Take It Back

A Solid State production, as part of the Dancing on the Edge festival. At the Firehall Arts Centre on Thursday, July 3. Continues on Friday, July 4.

At the outset, the idea of fusing break dance and swing dance might sound contrived. But Montreal-based Solid State’s mashup is so organic and fun-loving that it manages to invent a dazzling new vocabulary, make statements on gender roles, and get the audience members whooping like they’re at a full-blown battle. Basically, you have to know both styles inside and out to break them down this way.

The piece opens with its foursome—choreographers JoDee Allen and Helen Simard and dancers Joe Danny Aurelien and Guy-Robert Jean—smiling sweetly as they pose in vaguely vintage tweeds. Standout Allen starts fidgeting, at first falling into snarling rap-star postures and eventually diving into full B-girl moves. The rest of the show is a series of studies that play the old-time partnering of lindy hop off the solo one-upmanship of breaking.

What’s fascinating about the stylistic hybrid is the way the troupe can make the normally earth-bound breaking into weightless, graceful contemporary dance, or the way it morphs swing steps into athletic, even acrobatic feats.

But it’s smart too: in the couples dancing, the two strong women are more likely to lead than follow, and the very fact that they can keep up with the guys in the male-dominated realm of floor flips and head spins is subversive in itself.

Set to an exhilarating soundtrack of retro-swing-tinged hip-hop and remixed classics like “In the Mood”, the show proves that contemporary dance can appeal to a hip audience that’s more likely to spend the night out at a club than at the Firehall. Still, its biggest draw is that it’s fun—a rarity in an art form that sometimes takes itself too seriously.