Creators and directors: Kenrick ‘H2O’ Sandy and Michael ‘Mikey J’ Asante
Choreographer: Kenrick ‘H2O’ Sandy
Music: Michael ‘Mikey J’ Asante
Blak Whyte Gray from hip-hop dance company Boy Blue Entertainment is a show that might benefit from a programme. The audience has not only to interpret the dances but also to guess the sequence in which they are being staged.
Dance is associated with freedom of movement as dancers express concepts in a physical manner. However, the three dancers who perform in Whyte, which opens the show, have their freedom restricted and can move only in response to some external, painful, stimulus.
The tone is institutional, with the cast dressed in hospital pyjamas or possibly straitjackets standing against a white background with the lighting imposing bars or a barcode over them. Their movements are minimal and agonised, muscles spasming as if responding to electrical stimulus, perhaps part of some obscene experiment. By contrast the score, by Michael ‘Mikey J’ Asante, although coldly electronic has a spiritual aspect- tolling bells, a distorted choral effect and a bass so deep it vibrates through the stalls.
The movements of the dancers become more mobile but never expressive, remaining artificial and robotic stopping and starting on a loop. The slow-motion steps allow the dancers to adopt a stance of worship but nothing suggesting freedom
Whyte bleeds into Gray as dancers for the second piece enter while the first is still in progress- abseiling onto the stage on their backs pulling invisible ropes. Kenrick ‘H2O’ Sandy’s choreography features krump- jabs, arm swings, chest pops, and stomps- a style which is usually perceived as improvised or freestyle. Yet in Whyte such individuality is rigorously supressed.
Whyte is a highly disciplined and precise dance with the cast moving in unison. It is hard to avoid the sense of an army in training especially as one of the troupe behaves like a drill sergeant pushing the others to even more extreme movements. It is a furious dance, at times so fast limbs blur before returning to a more normal pace. There is the strong sense of being pushed to, and regretting indulging in, excesses as the cast mime firing weapons and staggering under the result.
The closing dance Blak is enigmatic. It may concern an individual being socialised into the acceptable norms of society. A dancer emerges helpless like a stringless puppet unable to control his limbs and has to be taught the correct basics of movement by other members of his tribe. Gradually, however, the innocence of the outsider fades and he is greeted as a leader or saviour draped in red robes.
The choreography in Blak is looser and allows greater individuality but is also more abstract. A darkened sequence of dancers wearing florescent paint, giving the impression of them dancing while being x-rayed, watched over by talismanic masks/statues is fascinating to watch but very hard to interpret.
Blak Whyte Gray is a high-energy demonstration of the adaptability and sheer exuberance of hip-hop that leaves the audience stunned and calling for more.
Runs until 22 October 2022
