Author: JoAnne Tucker

Rehearsals Begin for Binding

JoAnne Tucker / / Dance Midrash, New York Company

Rehearsals began with four collaborating dancers.  Deborah, Kezia, Susan and Beth (Bardin) had all helped to create Sisters.  There was an ease and comfort of working together that I really appreciated with a text like the Akedah which is challenging and disturbing.  I knew where I wanted to begin and that was opening with an angel ballet.  Having been introduced to a wide variety of percussion instruments by Newman Taylor Baker I also had decided that we would use text, chanting and percussion to accompany the movement.  That gives a certain freedom to choreographing as there is no music we need to follow.  It also means we don’t have any form to follow or any musical drive to motivate the piece.

I asked Mark Childs, the cantor we had worked with in Let My People Go, to help create the cantorial score of the piece and to be in at least the first performance in December 1989.  I was very grateful that Rabbi Norman Cohen had indicated his willingness to both speak before the piece was performed and to be part of the performance as well.

So we began with the angel ballet and played around with movement that might reflect a surreal appearance.  This included the dancers walking on tiptoe backwards, making diagonal crossing paths. Ritual movement from the Kedusha prayer would be incorporated.  The Kedusha is part of the Amidah, “the standing prayer which is central to every Jewish service.”  The Kedusha “calls us to imitate the choirs of angels singing ‘Holy, holy, holy.’ There is a custom of rising on our tiptoes with every repetition of the word kadosh, holy.” (https://velveteenrabbi.blogs.com/blog/2015/08/shabbat-morning-gratitude.html) 

We would take it a step further by turning the rising on the tiptoes to three jumps!  And toward the end of the opening angel ballet which is accompanied by a triangle percussion instrument, Mark would elegantly and boldly chant the traditional prayer.  Following that, the angels would birth the ram, inspired by Frederick Terna’s painting,  to the accompaniment of the traditional sounds of the shofar.

Costumes can sometimes help create a mood.  Somehow I wanted to have a very simple look to the piece and yet have the dancers have fabric that could indicate angel wings.  I loved the pants we had for performing the piece M’Vakshei Or and thought they could work with a black leotard.  The pants had a wrap-around design that gave a perfect place for fabric to be added.  Sometimes when I don’t know what to do for costumes I wander in department stores, particularly in designer areas.  As I was wandering around a store I came across a very simple and elegant chiffon poncho.  It had an irregular cut to it.  The price was over $200 and definitely out of our budget.  I drew a quick sketch of how it was constructed and realized it would be simple to make.  Next stop was the fabric store to pick out four different pastel colors in chiffon and enough extra to add some fabric to the pants.  The costumes worked and gave just the effect I wanted.


The Angels birthing the ram. From l. to r. Beth Bardin, Susan Freeman (as the ram), Deborah Hanna, and Kezia Gleckman Hayman in the chapel at Hebrew Union College – Jewish Institute of Religion, NYC.  Much to my disappointment we have neither formal professional pictures of this piece, nor any taken in dress rehearsal.  Luckily we have a video of the dress rehearsal.  So I have copied the VHS to a DVD and then to an MP4 file.  Using a screen shot I have captured some moments from the piece that I will be sharing in the blog. 

The next section of the piece is based on exploring this line of text: “After these things, God put Abraham to the test.” What were these things?  A duet begins between Deborah and Susan inspired by this poem:

Ishmael the older brother, boasted of his
Blood and brayed: My blood was drained when I was thirteen:

The younger Isaac whispered: if God
Wishes to take me, let God take all of me.


Deborah (standing) and Susan in the forefront as the brothers

At one of the early rehearsals Susan arrived with two poems she had written that she offered for the piece.  With her permission I share these poems which became part of the piece (with slight variations) and inspired choreography.

Abraham’s Trial
 
Hagar is crying – –
Banished and weary – –
In the wilderness.
The desert horizon is
Thirst and starvation.
Collapsing to her knees
She buries her face – –
Not to watch as Death’s path
Unwinds its parched fingers
Ready to take her son
In its suffocating embrace.
 
Hagar is crying in the  – –
After these things
Abraham was put on trial. Abraham is crying,
Forced to turn,
Return to the place
Familiar in his dreams – –
Wilderness.
(written by Rabbi Susan Freeman)
 

Beth and Kezia (l-r) as Hagar interpreting this poem in dance.

The piece continues using the second poem that Susan wrote:

The Birth of Isaac
 
Before these things
Sarah lay breathless.
Her eyes full, her cheeks damp,
Abraham holding their newborn son,
Joyous astonishment – –
And Sarah laughed.
Amazing is the One
Who creates life and death,
Laughter and tears.
And they called the child Isaac.
 
After these things
Sarah lay breathless,
Her eyes full, her cheeks damp.

A dance follows with Deborah as Sarah holding her new son and the three other dancers giggling and laughing in movement until the movement changes to a more hysterical, crying tone.

As the story unfolds Norman and Mark join the dancers on stage portraying Abraham and Isaac.

I could go on describing how the piece continues but instead let me invite you to click this link and see the final rehearsal for yourself.

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The Beginnings of a New Piece Based on the Akedah and Terna’s Paintings

JoAnne Tucker / / Art, Dance Midrash, New York Company

Shortly after the creation of Sisters, Rabbi Norman Cohen suggested Avodah create another dance midrash piece based on the Akedah portion of Genesis (22: 1–19) where God commands Abraham to offer his son Isaac as a sacrifice.  The Joseph Gallery of Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion was planning an exhibit of paintings by Frederick Terna called  “Articulation of Hope: The Binding of Isaac.”  Norman thought an Avodah concert featuring a new piece based on Terna’s paintings would be excellent to include in the series of programs related to the Exhibition. I had mixed feelings about focusing on these lines of text as they were very difficult for me to relate to. I agreed and we set the date for December 13th, the last of the programs so I could wait until the paintings arrived at the college and I could see Terna’s visual interpretation.

