Alvin Ailey | |
|---|---|
 Photographed byCarl Van Vechten, 1955 | |
| Born | (1931-01-05)January 5, 1931 Rogers, Texas, U.S. |
| Died | December 1, 1989(1989-12-01) (aged 58) Manhattan, New York City, U.S. |
| Occupation(s) | Dancer, choreographer |
| Awards | Presidential Medal of Freedom,Kennedy Center Honors |
Alvin Ailey Jr. (January 5, 1931 – December 1, 1989) was an American dancer, director,choreographer, and activist who founded theAlvin Ailey American Dance Theater (AAADT). He created AAADT and its affiliated Alvin Ailey American Dance Center (later Ailey School) as havens for nurturing Black artists and expressing the universality of the African-American experience through dance.
Ailey's work fused theater, modern dance, ballet, and jazz with Black vernacular, creating hope-fueled choreography that is credited with spreading global awareness of Black life in America. Ailey's choreographic masterpieceRevelations is recognized as one of the most popular and most performed ballets in the world.[1][2][3]
On July 15, 2008, theUnited States Congress passed a resolution designating AAADT a "vital American cultural ambassador to the World".[4][5] That same year, in recognition of AAADT's 50th anniversary, then MayorMichael Bloomberg declared December 4 "Alvin Ailey Day" inNew York City, while then-GovernorDavid Paterson honored the organization on behalf ofNew York State.[6]
Ailey was born to Alvin Ailey and Lula Elizabeth Cliff[7][8][9] inRogers, Texas, in his maternal grandfather's home at the height of theGreat Depression. As a child in the violently racist and segregated south, during his youth Ailey was barred from interacting with mainstream society.[10] When he was five, Ailey's mother was raped by four white men (one likely an employer), and Ailey recalled seeing members of theKu Klux Klan as a child.[11][12]
The elder Alvin Ailey abandoned the young Alvin and Lula shortly after Alvin was born, leaving Lula to work in cotton fields and as adomestic in white homes — the only employment available to her.[13] By the time Ailey was five, he joined his mother picking cotton.[12] After a white man raped Lula in 1936, Ailey began to fear white men.[7] As an escape, Ailey found refuge in the church, sneaking out at night to watch adults dance, and in writing a journal, a practice that he maintained his entire life. Even this could not shield him from a childhood spent moving from town to town as his mother sought employment, being abandoned with relatives whenever she took off on her own.[14][9]
Looking for greater job prospects, Ailey's mother departed forLos Angeles in 1941. He arrived a year later, enrolling at George Washington Carver Junior High School, and then graduating intoThomas Jefferson High School.[15] He was able to explore the arts in high school, singing in glee club and writing poetry.[16] He also took gymnastics.[11] He frequently attended theLincoln andOrpheum Theatres, where he was able to see a variety of African American performers, includingPearl Bailey,Fletcher Henderson,Billie Holiday,Lena Horne,Pigmeat Markham,Count Basie, andDuke Ellington.[16] In 1946, Ailey had his first experience with concert dance, awakening an until then unknown spark of joy within him,[17] when he sawBallet Russe de Monte-Carlo on a school trip andKatherine Dunham Dance Company's "Tropical Review" on solitary trips to the Los Angeles Philharmonic Auditorium.[18]
Also in high school, Ailey discovered his homosexuality, which added another layer of difference and isolation to his already racially segregated experience. Thus, "like many young gay men eager to corral the sensual impulses of the body, he turned to dance study."[16] He briefly studied tap, followed by exploring "primitive dance", as taught by Dunham dancerThelma Robinson. Neither of these styles were right for Ailey, possibly due to the physical location and old-fashioned sensibility of the lessons.[16] Therefore, he did not become serious about dance until 1949 when his classmate and friendCarmen De Lavallade dragged him to theMelrose Avenue studio ofLester Horton and he began exploring modern dance.[19][20]
Ailey studied a wide range of dance styles and techniques — from ballet to Native American inspired movement studies — at Horton's school, which was one of the first racially integrated dance schools in the United States.[21][22] Though Horton became his mentor,[23] Ailey did not commit to dancing full-time, recognizing the lack of opportunities for black male dancers.[16] Instead, he pursued academic courses, studyingromance languages and writing atUCLA (1949),[24][25]Los Angeles City College (1950–1951), andSan Francisco State University (1952). During this time, he sporadically returned to Horton to work between courses.[16] Living inSan Francisco, he metMaya Angelou, then known as Marguerite Johnson,[26] with whom he formed a nightclub act called "Al and Rita".[27] Eventually, he returned to study dance with Horton in Los Angeles.[28]
