My colleague Richard Chang, beat me to the announcement: Today is my last day at the Orange County Register. I am leaving after 18-1/2 wonderful, challenging, fun and outrageous years as this newspaper’s dance critic and arts reporter. It has been a privilege and an honor.

Many of you have heard me say that being a dance critic was all I ever wanted to be. I remember as a teen-ager reading the daily newspaper at the kitchen table and angrily disagreeing with its dance critic. “I can do better than that,” I thought, with more bravado than intelligence.

I free-lanced as a dance critic in New York City for four years, and in Los Angeles for two before I was hired at the Register as the staff critic.  I still vividly remember my elation on that day. I had been keeping my own clipping file of dance stories for 10 years — I could finally put it to use. (This was before the Internet.) And I never anticipated that being a dance critic in Orange County, Calif., 35 miles south of downtown Los Angeles, would turn into such an amazing opportunity. Nederlands Dans Theater, Royal Danish Ballet, New York City Ballet, Paris Opera Ballet, Mark Morris Dance Group and more. I have lapped it up. It has been an honor and an important responsibility to write about local dance and chart its ups and downs.

I leave this profession with a heavy heart. It’s a dreadful time for newspaper journalists in particular.  I do not know if the Register will replace me with a staff dance critic.  Let’s continue to advocate for the arts and for arts coverage at daily newspapers. Please let the Register editors and publisher know how important it is to you that the Register continue to report and write about dance and the arts in Orange County. The arts are the heart and soul of a community — and they’re local! The Register is all about local news.

Now for the truly great news: Beginning April 14, I will be joining the Tony Award-winning theater, South Coast Repertory in Costa Mesa, as Associate Director of Development for Individual Giving. I have searched my soul about what should be my next career move, and certain things were clear. I wanted to work for an arts organization. I wanted to be actively involved with like-minded people. And I wanted to help the arts survive. I look forward to doing all of that at SCR.

In the meantime, please stay in touch. My personal e-mail is: laurableiberg@yahoo.com

OK. I admit it. That’s not me riding that awesome wave (captured last December by Register photographer Michael Goulding). But can you guess what Orange County beach city that is?

That’s where I’ll be vacationing this week. Let’s see how many of you can guess. See you all back in action on March 31.

Jennifer Backhaus (shown above, in a 2007 photo by the Register’s Paul Rodriguez) and her company of eight modern dancers had their first concert at the Irvine Barclay Theatre Friday and Saturday. Read my review here.

Randi Galbraith and Ballet Repertory Theatre co-director Anthony Sellars in “Coppelia.” Photo by Melody Vo.

Other than “The Nutcracker,” chances are generally slim and none that two local ballet studios would plan the same ballet on the very same weekend. It’s happened this year nonetheless, with “Coppelia,” the classic ballet from 1887, about a girl with enamel eyes (according to the original sub-title) and love gone awry.

(more…)

Nā Lei Hulu I Ka Wēkiu, pictured in a previous show.

In ancient Hawaii, “unskilled love-making was socially unacceptable.” Director Patrick Makuakāne.

Because I’ve lived and shivered in foggy San Francisco (year-round, I might add), I think of it as an incongruous place for Hawaii’s dance, the hula.

Regardless, the San Francisco-based hula troupe Nā Lei Hulu I Ka Wēkuiu is a thriving, highly regarded community and performing arts organization. Its founder and director, Honolulu-native Patrick Makuakāne, is an impressive speaker and I was eager to see Nā Lei Hulu I Ka Wēkuiu on its return to the Carpenter Performing Arts Center in Long Beach this weekend. The second show is today.

(more…)

Snapshot of “Map,” taken at its world premiere; photo by Stephanie Berger. 

That was fast. Shen Wei Dance Arts breezed into the Irvine Barclay Theatre for one performance Tuesday (March 11) and then the New York-based company was gone. Shen literally flew in to Orange County that afternoon from Beijing, and watched his dancers from a center section seat a few rows in front of me. He is a lead choreographer for the opening ceremonies of the Summer Olympics, I was told by Shen’s executive director Brett Egan (whom I mention because he’s an alumnus of the Orange County High School of the Arts.

Shen, who was born in China and mixes an eastern and western artistic sensibility, is a gifted choreographer. I had mixed feelings about the two ballets shown at the Barclay, though. Read my review here.

 Giordano flexed his muscles for photographer Mike Canale.

Gus Giordano, who codified American jazz dance and brought it from the realm of movies and nightclubs, to the concert stage, died of pneumonia on Sunday in Chicago. He was 84, according to his family.

August Thomas Giordano was born in St. Louis and during World War II, was assigned to a performing group that put on shows at military bases. He appeared on Broadway in musicals such as “Paint Your Wagon” and “On the Town” with his late wife Peg. The couple moved to Evanston, Ill., just north of Chicago, where he opened his own studio and started a small concert dance troupe, now called Giordano Jazz Dance Chicago. His “American Anthology of Jazz Dance,” published in 1975, was the first book to preserve and develop American jazz dance as a true art form.