About a week before the opening, Norman called to let me know that the paintings had arrived and suggested I walk through the gallery with him to look at them.  This would also give me an opportunity to discuss the text with him and gain some more insight into these critical lines that play such a strong role in Jewish life… not only read when that portion of the Torah is read but also read on the High Holiday of Rosh Hashanah (Jewish New Year). 

As I walked through the gallery, studying each painting carefully I was struck by the strong role of the angels and the ram that is finally sacrificed instead of Isaac. A painting entitled An Offering Set Aside shows the ram as an egg in a womb of perhaps an angel.  Once I saw that painting I thought I might have a place to begin.

In my file I found a brochure that HUC-JIR created for the exhibit that includes a biography of Terna and a scholarly essay written by Norman on Frederick Terna and the exhibition.  Norman notes:

Drawn to the piercing questions of the Akedah, Frederick Terna has wrestled with this text for many years. As a Holocaust survivor he has found in this story one vehicle to deal with his own life experiences and to express deep-seated emotions in a most creative manner.  

Norman also refers to the one painting that had the most poignancy for me in beginning the creative work on the piece.

An Offering Set Aside reminds us that from the very outset of creation, the ram, the salvational vehicle and through its horns, the symbol of the messianic, is waiting.  Programmed into human existence from its inception is the potential for redemption.

When I left Norman that day after seeing the paintings, I had a hunch where the new piece on the Akedah would begin.  I also was impressed with Terna’s paintings which while sometimes showing the pain and suffering of the text also had a softness and nurturing quality to them using feminine colors.  Perhaps that could calm my uncomfortable feeling of creating a piece on text that I found extremely puzzling and which did not have a woman’s voice in it at all.  It was a story of a father and son with Sarah, the mother, not even mentioned.

In reflecting back on developing this new piece on just nineteen lines of text from Genesis I realized it brought together elements that both challenged and inspired me.  It required that I do research and make sure I was aware of traditional midrashim as well as contemporary thought.  It involved collaboration with Rabbi Norman Cohen, an outstanding scholar; Mark Childs, a cantor I had just worked with in creating “Let My People Go,” and a wonderful group of dancers.  And then there were the paintings of Frederick Terna to inspire and point me in new directions.

When I looked at traditional midrashim on the nineteen lines it was fascinating to me to see that the phrase “after these things,” which is part of the opening line of text,  had lots of midrashim. Hum… we could work with this in dance… indeed what were “these things” that might have caused God to put Abraham to such a test as to sacrifice his son?  

I had also recently read a book called The Thirteen Petalled Rose: A Discourse on the Essence of Jewish Existence and Beliefby Adin Steinsaltz.  In the book he talks about angels in Jewish text, suggesting that each is a manifestation of a single emotional response or essence.  Angels were an important part of Frederick Terna’s paintings and so Steinsaltz’s words became particularly meaningful for me as I prepared to meet with the dancers and begin work on the new piece.

It would be an interesting journey working with the four dancers to create the piece, and both Norman Cohen and Mark Childs had agreed to collaborate and even perform in the first performance.  Luckily I have a video of the final rehearsal for the performance, which I will refer to in the next blog on this piece. I also have two other videos of the piece:  one that is done five years later and a third that was done eight or nine years later.  As I watched all three videos one evening I was struck by how a piece evolves over time  — from when Norman Cohen and Mark Childs were part of the piece,  actually moving on stage with the dancers; to a performance with a cantor alone singing and narrating the story;  to the dancers handling singing, chanting text and narrating as they move. I will share more about this over the next several blogs.

Before closing this blog I want to share more about the painter Frederick Terna.  The program for the exhibition of his paintings on the Akedah includes a section that he wrote:

About twenty years ago, leafing through one of my old sketchbooks, I came upon a drawing that resembled a person wielding a knife over a smaller figure. It made me pause and I wondered who I feared or who I had wanted to kill.  Searching for an answer and not finding one, I wondered about the prototype, the archetype.  Abraham and Isaac came to mind.  I opened a new sketchbook, put aside the old one, and proceeded to play with the idea.


He continued to explain the relationship of his paintings to the Holocaust:

During World War II, I spent more than three years in German concentration camps.  Painting around the theme of the Akedah has become one of my ways, though not the exclusive one, of dealing with those years.  

I was curious if Frederick Terna was still alive; since he was born in 1923 he would be 96 now.  I Googled and found that he is indeed alive and he had an exhibit at St. Francis College in Brooklyn Heights, NY in the winter of 2017.

On a website called The Ripple Project there is a wonderful interview of him that is called “A Lesson in Civility” and I quote from it. Here’s a link to read more and see some recent photos which I hunch are from about 2017: 

A writer from the Ripple Project asked Fred what he thought of the Presidential election.  His response is described:

He closed his eyes for [a] second, as he often does before he begins to speak, as if to enhance the drama. Tilting his head right and with a wry smile said: “I’m disappointed, confused, and surprised but not worried. Dictators don’t last, it’s against human nature. We just need to keep our civility.” 

As the discussion continued:

Fred responded in a deeper tone, the smile was gone: “When we were in the camps, facing death, humiliation, starvation, anger, not knowing if we will live another 10 minutes… we still kept our civility. We always knew the Nazis wouldn’t last, it’s against human nature. It doesn’t matter what the Nazis did to us, how much they screamed and yelled at us. When we were alone in the room, at night, we were civilized. We knew that our civility is the key to survival, our humanity and civility will outlast the Nazis. It might take a month, a year or ten, but it will outlast them.”

I am indeed very humbled and inspired by both the paintings and words of Fred Terna.  Civility is something for all of us to keep in mind each and every day.

Postcard announcing the Exhibit at HUC-JIR

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More on Sisters: A Peek into the Rehearsal Studio and Some Dancers’ Reflections

JoAnne Tucker / / Dance Midrash, Dances on Biblical Women

In the Summer 1992 issue of Outlook (the Women’s League for Conservative Judaism’s magazine), Kezia and I wrote an article entitled “Midrash in Motion” which shared more about our process of creating Sisters, including some of the dancers’ thoughts and conversations in the rehearsal studio.

