Not Ailing

Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater

Through Sunday, April 13

At Wang Center for Performing Arts

A SERIES OF theme evenings--like Wednesday night's "In the Black Tradition"--highlight the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater's engagement in Boston this week. In his introduction to "In the Black Tradition," Ailey discussed the use of music and choreography to explore and celebrate Black experience in America. Despite their technical finesse, the four works of this opening-night performance lacked the emotional element of a typical Ailey program.

The performance opened with "Blues Suite"--set to jazz and blues music--a piece that Ailey created in 1958 about people and places from his hometown in Texas. As Ailey explained in his introduction, the train sounds we hear during "Blues Suite" echo those he heard growing up near a railroad track.

The piece knits 10 different numbers together--alternately using the whole company, a couple, and an ensemble of male dancers. Although the sharp turns, leaps and skillful hip and rib isolations of the dancers made a powerful visual impression, in particular the vignettes in which male members of the company moved in unison were most successful. Here Ailey created an atmosphere ringed with the electricity and power of their movements. The effect was a mesmerizing tour de force of the men's energy, strength and technical precision.

The women also displayed their command of pantomime in some of the humorous numbers. Dressed in colorful costumes from the '20s, they lifted their legs effortlessly into arabesques. The motion does not stop as the women join their partners in a finale of lunges, head rolls and turns with their arms carving angular shapes in the air. This breathless scene ended as a bell rings and a train whistle blows in the distance.

A PIECE THAT Ailey choreographed in 1971 to music by Alice Coltrane, Laura Nyre and Chuck Griffin, "Cry" was performed poignantly by Deborah Manning, but suffered from the absence of the strength of dancer Judith Jamison. Ailey created the dance "for all Black women everywhere--especially our mothers," and it moves slowly and somberly from expressions of anguish and suffering to ones of triumph, hope and energy. Although Manning executed the steps beautifully, she lacked the stage presence necessary to transmit the messages implicit in "Cry"--fear, anger and the struggle of Black women.

Despite these problems, Manning did demonstrate confidence and control over the choreography, and as a result could concentrate on mastering her technique. The effects of these efforts were clear as she moved her torso in and out of body waves with ease, balanced in arabesque without flinching, and seemed to lengthen her arms every time she lifted them. In addition, Manning used the famous white skirt with ruffled edges to her advantage--charging her figure with momentum as she maneuvered rapid figure-eight turns in the last few minutes.

Donald McKayle choreographed the next piece, "Rainbow 'Round My Shoulder," describing the experiences of men on a chain gang in the South in the early 20th century. The dance alternated between scenes of the men at work and sketches of the men's dreams about their sweethearts, mothers and wives. Like "Blues Suite," this work gives the men in the company an opportunity to demonstrate their technical brilliance when dancing in an ensemble.

The choreography includes kicks, stag leaps and sharp arm movements that create a heavy, staccato feeling. This tone is compounded by the men's ability to dance in unison and in rhythm with the percussion that plays throughout. McKayle intersperses painful expressions of work in the chain gang--throwing fists into the air, clasping hands and stamping feet on the floor--with a flirtatious duet that lightens this somber piece that ends with a gunshot and a man's death.

"Suite Otis" capped off the evening, set to music by and dedicated to the late Otis Redding. Five couples moving synchronously--women dressed in hot pink dresses and men in loud red pants--danced comically against a jet black screen. This sequence was interupted by a short, jazzy piece danced by five women to the song "Satisfaction." The rhythm of this work was contagious, and the audience demanded an encore.

Despite sophisticated dance technique and works synthesized from good choreography, music and costumes, the performance lacked the emotional electricity that usually accompanies an Ailey program. In addition, it seemed odd that a night dedicated to the theme "In the Black Tradition," did not include Ailey's masterpiece, "Revelations," which celebrates Afro-American gospel, religious, and jazz music.