EntreDança Festival at Rio SESCs Features Afro Talents in a Nation of Dance Enthusiasts

By Harold Emert –

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Brazil is a nation of talented dancers and choreographers who have been featured stars in world-renowned ballet troupes from the Bolshoi to the Royal ballet companies.

And despite the continuing economic crisis affecting a culture which has produced, among others, the world-renowned Deborah Colker contemporary dance company (currently in Britain) and Royal ballet star Thiago Soares (who is currently Rio’s Municipal Theatre choreographer), Brazil continues nurturing new talents.

This month and stretching until June 2nd, the fourth edition of Rio’s SESC EntreDança (BetweenDance) is presenting the “shakers and movers” of contemporary Afro-Brazilian dance, as SESC describes them, in a festival mixing movement with other theatrical forms.

Tickets are R$30 (R$15 for senior citizens) at Sesc units in Copacabana, Nova Iguacu, Ramos as well as Novo Friburgo (Rio state).

The Festival features multi-faceted dance works created and performed by Afro-Brazilians, aesthetics, methodology, classes, and points of view.

The project has as its motivation for the recognition of new dancers, choreographers, and dance companies.

Fourteen invited companies from the state of Rio de Janeiro and other Brazilian states are participating this year.

Apart from dance shows, the Festival features free workshops, presentations in urban spaces and public spaces and inter-exchange between artists.

Sesc organizers say, “Always seeking to stimulate culture in the state of Rio, SescRio is presenting a Festival with the central objective of increased dance performances, to stimulate a constant formation of new audiences and the revelation and accessibility to a cultural asset.”

The Rio Times attended on May 4th at Sesc Copacabana, the São Paulo contemporary dance trio A-Vos, which “is dedicated to our ancestors. We dance to life memories.”

The presentation “between dances” included dramatic speaking and a question and answer session with the audience.

Other dance ensembles include Imperadores da Dança (Dance Emperors) which was created in 2006 in Rio’s north zone by Anderson Santos of Bahia, with performances at the 2012 Paralympics in London as well as at Lincoln Center in New York (2014), Zurich (2016) and at the closing ceremony of the 2016 Olympics in Rio.

Carlos Laerte created the Laso Dance Company in 2002 with the idea of “bringing a new identity within Carioca dance companies. “It works with cinema, theatre, and classical and modern ballet.”

Performances include: 

The Laso Dance Company:
May 12 (.Sunday), 8 p.m. ,Sesc Copacabana ( Rua Domingos Ferreira 160–Copacabana)
May 17 ( Friday) at Sesc Ramos ( R. Teixeira Franco , 38),7:30 p.m.
May 31– Sesc Nova Friburgo (Av.Pres.Costa e Silva, 231, Center), 7 p.m.

Rubens Barbot Company, May 16 and 19, 8 p.m.at Sesc Copacabana

Imperadores of Dance ( Dance Emperors):
May 17 ( Friday) 6 pm to 8 pm
Oficina de Passinho (Favela Funk Workshop) at the Carioca School of Afro Dances(Escola Carioca de Dancas Negras, Rua Santos Estevao , 103 — Andarai

May 30 at Sesc Ramos (R.Teixeira Franco , 38),10 a.m. to 12 p.m.