This week the Traverse is hosting its fifth dance festival, showcasing five dance companies, on five consecutive nights, from across Scotland and the UK. Thursday’s performance, Extremely Bad Dancing to Extremely French Music, was choreographed and performed by Karl-Jay Lewin, with Tim Parkinson playing Matteo Fargion’s composition on the piano.
The fifty minute piece consisted of fifty separate piano and performance solos, the title of each displayed on flipcharts on the two sides of the stage. One performance solo was called ‘Extremely Bad Dancing’ (hence the title of the show) but unfortunately there wasn’t really any good dancing to compare it with. There was some ‘can’t really be bothered’ dancing; there was some banging on a drum (perhaps a reference to Jay-Lewin’s interest in politics) while shouting four rude words in different orders; there was some standing still while dressed as an elephant; some nudity and some hiding behind the piano.
The programme blurb informs that Jay-Lewin has, ‘moved audiences to laughter, tears and exasperation in equal measure’ and indeed, some members of the sparse audience were - quite understandably - chuckling in places. However, the performance was more funny-peculiar than funny-ha-ha and, while Jay-Lewin does possess a somehow endearing quality and displayed the beginnings of some potentially promising ideas, it would be fair to say that at least one audience member was left feeling bemused, bewildered and a bit bored.
The Traverse Dance Festival ran 5 - 9 Nov