Chapman University dance department chairman Dale A. Merrill, artistic director of Seattle’s Spectrum Dance Theater from 1985-2002, said Giordano made multiple contributions to jazz dance, from organizing the first Jazz Dance World Congress in 1990, to discovering and helping young choreographers, such as Mia Michaels (”So You Think You Can Dance”). Giordano also established a distinctly Chicago jazz dance style.

“He really isolated what was called ‘jazz perpendicular.’ It’s a twisting, a separation of the torso from the lower body,” Merrill said. “They are what I call the super jazz shapes. When you think of jazz dance those are the shapes that Gus Giordano used all the time, and codified them. Another thing that was remarkable about Gus was he really fostered and helped a lot of young choreographers get their start.”

The family announced that the funeral will be held Friday in Chicago. The company is planning a tribute concert Oct. 24-25 at the Harris Theater in Millenium Park, Chicago.

ABT’s “Swan Lake.” Photo by Marty Sohl 

Ballet, flamenco, modern….Lots of dance coming up the rest of this month:

Tomorrow night, Shen Wei Dance Arts stops at the Irvine Barclay Theatre with “Re- (Part 1),” inspired by Shen Wei’s trips to Tibet, and “Map,” the choreographer’s further explorations of pure movement. 8 p.m., March 11.

There’s Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater all week at the Orange County Performing Arts Center with three different programs. March 11-16

The San Francisco-based contemporary hula troupe, Nā Lei Hulu I Ka Wēkiu, returns to the Carpenter Center at Cal State Long Beach, 8 p.m., March 14-15. They perform “Daughters of Haumea,” a work devoted to women of ancient Hawaii.

Los Angeles Ballet repeats its sensational spring repertory program, including Melissa Barak’s stirring “Lost in Transition” at the Redondo Beach Performing Arts Center. 7:30 p.m. March 15.

Orange County’s own Backhausdance celebrates its fifth anniversary with its first performance at the Irvine Barclay Theatre, 8 p.m. March 21-22. Artistic director Jennifer Backhaus premieres “Shift” and “Countdown,” and the chamber ensemble digs into some favorites, such as “Sitting on January.” (Backhausdance also appears with other companies at producer Jamie Nichols’ “Celebrate Dance 2008″ at the Alex Theatre, Glendale. 8 p.m., March 15.)

Spain’s Noche Flamenca, starring Soledad Barrio, stops for one night at the Cerritos Center. 8 p.m. March 21.

And American Ballet Theatre reprises artistic director Kevin McKenzie’s production of “Swan Lake” at the Los Angeles Music Center’s Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. Principal casting is: Michele Wiles & David Hallberg, 7:30 p.m. March 27; Irina Dvorovenko & Maxim Beloserkovsky 7:30 p.m. March 28; Gillian Murphy & Jose Manuel Carreño 2 p.m. March 29; Paloma Herrera & Ethan Stiefel 7:30 p.m. March 29; Julie Kent & David Hallberg, 2 p.m. March 30.

The last week of March, three local dance studios have big productions in the works, including the 20th anniversary gala for Festival Ballet Theatre, which will feature guest artists and the local debut of students from the Upper Division of the Royal Ballet School. I’ll report more on those concerts later in the month.

Linda C. Sims,  Alicia J. Graf and Glenn A. Sims in Alvin Ailey’s “Revelations.” Photo by Andrew Eccles.

The Orange County Performing Artscenter will  have reasonably priced student rush tickets available for the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, March 11-16.  Orchestra seats are $20 and balcony seats are only $10 (the same price as a movie!). Show up at the box office one hour before curtain and bring a valid student ID. Call the Center’s ticket information line in advance to find out what’s available: 714-556-2787.

The company has planned three separate programs, with some repertory new to OC, such as Maurice Béjart’s 1970 version of “The Firebird”; Camille A. Brown’s new “The Groove to Nobody’s Business”; and Twyla Tharp’s electrifying “The Golden Section” (from her full-length 1981 piece, “The Catherine Wheel”).

Read my preview story about the company and artistic director Judith Jamison.

Lewis Segal, the longtime dance critic at the Los Angeles Times, revealed today he has become a victim of that newspaper’s latest rounds of buy-outs. He was told his position as dance critic is being eliminated. He will stay at the Times through the end of March, and possibly write free-lance reviews after that.

Lewis and I often came away from the same performance with entirely different assessments, and that’s a good thing.  I’m old-fashioned. I believe our society, our democracy even, depends on as many viewpoints as possible. Whether that’s covering dance, city hall or Angels baseball.

The cycle of journalistic lay-offs seems never ending and we are the poorer for it.