            “Maybe Leah’s eyes were weak from crying,” Deborah suggests.

            “Maybe,” muses Kezia. I don’t think she really had weak eyes. Other people just called them weak because she was thoughtful and withdrawn, especially compared to Rachel, and sensitive in a way people would not see.” 

            “Deborah, your interpretation matches a traditional midrash,” interjects JoAnne. “However, I want to focus on Rachel and Leah’s reactions when they were described as the beautiful Rachel and the weak-eyed Leah.”

            This snatch of conversations did not take place in an ordinary midrash class. Deborah Hanna and Kezia Gleckman Hayman, professional modern dancers of the Avodah Dance Ensemble, are rehearsing….

            Focusing on the initial question, two dancers improvised as [Cantor] Stone repeatedly chanted, “Rachel was beautiful, Leah had weak eyes.”  Coached by Tucker, Stone moved closer and closer to each dancer, first shouting the text in their ears, and then whispering.  The dancers reacted, their movements altered by the forceful suggestions of the intruder.  It was immediately clear that such chanting would be powerful.

Since the article was written and published several years after the piece was created, it ended with some reflections by Deborah and Kezia about performing the piece.

In mentioning the company’s community of performers, we must mention that when Sisters (and other works) toured over the years, if the original cantor could not travel with the company, exceptional local cantors occasionally agreed to take on the role in the piece – not an easy task, since it meant learning the role mainly by studying a video and then having usually only one quick rehearsal both to coordinate with the dancers and to master the staging.  And staging was complicated – for everyone – because it required customizing the choreography to fit most safely and dramatically into each unique performance space, which often included features such as stairs.  We are grateful to all the local cantors who performed so artistically and soulfully with us over the years, for Sisters and other company repertoire.

The form of the piece has remained substantially the same. Kezia and Deborah are still stepping into the sisters’ lives.  And yet, they still ponder the meaning of Leah’s weak eyes – in discussions and in dance.  In each performance, Leah discovers a new element of her feelings toward Rachel.  In each performance, Rachel feels a bit differently when she chooses to reveal the secret sign, thereby surrendering her bridal veil.  Each time, the cantor’svoice reveals new shades of emotion.  Each time, the company’s community [of performers] creates a bond distinct from the previous performance.  Each time, new midrash is created.

In 2004 when I was getting ready to leave the New York area I invited dancers and company collaborators to a Sunday afternoon gathering.  I asked both those that attended and those that couldn’t make it to write an Avodah Memory.  Rabbi Susan Freeman shared this one:

            Besides all the laughing and intense improvising…. I often think of the awe-inspiring moments of holding a pose in “Sisters” at a synagogue in suburban Detroit – with the sanctuary in the style of an enormous tent.  Any gaze extended into the “folds” of this amazing architecture.  I felt so alive – spiritually, intellectually, emotionally, socially, aesthetically.  It was one of those unique experiences of being wholly present – when the immediate moment becomes aligned with the eternal moment. 

The performance Susan is describing took place at Temple Beth El in Bloomfield Hills, outside of Detroit.  The cantor’s role there was beautifully performed by Cantor Gail Hirschenfang. With a satisfying sense of life’s circles, Kezia is delighted to note that Cantor Hirschenfang is now the cantor of the temple to which Kezia belongs in Poughkeepsie. 

The photograph of the building’s outside is by Rob Yallop from the website MichiganModern.org.  A photo of the soaring inside of the temple, with the “folds” described by Susan, can be found at the following link.

Here is a link to see a video of the first performance of Sisters.

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Remembering Rabbi Larry Raphael

JoAnne Tucker / / New York Company

It is with great sadness that I share news of the passing of Rabbi Larry Raphael.  Larry was an important person in my life and in the Avodah Dance Ensemble’s life, from the time Avodah became associated with Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in 1978.  At that time, Larry was an Assistant Dean. He stayed at HUC-JIR until 1996, leaving (as Dean) when he became the first Director of Adult Jewish Growth at the Union for Reform Judaism.  He left the New York area in 2003 to become the 9thRabbi at Sherith Israel in San Francisco.  He died this past Sunday.

I liked to refer to him jokingly as Avodah’s casting director, because he told Rick Jacobs (then a student at HUC-JIR) that Avodah was looking for a tall dancer. Rick auditioned and was an important force in the company for many years.  He also recommended, when they were students, Cantor Mark Childs and Rabbi Susan Freeman, both of whom played very important roles in the company.

By 1983, Larry was a Board Member of Avodah, formalizing his enthusiasm and support for the dance company.  As the company’s home address was HUC-JIR and I often stopped by to check Avodah’s mailbox, I was always glad to see Larry in the hallway or stop by his office and know that if there was something on my mind, he would be very welcoming and take time to discuss any challenges I might be facing with the company.

One of Larry’s roles in New York was to conduct High Holiday services for young adults living away from home in Manhattan.  Well, Murray and I didn’t fit the category of “young adults,” but since we had a relationship with HUC-JIR, we were welcome to attend services there. Those attending weren’t a community, but Larry’s warm way of leading made us feel we were.  The Rosh Hashanah service after 9/11 was a good example. Shortly after beginning the service, he invited us to introduce ourselves to someone sitting near us that we didn’t know and share where we were on 9/11.  I will long remember the buzz in the room and the connections made instantaneously.

When Avodah created repertory related to Selichot, Larry invited us to perform that or any relevant dance midrash as part of the afternoon Yom Kippur service.  It was never a full company, as some of the dancers were observing the High Holiday in their home communities, but there were at least two or three dancers who would join me to participate.  It was a special feeling to incorporate dance into this most sacred time in the Jewish calendar, and I am very grateful that Larry gave us that experience.

