solitudes solo (english version)

In Solitudes Solo, Daniel Léveillé displays some supreme artistry in these essential and spare solo dances. The work, which has won him accolades, bears no commercial compromise and it only fleetingly touches on populist sentiment. His dancers display their toned muscularity and physical ability in five variations. None of the movements the choreographer has devised in Solitudes Solo are easy and each successive dancer offers his/her take on the permutations of the specific movements.

Léveillé structurally sets up stylistic unity by having one dancer perform, exit, change the guard and have another assume his/her starting position. He is a master of orderliness and here he uses compact strategies to showcase human bodies, almost as objects of anatomical study. These are confident bodies ready to move and, in action, the muscles are taut, the thighs bear weight and backs undulate over the spine. He choreographs using glides, pivots, jétés, pliés, and plunges, and with nods to 1970’s modern dance vocabulary.

Léveillé embraces the possibilities in each and every man and woman he’s working with, and in the choreography the angles of the body oppose and complement each other: ...