simon’s Island Singers; Meredith Monk; Lonnie Young, Ed Young and Lonnie Young Jr.; Craig Loftis; Henry Williams, Henry Thomas, George Roberts, Allan Lovelace; Omar Thiam with Jam Begum & Khady Saar; Edna Wright, Henry Thomas, Henry Williams & Margaret Wright
Live vocals selected and arranged by Reggie Wilson
“Outside Eyes”: Susan Manning and Phyllis Lamhut
Math Advisor: Jesse Wolfson
Donated materials:
Indigo batik cloth: Lynden Sculpture Garden, Arianne King Comer with Adjua Nsoroma and Fist & Heel
Shaker peg rails: Lorraine E. Weiss of the Shaker Heritage Society (Watervliet) and Richard Flanders of the Northeastern Woodworkers Association. Shaker archives and research: Hancock Shaker Village; Mount Lebanon Shaker Society
POWER is dedicated to The Dead
WORLD PREMIERE
Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival
July 10-14 2019
NY PREMIERE
BAM Harvey Theater
2022
SELECTED REVIEWS
"Wilson’s variation on the theme is fueled by his discovery that there were black Shakers once upon a time" - Boston Globe
(full review)
”It may be a gift to be simple, but there was deep complexity underlying the simplicity here " - Berkshire on Stage
(full review)
MORE INFO ON POWER
Photos: © Christopher Duggan, courtesy of Jacob's Pillow
The Company’s name is derived from enslaved Africans in the Americas who reinvented their spiritual traditions as a soulful art form that white and black authorities dismissed as merely ‘fist and heel worshipping'.
Reggie Wilson/Fist and Heel Performance Group is a Brooklyn-based dance company whose mission is to create, research, develop, and present new performance work that investigates the intersections of culture and movement practices. The Company’s body-of-works draw from the spiritual and mundane traditions of Africa and its Diaspora; Fist and Heel believes in the potential of the body as a valid means for knowing.
The choreography of Reggie Wilson displays rigor, structure and craft in a postmodern dance vernacular. His choreography expands the limitations of textbook definitions of ‘black dance’ and range from strict dance pieces to full, all-inclusive performance art pieces with arranged vocalizations, text, and inclusion of other media. Fist and Heel’s performance works strive for authenticity and respect of Reggie Wilson’s creative vision.
The Company has received support from major foundations and corporations and has performed in the United States and abroad at notable venues including Dance Theater Workshop, New York Live Arts, Brooklyn Academy of Music, REDCAT, John Michael Kohler Arts Center, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, and Festival Kaay Fecc in Senegal.
© 2016
Choreography by Reggie Wilson
Lighting Design by Chris Kuhl
Video Collaboration with Aitor Mendilibar
Costumes by Enver Chakartash
Cast: Yeman Brown, Raja Feather Kelly, Clement Mensah, Anna Schon, and Annie Wang.
Music: Rev. Olsie Cowan; Baaba Maal; Aster Aweke; Tchad Blake; The La Drivers Union Por Por Group; Fist & Heel Performance Group; The Singing and Prayer Bands of Maryland and Delaware; “Young Tikar Woman”; Gonga Sarki Birgui and Hamadjam Sarki Siyawa; Local musicians from the Border Area of the Ivory Coast and Burkina Faso
Choreographic Advisor: Phyllis Lamhut
All performances of CITIZEN are performed in loving memory of our Carrie Wood and Thomas French.
WORLD PREMIERE
Philadelphia Fringe Arts
September 8-10 2016
NY PREMIERE
2016 Next Wave Festival
BAM Harvey Theater
December 14-17 2016
SELECTED REVIEWS
"Wilson and his dancers beautifully articulate humankind’s desire to belong." -Phindie
(full review)
"deeply felt, stinging solos" - Philadelphia Inquirer
(full review)
"CITIZEN, Wilson's exploration of group and individual identity, history, and belonging, proceeds with mesmerizingly virtuosic solos and groupings." -THINKing Dance
(full review)
Photos: © Aitor Mendilibar
© 2013
Choreography by Reggie Wilson
Lighting Design by Jonathan Belcher
Costume Design by Naoko Nagata
Dramaturgy by Susan Manning
Cast: Rhetta Aleong, Dwayne Brown, Yeman Brown, Paul Hamilton, Lawrence Harding, Raja Feather Kelly, Clement Mensah and Anna Schon and Reggie Wilson
Music: Louis Armstrong; The Klezmatics; Amahlokohlo; Ngqoko Women’s Ensemble; Mazaher; Aly Us; The Growling Tiger; Bi Kidude; Southern Sons; The Blind Boys of Alabama.