I was honored to be on the faculty of several summer Kallot of the UAHC (now the URJ), where for five days adults gathered together and studied.  I led dance midrash workshops.  Larry, aided by Barbara Shulman, was in charge.  These were very special programs, not only because we had very enthusiastic and dedicated adults in our sessions, but because I was learning from and connecting with some of the outstanding scholars and cantors of the 90’s and early 2000’s. 

I am deeply grateful for Larry’s role in helping to build The Avodah Dance Ensemble, his friendship, his innovative approach, and his warmth.  The Yiddish word “mensch” so beautifully fits him.  

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Cantor Meredith Stone on being a part of Sisters

JoAnne Tucker / / Dance Midrash, Dances on Biblical Women

Meredith Stone has served as Cantor of Congregation Emanu-El of Westchester in Rye, New York for more than 30 years. Among her contributions to the congregation are many creative initiatives in worship, a vibrant women’s study group, and years of innovative musical programming.  She is an accomplished soprano with a broad range of professional credits. She graduated from Brown University, holds 2 Master’s degrees in music, and received an honorary doctorate from Hebrew Union College.  She and her husband live in New York City and have 2 wonderful daughters now in college. She loves immersing herself in creative endeavors, especially making art, and hopes to one day get beyond Wednesday in the New York Times crossword puzzle. 

JoAnne: In writing the blog on Sisters I found I had some questions and I reached out to Meredith to ask if she had any information to share.  What follows are my questions, her answers and her reflections on being a part of the collaboration of Sisters.

JoAnne: We used quite a few poems in the piece. Do you know where we found them?

Meredith: Sadly, all I recall about the poems is that you and I went on a big scavenger hunt looking for anything related to Rachel and Leah.  Which was more challenging but perhaps more rewarding than today when you can find so much online without any effort at all.      

JoAnne: Opening vocalise is by Ron Nelson. What do we know about him?

Meredith:  Ron was a composer and beloved teacher of music theory at Brown University where he taught for many years. As a music major, I took several classes with him.  (He made music theory feel relevant: I remember one day he played us a Stevie Wonder recording then went to the piano and analyzed all the chords for us.) A terrific guy.  Looks like he’s now 89 and living out west. 

JoAnne: There is a piece we used called Rachel m’vakoh al Boneho.  Any information about this one?

Meredith: Yes, this is a classic piece of Chazzanut “Rachel weeps for her children” by David Roitman. 

Meredith continues sharing her thoughts about participating in Sisters:

As a young child my dreams of becoming a ballerina were shattered when I realized I’d never get to appear in The Nutcracker (which I saw every year) at the Boston Ballet since I didn’t study in their prep program.  But the real reason is that châiné turns made me dizzy and I couldn’t stand getting sweaty.  Singing required far less exertion!

I had always loved dance and was excited when JoAnne approached me with the opportunity to collaborate with Avodah.  I was intrigued by the idea of exploring together the complex relationship between siblings, especially sisters, and enjoyed tracking down music and poetry that could enrich the piece.  I couldn’t have been more honored to appear onstage as a “dancer” Ha!  JoAnne was great about integrating me into the group and making me look like I was one of them, sort of!  

I loved combining different aspects of artistic expression with dance – singing, Hebrew chant, instrumental music, spoken word. 

I also enjoyed seeing the creative process unfold.  I had had no idea that dancers helped choreograph pieces, experimenting with different ways of moving, actively participating in the development of the work.  I was more accustomed to the world of opera in which you were expected to interpret a musical score and follow the stage director.  The dancers were so integral to the process, motivated, intelligent and fun!  We had such a good time when we travelled.  I recall we even participated at an American Conference of Cantors convention in Florida when we were asked to create a worship service in movement and dance.  

Rehearsing in Chinatown had some nice side benefits – really cheap noodles at Bo Ky on the corner of Mulberry and Bayard, and great buys on exotic vegetables and cool knock-offs along Canal Street. 

Looking back, the unique opportunity of working with JoAnne and Avodah gave me so much- igniting my creativity, which I’ve cultivated ever since and which has sustained me through my last 30 years in the cantorate.  

Thank you, Avodah.  Thank you, JoAnne!

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Guest Blog: Today is International Women’s Day

JoAnne Tucker / / Guest Posts, Healing Voices - Personal Stories

JoAnne: Today is International Women’s Day and I am pleased to welcome Guest Blogger Georgellen Burnett to Mostly Dance.  I met Georgellen when she signed up to volunteer for Healing Voices – Personal Stories, the film company I founded to increase social awareness of domestic violence.  A survivor/thriver of domestic violence she has been very active in publicizing Healing Voices and raising money in our local community of Santa Fe.

Georgellen Burnett is a native New Mexican and a women’s historian.  She devotes her time to women’s history, women’s political advocacy, and domestic violence issues. You can reach Georgellen by email at: georgellen.burnett@comcast.net

Georgellen’s Blog

On March 1, 2019, Governor Michelle Lujan-Grisham and Mayor Alan Webber issued proclamations designating March as Women’s History Month in New Mexico and Santa Fe. President Donald J. Trump also issued a proclamation designating March as Women’s History Month in the United States.

Santa Fe NOW and the New Mexico League of Women Voters are collaborating on a celebration for 2020 of the 100thAnniversary of the Passage of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920 in which women achieved the vote.

In 1977, when the women who would establish the National Women’s History Alliance began planning a women’s history week, March 8th, International Women’s Day, was chosen as the focal date.

The selection was based on wanting to ensure that the celebration of women’s history would include a multicultural perspective, an international connection between and among all women, and the recognition of women as significant in the paid workforce.

United States women’s history became the primary focus of the curriculum and resources developed. At that time, there were no school districts in the country teaching women’s history. The goal, although it most often seemed a dream, was to first impact the local schools, then the nation, and finally the world. It is a dream that is becoming a reality.

Women’s History Week, always the week that included March 8th, became National Women’s History Week in 1981 and in 1987 National Women’s History Week became National Women’s History Month. The expansion from local to national and from week to month was the result of a lobbying effort that included hundreds of individuals and dozens of women’s, educational, and historical organizations. It was an effort mobilized and spearheaded by the National Women’s History Alliance.

