Sat 12/13 @ 7:30PM
Sun 12/14 @ 4:30PM
Whatever happened to Black Nativity? If you’re looking for an African-American treatment of the birth of Christ, consider seeing Coming of the King this weekend.
Coming of the King is an all-dance, inter-racial production conceived, directed, and choreographed by Terence Greene, who choreographed several productions of Black Nativity for Karamu House in years past. Greene has been putting his Creative Workforce Grant from Cuyahoga Arts and Culture to work, running city-wide auditions beginning in early October.
The Cleveland tradition of Black Nativity goes back to 1961 when Karamu commissioned its alumnus, poet Langston Hughes, to write a drama for the Christmas season. Hughes responded with Black Nativity, a Gospel Song Play, which went on to become a national and international hit. Since then Black Nativity has gone through many permutations including a film and a television production; it has often been freely adapted and rewritten in annual productions across the North American continent.
After his graduation from Cleveland School of the Arts, Greene studied and performed extensively, including many theater and touring productions of Broadway shows and a long stint with Dayton Contemporary Dance Theater where he won the Josie Award for Best Male Dancer.
He currently divides his time between his dance company, Greene Works Project, CSA where he is Dance Director, Mount Zion Fellowship Church where he is Artistic Director of the Youth Praise Dancers, and the Board of Cleveland Dance Movement which will be hosting the annual convention of the International Association of Blacks in Dance in Cleveland this January.
See our preview of Greene’s concert at Tri-C last summer here. Watch for our preview of the IABD Convention in the 1/21/2015 issue of CoolCleveland.com.
Money for the Creative Workforce Fellowships comes from a voter-approved cigarette tax through Cuyahoga Arts and Culture (CAC) and administered by Community Partnership for Arts and Culture (CPAC).
Coming of the King will be performed at 7:30 pm Saturday 12/13 and 4:30 pm Sunday 12/14/2014 at Tri-C Eastern Campus Main Theatre, 4250 Richmond Road. For tickets in advance phone Charlene Brown at 216-534-0273 or Melody Anderson at 216-744-0437: $20 General $15 Students $18 Groups of 15 or more. Tickets day of show $25 at the Tri-C Box Office.
From Cool Cleveland contributors Elsa Johnson and Victor Lucas. Elsa and Vic are both longtime Clevelanders. Elsa is a landscape designer. She studied ballet as an avocation for 2 decades. Vic has been a dancer and dance teacher for most of his working life, performing in a number of dance companies in NYC and Cleveland. They write about dance as a way to learn more and keep in touch with the dance community. E-mail them at vicnelsaATearthlink.net.
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