Live vocals-original composed by Reggie Wilson
Traditional live vocals arranged by Reggie Wilson
Sound Engineered by Dave Synder
Assistant to Engineer Matt Hall
Choreographic Advisor: Phyllis Lamhut
Math/Fractal Symmetry Consultant: Jesse Wolfson
70 minutes running time
WORLD PREMIERE
Philadelphia Fringe Arts
Suzanna Roberts Theater
September 19-21 2013
NY PREMIERE
2014 Next Wave Festival
BAM Harvey Theater
December 4-7 2013
SELECTED REVIEWS
"Ideas lead to other ideas and accumulate in clusters before he translates them into sensual, structurally complex performances." - NYT
(full review)
"The movement sustained a muscular power and psychological drive that throbbed with a kinesthetic impact on the viewer... into a glorying of movement in all its fluidity" - ABQ Journal
(full review)
© 2012
`Hard Heads Make Soft Tales (a Sweetie)
`the duet (2012 source works from 1989-2009)
`INTRODUCTION (1996)
`Big BRICK: a man's piece (2002)
Choreography by Reggie Wilson
Lighting Design by Jonathan Belcher
Costume Design by Epperson
Cast: Rhetta Aleong, Dwayne Brown, Paul Hamilton, Lawrence Harding, Raja Feather Kelly, Malcolm Jason Low, Clement Mensah and Anna Schon (Andrè M. Zachery - Understudy) and Reggie Wilson
Music: The Ngqoko Women's Ensemble, Traditional Music Arranged by Reggie Wilson
Live vocals arranged by Reggie Wilson
70 minutes running time
NY PREMIERE
New York Live Arts
March 14-17, 2014
SELECTED REVIEWS
"Voice and body share a powerful communion" - NYT (full review)
"Reggie Wilson embodies the Ghanaian Akan symbol of Sankofa, a bird that looks backward, revisiting the past, to seek the egg that will hatch its future." - Dance Magazine (full review)
© 2009
Project Direction Reggie Wilson
Co-Choreography Reggie Wilson
Co-Choreography Andrèya Ouamba
Co-Lighting Design Jonathan Belcher
Co-Lighting Design Carrie Wood
Costume Design Naoko Nagata
Cast: Rhetta Aleong, Fatou Cisse*, Marcel Gbeffa*, Michel Kouakou, Paul Hamilton, and Anna Schon and Reggie Wilson
Music: Franklin Boukaka, Traditional Atege-Gabon (the village of Odjouma), Aretha Franklin, Serge & Dechaux, Sister Rosetta Tharpe, mixed by Craig Loftis, Franco and Le Tpok Jazz, Robert Belfour.
75 minutes running time
WORLD PREMIERE
Walker Arts Center
McGuire Theater
November 12-14, 2009
NY PREMIERE
2009 Next Wave Festival
BAM Howard Gilman Opera House
December 16-19, 2009
SELECTED REVIEWS
"The Good Dance is the final offering of the 2009 Next Wave Festival, and it’s hard to imagine going out on a higher note than this meticulously constructed, beautiful work." -NYT (full review)
"The Good Dance really does communicate viscerally and visually. In what seems to be an effort to suggest the flow of influence between the two continents, the eight dancers kick, shovel, toss, and carry 300 plastic water bottles back and forth from one side of the stage to the other. The piece is honest about the differences and rivalries between the two cultures, but it's dominated by an underlying sense of affinity and kinship." -Chicago Reader (full review)
Through travel and ethnographic research, Wilson incorporates performance practices of the African diaspora into his choreography, and in so doing updates the research-to-performance methodology of Zora Neale Hurston, Katherine Dunham and Pearl Primus from mid-century.
At the same time he freely borrows movement material and compositional devices from a wide range of sources, blurring the distinction between black dance and modern dance and challenging spectators to recognize the global circulation of American and African cultures. Wilson pushes us to reconsider the transnational circulation of modern dance, for his encounters with Phyllis Lamhut, Ohad Naharin, Noble Douglass and Andreya Ouamba call for a global dance history, rather than histories premised on a single nation-state or subculture.