National Women’s History Month is now recognized throughout the world. Women from Germany, China, Saudi Arabia, Canada, Japan, Russia, the Ukraine, and diverse African nations have visited the National Women’s History Alliance’s office or attended their events. One result from this contact has been the establishment of a women’s history program and museum in the Ukraine. In 1989, The National Women’s History Alliance accepted an invitation from the government of Spain to address an international women’s conference on the importance of women’s history and the impact of National Women’s History Month. In 2001 a sistership with the Working Women’s Institute of Japan was established resulting in the National Women’s History’s posters and display sets being featured in the organizations first exhibit.

The National Women’s History Alliance’s websitereaches the global community. They receive emails from individuals throughout the world. Each year hundreds of National Women’s History Month posters are distributed to military bases and Department of Defense schools throughout the world for special programs and events that celebrate and recognize women’s accomplishments. It is the hope of the National Women’s History Alliance that the celebrations at these different venues will ignite a sense of celebration and recognition that honors women of all nations.

From The National Women’s History Alliance.  They have an excellent website.
Please check it out.
www.nationalwomenshistoryalliance.org.
 

Sisters: A Dance Piece on Rachel and Leah

JoAnne Tucker / / Dance Midrash, Dances on Biblical Women

Thirty-one years ago. That is when this piece received its first performance,in a concertsponsored by the Corpus Christi Jewish Community Council in Texas. Sisters was a collaboration between Cantor Meredith Stone and myself.  Meredith’s brother Rabbi Warren Stone was a rabbi at a Reform congregation in Texas and he arranged the performance in Corpus Christi. Before I write about the specifics of the piece I want to say how grateful I am that I kept scrapbooks on Avodah. Not only do I have ten scrapbooks of Avodah history but also videotapes from many performances, and some of them include my narration which gives me an idea of what was important to me at the time.  For a few pieces I even have a file with notes and musical scores.  For Sisters,a piece about the Biblical sister wives, Rachel and Leah, I have a file, a video of the piece in November 1988 with my narration and another video in 1995 with some different performers and again my introduction to the piece.  I could not write these blogs without having these materials to refresh my memory.

Of the many pieces I choreographed over the 34 years I was artistic director of Avodah, this one was unusually meaningful to me.  In watching it again I am also particularly fond of the choreography. One of the main reasons I began Avodah and continued particularly in the later 70’s and on was to find the woman’s voice in the Torah, particularly the five books.  The importance of these five books (Genesis, Exodus, etc.) resonated strongly with me as a portion is read each Shabbat and by the end of the Jewish year the five books have been completely read.  The patriarchal tone is so strong that I found myself consistently looking for the female voices.

I was not alone.  The 1980’s was a time when there was a lot of feminist writing, art, dance and theatre happening in religious spheres. The first female rabbi, Rabbi Sally Priesand,had been ordained in 1972 by Hebrew Union College. Earlier in 1935 Regina Jones had received semicha (ordination) by a liberal rabbi in Berlin.  She had found work as a chaplain.  Remaining in Germany she died in Auschwitz in October of 1944 at the age of 42.  By the 1980’s Rabbi Sally Priesand had her own congregation in Tinton Falls, NJ having first been an Assistant and Associate Rabbi at Stephen Wise Synagogue in Manhattan, which she left when she realized she would never become their Senior Rabbi.  After a few years she became the Rabbi for Monmouth Reform Temple and was there until she retired in 2006.  I always felt a strong emotion on the several occasions when we performed at Monmouth Reform Temple, aware of the strong pioneering efforts it took her to be the first!

In writing about Sisters, I want to set the scene for the kind of energy that was going on among many women in religious communities at this time. New feminist prayers were being written.  The first women-only Passover Seder was held in 1976 co-hosted by Esther M. Broner and Phyllis Chesler and attended by 13 women including Gloria Steinem and Letty Cottin Pogrebin.  By 1988 Feminist Passover Seders were gaining popularity and it was in 1988 that Debbie Friedman wrote Miriam’s Songand introduced it at a NYC Seder where the women grabbed tambourines and filled the room with dance. 

Rosh Chodesh groups had begun to form in the 1970’s.  While reference to the woman’s role in Rosh Chodesh (the holiday celebrating each new moon) goes all the way back to Talmudic times, women centered groups were gaining popularity throughout the United States in the 1980’s

As I began to focus on creating Sisters on the story of Rachel and Leah I was aware of this new energy and wanted to capture it in this new piece.  I found the perfect collaborator in Cantor Meredith Stone.  We played with ideas for the piece for well over a year.  

Susan Freeman, a rabbinic student at HUC-JIR, had also recently joined the company which meant she would also be able to recite prayers in Hebrew as accompaniment or counterpoint to Meredith’s chanting and singing.

As I watched both videos of the piece I was struck at how well developed the choreography was in each section.  Meredith and I had clearly defined each section. The choreography for each part had a distinctiveness and unique phrases that were developed.  At the same time I felt the piece held together as a whole.

The piece opens by setting the retelling of the story of the sister wives as if it is happening in the midst of a Rosh Chodesh ceremony.  The movements for this section are very circular and inspired by the shape of the new moon.  Meredith is humming a vocalization by composer Ron Nelson while Susan is chanting the Rosh Chodesh prayer from the Reform Gates of Prayerbook while she circles the three dancers in the center who are doing very circular and lyrical movement.  

As the music builds and the moon-like movement begins to fade, Susan and the dancer from the center who won’t be portraying one of the sisters begin wrapping the other two dancers with an imaginary thread.  

From the beginning of Sisters.Beth Bardin standing and Susan Freeman on the ground. Photo by Stanley Seligson.


In the 1995 video I shared with the audience that this section was inspired by the idea that red threads are given out at Rachel’s Tomb located at the northern entrance to Bethlehem.  Several years earlier I had been to the Tomb and gotten my red thread which I tied on my wrist and wore for quite a while.

