grounds – COOPER GENERAL NEWS

BECKET, Massachusetts – For the past year and a half, the Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival has faced bigger challenges than the weather. Last summer, for the first time in its 88-year history, the festival had to cancel all performances in its idyllic home here in the Berkshires. Last November, when the pandemic was still raging, one of the festival’s two theaters was destroyed in a fire.

Jacob’s Pillow has recovered and has a full summer season of performances planned, both on-site and online. But the pandemic isn’t over yet, so all on-site shows are outdoors and subject to Covid protocols and weather. On Wednesday, the opening day, the main obstacle was the rain.

The festival hired a meteorologist to call a few hours before the show. The matinee took place on Wednesday, but the evening performance was not. That means I’ve only seen one of the two programs Dorrance Dance – the leading tap company for the past decade and a regular pillow type – has been preparing to kick off the season.

It was a happy reintroduction, especially since the matinee program is a kind of theme park tour of the grounds. (The video of this will be available for free on the festival website from July 15-29.) Spectators will be divided into small groups, marked with colored armbands, and each group will be guided by instructors to a series of stations, on which members of Dorrance Dance perform vignettes on a loop.

In the open-air pub we meet Aaron Marcellus, Claudia Rahardjanoto and Luke Hickey, who after the last call pretend they are squeezing in another jam session. Marcellus is a singer, a soulful and talented one, but at some point he also contributes a bit of tap. Hickey replaces him on the piano and Rahardjanoto, who plays bass, joins him in a tap-and-song duet. This circular trade is characteristic of Dorrance Dance and the playful, welcoming, and improvised spirit that makes the company a smart choice to welcome audiences back in.

The next piece in the Tea Garden shows a different side. In what looks like beekeeping suits, Warren Craft and Rena Kinoshita are tinkering with electronics and antennas and turning the faucet into an esoteric attempt at communication over potentially interstellar distances – or something like that. Is it the latest report on UFOs?

The science fiction theme is picked up later when we meet Michelle Dorrance, Leonardo Sandoval and Byron Tittle in overalls setting up a ladder and satellite dish. Nearby, chairs are arranged around a gravel pit, in which the three dancers with shovels and boots work out a small symphony in rhythm, paying attention to the tonal possibilities of the gravel: crunching, scratching, rattling.

Before that we visited Ephrat Asherie and Matthew West in the woods and performed a sad dance of separation to greyhounds. And we’ve spied on Josette Wiggan’s friend in a secluded and rustic cabin, hanging up the laundry to dry as she moves to Sarah Vaughan’s records in the heat and comes amazingly close to a dance equivalent of Vaughan’s voice. We end up finding the rest of the company (including the stellar trumpeter Keyon Harrold in a guest appearance) around more booths, pounding on washtubs and washboards, and having a great old time.

Where are we? When are we These vignettes have something to replace, something that is far too reminiscent of theme parks in backyards. The well-known scenarios also miss an opportunity, because the pillow has its own rich history of architecture and location. (Could the hut dances allude to the history of the place as a subway station?) The camp setups reinforce the feeling of thinness. As soon as the last party starts and we are set up to participate, we will be led away. The journey is over.

In these circumstances these mistakes are forgivable. Dorrance Dance offers a pleasant tour. Had I seen the other program with two new works for the festival’s open-air stage, the matinee might have seemed like the perfect starter. But the evening show on Thursday was also rainy and I had to go back to Brooklyn.

Fortunately, part of the program I missed – a premiere by Wiggan’s friend to music by Harrold – will be on July 9th and 10th at the Queens Theater in Flushing Meadows Corona Park. These shows are also held outdoors (but with an indoor backup plan, if it rains). I watch the weather.

Dorrance dance

See you Sunday at Jacob’s Pillow, Becket, Mass .; jacobspillow.org.

A Chinese man wears a protective mask as he stands in front of the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics logos at the National Aquatics Center in Beijing, China on April 9, 2021.

Lintao Zhang | Getty Images

House spokeswoman Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., On Tuesday called for a “diplomatic boycott” of the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics in response to China’s human rights record.

“We cannot pretend there is nothing wrong with the Olympics in China,” Pelosi told the Congress Human Rights Commission and the Congressional Executive Commission for China during a hearing on the Games.

Pelosi suggested in her remarks that athletes should still be able to take part in the Games, but that the leaders and kings of the world should not travel to attend them in person.

“When heads of state go to China in the face of a genocide that is going on while you are in your seats, the real question is, what moral authority do you need to speak about human rights anywhere in the world when you are ready, the Chinese government? To show her respect when she commits genocide? “

Pelosi has beaten corporate sponsors of the Games, who “look the other way at China’s abuses out of concern for their bottom line.” She specifically called on companies that are allegedly committed to weakening parts of a bipartisan law aimed at the use of forced labor in the Xinjiang region.

“If we do not speak out against human rights violations in China for commercial reasons, we will lose all moral authority to stand up for human rights anywhere,” said Pelosi.

China has labeled “lies and disinformation” allegations that it violates the human rights of Muslims in Xinjiang.

The games are scheduled to open on February 4, 2022.

Pelosi acknowledged that their proposed diplomatic boycott may not work. “I don’t know if it’s possible because we haven’t done it in the past,” she said.

In 2008, Pelosi called on then-President George W. Bush to boycott the opening ceremony of the Summer Olympics in Beijing to protest against China’s human rights record, which at the time was largely marred by the government’s actions in Tibet.

Bush attended the opening of these games along with more than 80 other heads of state.

Activists and lawmakers from both parties have called on President Joe Biden to withdraw from the 2022 Olympics in protest. They cite China’s reported treatment of Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang – which has been labeled genocide by both the Trump and Biden administrations – and Beijing’s response to protests in Hong Kong.

The US Olympic and Paralympic Committee has said it opposes boycotts, including because they affect athletes who have trained for years to compete.

The White House previously left the door open for a boycott, but press secretary Jen Psaki said last month that such a move would not be discussed.

“While China has changed in some ways over 30 years, it is appalling that its human rights record has deteriorated,” Pelosi said in the virtual hearing on Tuesday afternoon.

Pelosi stressed that she is a dedicated Olympic fan and that the athletes’ performance in the Games is a source of pride.

“Let’s honor them at home,” said Pelosi. “Let’s not honor the Chinese government by letting heads of state go to China to show their support for their athletes.”

“Silence on this issue is unacceptable. It enables China’s abuse,” Pelosi said.