© 2006
Choreography by Reggie Wilson
Lighting and Set Design by Jonathan Belcher
Costume Design by Naoko Nagata
Cast: Rhetta Aleong, Elaine Flowers, Paul Hamilton, Lawrence Harding, Penelope Kalloo, Michael Kouakou, Pene McCourty and Reggie Wilson
Music: Denise Williams, Jimmie Lunceford and His Orchestra, Dickie Wells' Shim Shammers, Grace Jones, Timmy, and R. Kelly and Thione Seck.
Traditional songs collected and arranged by Reggie Wilson
Sound Engineered by William Moses
Choreographic Advisor: Phyllis Lamhut
65 minutes running time
NY PREMIERE
Dance Theater Workshop
February 15, 2006
SELECTED REVIEW
"a concise gem of a world, where music and movement are sewn together by a social dance form called stepping". - NYT
(full review)
© 2004
PROJECT DIRECTION BY Reggie Wilson/Fist and Heel Performance Group
Artistic Direction by Reggie Wilson, Noble Douglas, and Thomeki Dube
Lighting Design by Tyler Micoleau
Visual Design by Thabiso Phokompe
Costume Design by Adrienne McDonald
Performed by: Reggie Wilson/ Fist and Heel Performance Group: Rhetta Aleong, Paul Hamilton, Penelope Kalloo, Pene McCourty, Reggie Wilson. Noble Douglas Dance Company: Charlene Harris, Richard Lessey, Louanna Martin. Black Umfolosi: Thomeki Dube, Dumisani Ndlovu, Brian Sibanda, Clemence Sibanda
Sound Consultant: John Guth
70 minutes running time
NY PREMIERE
Dance Theater Workshop
October 22, 2003
SELECTED REVIEW
"they create a community not only among the dancers themselves, but also between the dancers and the audience." - Critical Dance
(full review)
MORE INFO ON BLACK BURLESQUE (REVISITED)
GENERAL INQUIRIES
Hillary Kooistra
Company & Logistics Manager
hkooistra@fistandheelperformancegroup.org
Rhetta Aleong
Administrator
RAleong@fistandheelperformancegroup.org
Mailing Address
476 Dean St, Suite 3
Brooklyn, NY 11217
ph. 718.636.9509
BOOKING
Sophie Myrtil-Mcourty
© 2014, LOTUS ARTS MANAGEMENT
72-11 Austin Street, #371
Forest Hills, NY 11375
INFO@LOTUSARTSMGMT.COM
ph. (347) 721–8724
© 2002
2002 BESSIE AWARD
`INTRODUCTION (1996)
`Rise, Sally, Rise (2000)
`Big BRICK: a man's piece (2002)
Choreography by Reggie Wilson
Lighting Design by Kathy Kaufman
Costume Design by Epperson; Darrell Cortez
Cast: Rhetta Aleong, Nicole Falloon, Elaine Flowers, Paul Hamilton, Lawrence Harding, John Hunte, Penelope Kalloo, Edward Lawrence, Baraka De Soleil, Stephaine Tooman and Reggie Wilson
Live vocals arranged by Reggie Wilson
70 minutes running time
NY PREMIERE
Danspace Project at St. Marks Church
April 2, 2002
SELECTED REVIEW
"typical Wilson, making works at once blatant and subtle, substantial and mystical, as expressive as the drums slave masters forbade captured Africans to play" - Village Voice (full review)
© 2000
"Wangena" means "s/he is coming in" the Ndeble language of Zimbawbe.
`INTRODUCTION (1996)
`Jumping the Broom (2000)
`Rise, Sally, Rise (2000)
`Vanitystarts@home (2000)
`PANG (2000)
Choreography by Reggie Wilson
Lighting Design by Jonathan Belcher
Costume Design by Darrell Cortez
Cast: Rhetta Aleong, Nicole Falloon, Elaine Flowers, Paul Hamilton, Lawrence Harding, John Hunte, Penelope Kalloo, Richard Rivera, Stephaine Tooman and Reggie Wilson
Music: Lillie Mae Kirkman, Lonnie Young, Ed Young and Lonnie Young Jr., Al Miller and his Swing Stompers and Blind Willie McTell
Live Vocals arranged by Reggie Wilson
70 minutes running time
NY PREMIERE
Dance Theater Workshop
September 13-30, 2000
SELECTED REVIEW
"Mr. Wilson punctuated his words with rhythmic sways, gentle stamps and meditative humming that filled the solo with a quiet fervor." - NYT (full review)