Custom says that getting a red thread at Rachel’s Tomb goes back about 150 years.  Usually the small length of thread which is just enough to tie around one’s wrist comes from a much longer red thread that had been wound around the Tomb several times.  It is thought that the thread can protect a person.

While the wrapping has been going on Meredith has been singing Roitman’s Rachel Weeps for Her Children, a very strong and moving piece.  Susan also starts reciting a poem:

And the children struggled together
     Two nations
One stronger than the other
The elder… the younger
Brothers sisters

Meredith joins her saying the word “sisters.”

The scene is now set for totally focusing on Rachel and Leah.  They perform a lyrical, gentle duet with a lively and playful middle section accompanied by a piece of Bartok which Meredith played on a recorder.  Chanting continues telling the story of Leah and Rachel.

From l to r: Kezia Gleckman Hayman as Rachel, Deborah Hanna as Leah accompanied by Cantor Meredith Stone on the recorder.  Photo by Stanley Seligson.

There is a traditional midrash that says Rachel and Jacob had a secret sign, and that Rachel shared that sign with Leah so that Jacob could be deceived by having the older sister Leah under the wedding veil instead of his beloved Rachel.  The secret sign was for Rachel to touch her toe, thumb and ear.  This provided wonderful inspiration for movement with Rachel demonstrating the three gestures to Leah and then Leah following through with them in a short solo showing some of her anxiety.

Strong diagonal crosses have always been a favorite of mine and are used in the piece as Susan recites, to Meredith’s drumming, the names of “the children they bore.” Coming from opposite corners the two dancers come into the center and then circle around each other.  This is repeated several times until  they are in the center and  Benjamin’s name is repeated over and over as Kezia portraying Rachel is falling to the ground, using a traditional Graham contraction and ending in stillness to capture the idea that Rachel died during the childbirth of Benjamin. 

I remember having a hard time finding an ending to the piece.  I asked Deborah playing Leah to reach out and touch Rachel’s hair.  Kezia instinctively slowly sat up.  As if brought back to life, Rachel then rises and the other two dancers join the group with the Bartok melody coming back as well as some movement from the earlier duet as the following poem by the Israeli poet Rachel is recited:

Her blood is flowing in my veins
And in my song is heard another
The shepherdess of Laban’s sheep,
Rachel our mother

The very first time I saw a full dance run-through of the piece with the ending, I knew that it worked and I also felt an overwhelming emotion. In fact I excused myself from the room and spent several minutes alone in the hallway.  I realized how personal the piece was to me.  My youngest sister Suzanne at age 26 had committed suicide and the gesture of Leah bringing Rachel back to life was what I wished I could have done.  While that had happened about ten years before, the pain of losing her was still present.  

Kezia and Deborah played a strong role in creating the parts of Rachel and Leah and their performances were filled with intensity along with beautiful dancing. Susan brought her rabbinic studies into the dance studio chanting prayers, poetry and the names of the children along with her dancing.  When Susan left the company, Beth Millstein brought excellent Hebrew chanting skills to the company and was able to easily take on Susan’s role.  Elizabeth took over Deborah’s role as Leah when Deborah moved on.  The part of Rachel was only danced by Kezia, always with such beauty and tenderness. 

Hebrew Union College liked to coordinate programs and exhibits in the Joseph Gallery on the first floor.  While the first performances of Sistersoccurred in the spring of 1988 in Corpus Christi and then in Dallas, the first performance in New York City was at HUC in November as part of a series of programs related to an exhibit of the sculptor Chaim Gross.  In the photo below, we were honored to welcome one of the sculptures into the dance company temporarily.

From l to r: Cantor Meredith Stone, Deborah Hanna, Beth Bardin and Kezia Gleckman Hayman dancing with a Chaim Gross sculpture. Photo by Stanley Seligson.

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A Comedy Tonight

JoAnne Tucker / / Uncategorized

As Avodah began to get more concert bookings I thought it would be fun to add some humor to our very serious repertory based on liturgy, biblical stories and Holocaust poetry. So in the spring of 1980 I added two new pieces inspired by weddings.  One of those pieces, Three Brides and a Cow, inspired by French Painter Marc Chagall, was short-lived in the repertory.  Both the music by Irving Fleet and my choreography were not up to their usual standards.  The costumes, however, created by Tallahassee artist Stuart Riodan, were outstanding.

The second piece, Mother of the Bride, did work and stayed in the repertory for quite a few years.  Our daughter Julie had had her Bat Mitzvah recently and that had influenced the piece as I saw how much planning can go into an event and how easy it could be to forget about the significance of the moment and in a frenzy just get caught up in all the details.  So in Mother of the Bride I took things to the extreme, focusing on a mother taking on an extremely strong role.  

A review in 1983 in the Montgomery, AL paper describes it wonderfully:

Mother of the Bride was a very funny piece with Ms. Mindlin as the harried mother trying to organize her daughter’s wedding.  The other characters were Ms Behrendt as the bewildered bride standing in roller skates as activity swirled around her and Ms. Rodin as a bridesmaid.  The mother literally rolled the bride off stage to her wedding after she had been dressed in her finery and a bouquet stuffed in her hands.

(Although the bride is on roller skates, she is stuck in one spot throughout the whole piece, unable to move independently, because her mother controls all the action.)  The music was Purcell and the mother’s costume actually came from my own closet.  A long party dress I had worn was altered to fit the various dancers who played the part of the mother! (Kezia, who often played the part of the mother, notes that when she was married and the organist asked if she wanted the familiar Purcell piece played at the ceremony, she shouted, “NO” and then had to explain her unusually strong reaction.)            

A year later I added a piece I called Noshing to fun Klezmer music. It was all about eating and talking.  There are quite a few different definitions for the Yiddish word to nosh.  They range from eating food enthusiastically or greedily to having a snack between meals.   A trio for three dancers, the piece opens with two dancers greeting each other in a rather catty way… looking each other up and down, with one dancer even checking the label in the other dancer’s dress.  A third dancer joins them.  Soon they are at a buffet table filling their plates with food.  One dancer is attempting to resist the temptation of filling her plate with too much food. Three chairs are upstage center. The dancers soon sit down and then alternate between pantomiming eating and talking.  These movements usually amuse the audience quite a bit.As Noshing continues we see two dancers busily having a “conversation” in dance highlighted by fancy footwork and then one dancer does a solo conveying a very gossipy tale. It’s a fun piece filled with more balletic steps than usual for me.  I found two videos in my Avodah collection and it was great fun to watch a performance in Omaha, NE and another outdoor one in Great Neck, NY – two different casts both successfully and playfully

(l to r) Nancy and Muriel Melacon in the chatty duet in Noshing.  Photo by Jim Williams.
My apologies to Nancy – and Anita, below – as I can’t remember their last names and don’t seem to have any reviews or programs which help me.
(l to r) Nancy and Anita in Noshing. Photo by Jim Williams. 

In the fall of 1982, Rick Jacobs suggested doing a piece honoring three Jewish comedians: Woody Allen, Groucho Marx and Lenny Bruce.  The choreography was mainly Rick’s, with some suggestions from me. The piece received a preview performance on our January tour to Alabama.  In the Woody Allen section, a beautiful female dancer seated in a chair downstage right totally ignores his attempts to flirt. The dancer leaves and Rick pretends the chair becomes the “beautiful lady” and dances with the chair.  As the section ends he is on the floor as the dancer returns and for the first time takes notice of him – on the floor, much to his dismay.

Abandoning a sweater and putting on a  jacket and nose glasses Rick becomes Groucho.  I particularly enjoyed this section with his bold Groucho strides.  Soon a dancer portraying Mrs. Dumont enters.  They dance together in a sarcastic way and at the end Rick carries her off much like a sack over his shoulder.  

Luckily I had a video of these two sections done in a performance at a JCC in New Jersey which helped to refresh my memory.  Alas I don’t have any video of the Lenny Bruce section and I don’t remember it performed very often.

With the rest of the repertory being so serious these three comedies added a new dimension and gave the audience a chance to laugh.  

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Things you Learn from Touring

JoAnne Tucker / / Uncategorized

This evening as we were getting ready to go out to dinner, Murray said, “Oh by the way the back door of our Rav SUV isn’t closing.” OK, I thought, let me take a look at it.

So… I opened the back door which looked normal except it wasn’t closing tightly and I immediately saw that the latch wasn’t hanging right.  Since it was evening and dark… I got out my iPhone, put on the flashlight and saw that one screw had come out of the latch and so it was hanging downward.  Murray joined me and we soon found the missing screw. Murray got a screwdriver and in just a few minutes it was back to working perfectly.

The fixed Latch of the car door.

Now Murray was a bit surprised, because he’d figured he would have to take it into a repair shop. While I usually am not solving car problems, this was a no brainer… and Murray was very happy that I had just saved us $85 or more.  All I could think was that one benefit of touring and running a dance company is that you learn to quickly problem solve.

Tonight I am remembering those moments of touring which required quick problem solving, and the last-minute challenges of directing a dance company.  One example I have already shared — the snow storm that left two dancers performing “Let My People Go” when there should have been a full company of six.  In a few hours that day we figured out how to make something work for the evening performance. (See “Let My People Go Meets Let it Snow”.)  

Last minute casting changes sometimes happened.  Like the time that Beth Millstein got the chicken pox two days before we were due to perform in Boston.  Well…  I called my good friend Linda Kent and asked if she could recommend one of her students or past students from Juilliard who might fill in and she said SHE was available. Wow that was pretty awesome to have a former member of Alvin Ailey Company and Paul Taylor Company subbing for us.  

And then there was the time in the airport when one of the dancers hadn’t arrived at our meeting place and it was getting very close to the time that the plane was due to take off.  Hmmm…. Not wanting to have the rest of us miss the flight, I left her ticket with a ticket agent and we all boarded the plane.  Just as they were about to close the door, the dancer appeared to a round of applause from us and those sitting near us.

When performing in services, we always worked to get furniture moved from the bema so the dancers could have as much space as possible to move. One day when one rabbi was determinedly saying that a podium couldn’t be moved, Rick and I gently tilted it back, disconnected the wires and moved it over to the side, giving the dancers their needed space.  The rabbi wrote a lovely review back to the Jewish Welfare Lecture Bureau that had booked us, saying that “JoAnne Tucker was very pleasant to work with in spite of being persistent.”

At one Friday Sabbath service in Connecticut, the rabbi was certain the best place for us to perform was in an area in the back of the sanctuary and everyone could just look over his or her shoulders to see us.  Now that was by far the oddest suggestion I had ever heard and there was no way I could agree to that.  For several hours we went back and forth… meanwhile I simply told the dancers to work on their spacing on the bema.  Finally I quoted scripture – Exodus 40:30-32 about levels of sacred space and remembered something we had written in Torah in Motion.  I convinced him that it would be all right for the dancers to be on the bema because they would not be going up to the ark where the Torah scrolls were kept. That space was just for him! Success!  We danced on the bema!

So many times, I entered a space in the early afternoon and had to make decisions of where I would run the sound, set it up, and make sure it worked.  How many times dancers had to quickly adapt to a new space, making it their own and performing brilliantly.  And then when we were in a theatre, I had to quickly learn the lighting system.  Larger companies carried tech people.  We didn’t. While I rarely ran the lights, I had to learn how to communicate with the light person and sometimes a sound person to be able to call the cues.  Then I would call my own cue and walk into the spotlight to narrate between pieces.

So… what I learned from running a dance company was to be flexible.  Problems can be solved by stopping, taking in the situation, and then seeing the possible solutions.  This training has served me very well in life and fixing our car door tonight was a small example.   

Murray and I, happy that the car is repaired.

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Dance and Art Together

JoAnne Tucker / / Art, Movement Workshops

In 2003 when my husband and I were thinking about moving from the New York area and I was becoming aware that I no longer had new goals for the dance company, I treated myself to classes at The Art Students League on 57thStreet.  Later I’ll write more about my beginning studies in art.  I knew it would be important to keep creative energy going in my life. Today I am excited to share how dance and art came together.  Just a few weeks ago (on Saturday, January 12th), I led a movement workshop at the Community Art Gallery here in Santa Fe.  It came about as a result of having a painting in the show “Exquisite Corpse.”  The show was for the 10thanniversary of the gallery, and to be eligible to participate, you had to have been juried into one of their themed exhibitions.

A floral painting of mine had been in an earlier show so I emailed back the form saying I wanted to participate.  

The painting that I did for “Viva Flores” in 2013 that made me eligible to participate in the 10thAnniversary Show “Exquisite Corpse.”

The program for the 10thanniversary show describes the intent and motivation:

Exquisite Corpse is an historic parlor game in which participants create one of three components of a figure drawing: head, torso and legs.  130 participating artists created one of those distinct sections.  When assembled together, these sections will create an exhibit that unites the disparate parts into singular figures.  Each artist’s section is priced individually at $150, and buyers have the opportunity to create their own combinations. ….. What better way to celebrate ten years of building innovative programming hand-in-hand with the community than to have a decade of artists together build a collective work of art.

When I got the return email in the spring, saying that I had gotten the body part of the “head,” I did a big sigh and was glad that I had all summer to work on it.  The painting wouldn’t be due at the gallery until the beginning of October.  Our instructions were that the piece had to measure 30” wide by 10” high. Well at least that gave me room to put things around the head!  I am not good at portrait drawing even though I did do a 5-month program in Santa Fe with the outstanding teacher Anthony Ryder in 2009.  In fact it was during those 5 months that Murray and I fell in love with Santa Fe and decided that we wanted to move here and make it our permanent year-round home.   

OK… since I was good at flowers I would do a self-portrait surrounding my head with tulips.  I had just returned from a spring trip to New York City and had been admiring all the beautiful displays of tulips, particularly in lower Manhattan near where the ferry from Jersey City arrived. Since I was staying in Jersey City and taking the ferry in daily I had lots of opportunity to wander through the display and take photographs.  

Slowly over the summer I developed the oil painting, particularly challenged with the self-portrait and loving doing the tulips.  I dropped it off at the gallery thinking, “Well at least I completed the assignment even if it wasn’t very good.” They had rescheduled the opening and Murray and I had reservations at Monument Valley, a place we had long wanted to visit, and so we missed the opening.

The view from our room in Monument Valley.


A week later, after returning from Monument Valley, I got an email from the gallery saying my painting had sold.   Wow… I was totally surprised.   Murray was busy in his office and I went bounding in asking if he wanted to go see the show and go to lunch afterwards. We agreed and I had an hour or so before we would leave.  For fun I googled the phrase “Exquisite Corpse” and the most amazing dance interpretation consisting of 42 choreographers, most of whom I was familiar with, came up.  (One of the choreographers was former Avodah dancer Sidra Bell.)  Each choreographer creates a phrase of about 10 seconds and the next choreographer opens his/her phrase with the last movement of the previous choreographer’s work.  The video on You Tube was great fun and extremely well made. 

When I got to the gallery I was thrilled with how Rod Lambert, the Community Gallery Manager, had put together the show.  He was the one who selected which heads would go with which torsos, and with which feet, and he had done an amazing job.  I was thrilled with how my head was arranged with two other pieces.  

My self-portrait and how it was arranged with two other pieces in
the Exquisite Corpse show.

When I congratulated him on how well the show was displayed, he shared how well the opening had gone, with enthusiasm from both the artists and other attendees.  He told us that more paintings were sold at the opening than for any other show.  At some point I talked about the video I had seen where 42 choreographers did their version of Exquisite Corpse.  Immediately Rod asked me about my background and whether I would be interested in doing a dance workshop related to the show.  He always arranged various kinds of workshops around the show and it would be fun to do a dance one since they rarely if ever had done dance.  There was a small honorarium for leading the workshop.  Of course I said yes and over the next several weeks, via email, we selected a date and I sent in my bio and a brief description of the workshop.

The workshop ended up being quite wonderful.  While it was small,with only five participants, each person was totally engaged and brought something special to the group.  My friend Regina (a professional storyteller)was one of the participants and she had brought a friend of hers who was also a professional storyteller. Of course at one point in the workshop Regina and I just laughed remembering that we started doing such things together when we were about six years old in her living room.  (That’s another blog sometime down the road.) One of the participants was totally deaf.  She read lips very well and when she didn’t understand something we wrote on a large piece of paper we had placed on the wall. She had a lovely quality of movement. Two other women came in a few minutes late, one a writer and the other a therapist who had a dance background.  They quickly became a part of the group.  

We used some warm up improvisational work to lead to the centerpiece of each person creating their own solo. (Since it was a small group and each person was very capable I changed the original plan of small groups creating a dance and instead asked each person to create a solo.  That would have been risky with most small groups but not with this one.)  I asked them to select a head, a torso and feet from any of the works; the parts did not need to be from the same arrangement.  By the way, some of the works were sculptures, like the torso in the piece I was a part of, while others were photographs or paintings in any medium.  The choreographers were then to imagine how the head, torso and feet would move with at least 2 movement phrases for each part of the body.

While they were creating their pieces, I put a blanket of percussion instruments out, bringing the energy of my favorite accompanist Newman Taylor Baker into the room.  When we gathered back together, each person shared their solo and I accompanied.  Then after exploring the instruments, one person selected the instruments they wanted for their solo and another person in the group accompanied them. Each workshop participant also took us to the pieces that had inspired their movements.

The results were super.  Before ending we linked the solos together as the 42 choreographers had done, and then we all watched the video I had seen, and which I highly recommend.  Here again is the link to watch it.

I left feeling a sense of completeness.  Dance and art together shared with five totally present and creative participants!                

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