Ailey joined Horton's dance company in 1953. While there, he took daily technique classes, studied art and music, and taught children's classes. In 1953, he made his debut in Horton'sRevue Le Bal Caribe. In a workshop the summer of 1953, Ailey created his first dance composition,Afternoon Blues. This work was a three-minute solo blues adaptation ofL'Aprés-midi d’un Faune, which he had seen performed by the Ballet Russe de Monte-Carlo. In this piece, Ailey played the eponymous Faun to a selection fromOn the Town.[16]
Horton died suddenly November 1953 from a heart attack, leaving the company without leadership.[29] In order to complete the organization's pressing professional engagements, and because no one else was willing to, Ailey took over as artistic director and choreographer.[30][31] In particular, Horton's company was committed to performing atJacob's Pillow in the summer of 1954. Ailey worked collaboratively with the Horton company dancers and choreographed based on them, gaining the support of the company's dancers who had much more experience than Ailey. These works includedAccording to St. Francis (4 June 1954), a tribute to Horton as a "kind of allusion to Lester's life" featuring James Truitte. He also choreographed and directedMorning Mourning (4 June 1954), a piece based on[16] the work ofTennessee Williams featuring de Lavallade and set to an original score byGertrude Rivers Robinson.[16] As Horton had done, Ailey designed the sets forMorning Mourning and collaborated on the lighting. That summer, Ailey also made his first large group piece,Creation of the World (13 July 1954), set to a score byDarius Milhaud. Under Ailey, the Horton company had commercial engagements on television programsParty at Ciro's,The Red Skelton Show, and theJack Benny show. Ailey and de Lavallade also performed in a segment ofCarmen Jones.[16]
In December, 1954De Lavallade and Ailey were recruited byHerbert Ross (who had choreographedCarmen Jones) to join the Broadway show,House of Flowers. Ross had been hired to replace George Balanchine as the show's choreographer and he wanted to use the pair, who had become known as a famous dance team in Los Angeles, as featured dancers.[32][33] The show's book was written and adapted byTruman Capote from one of his novellas with music fromHarold Arlen and starredPearl Bailey andDiahann Carroll.[34]
Ailey and De Lavallade metGeoffrey Holder, who performed alongside them in the chorus, during the production. Holder married De Lavallade and became a life-long artistic collaborator with Ailey.[34] AfterHouse of Flowers closed, Ailey appeared inHarry Belafonte's touring revueSing, Man, Sing withMary Hinkson as his dance partner,[35] and the 1957 Broadway musicalJamaica, which starredLena Horne andRicardo Montalbán. Throughout the late 1950s, Ailey continued to study dance technique sporadically, learning with theNew Dance Group'sHanya Holm,Anna Sokolow,Charles Weidman, andKarel Shook.[16] Drawn to dance, but unable to find a choreographer whose work fulfilled him and wanting to continue the work he had begun at the Horton school, Ailey started gathering dancers to perform his own unique vision of dance.[36]
In 1958 Ailey founded theAlvin Ailey American Dance Theater to present his vision of honoring Black culture through dance. The company had its debut at the92nd Street YM-YWHA on March 30, 1958 in a concert shared with choreographer Ernest Parham, with headlining guest artistTalley Beatty.[16] The performance included Ailey's first masterpiece,Blues Suite, which drew from Ailey's Texas childhood andHouse of Flowers, following men and women as they caroused and cavorted over the course of an evening while blues music played in the background until church bells began to ring, signaling a return to mundane life.[37][38] Ailey danced in the other two premieres at this performance,Redonda andOde and Homage.Redonda, which was later retitledCinco Latinos, brought together five short pieces described as "Latin Theme" in a work similar to Horton's.Ode and Homage, set to a score byPeggy Glanville-Hicks, was a "dance of faith, respectfully dedicated to the memory of Lester Horton".[16]
Following the success of his first concert, Ailey continued choreographing for a shifting roster of dancers who were available for dances at the 92nd Street YM-YWHA, working with designers Normand Maxon, Ves Harper, and Nicola Cernovich. These works included the integratedAriette Oubliée (December 21, 1958, a choreographic fantasy pantomime set toDebussy's similarly named song cycle and featuring Don Price and de Lavallade. He also choreographed for other companies in collaborations, such as a version ofMiss Julie,Mistress and Manservant, to a score byRavel for the Shirley Broughton Dance Company.[16]
On January 31, 1960, the AADT premiered several new works at the 92nd Street YM-YWHA. These includedSonera, Ailey's first attempt at choreographing on point. Ailey also reworkedCreation of the World for this performance as a duet for himself and Matt Turney of theMartha Graham Dance Company, which received great acclaim.[16] He also premiered his most popular and critically acclaimed work,Revelations. In creatingRevelations, Ailey drew upon his "blood memories" of growing up in Texas surrounded by Black people, the church, spirituals, and the blues. The ballet charts the full range of feelings, from the majestic "I Been ’Buked" to the rapturous "Wade in the Water", closing with the electrifying finale, "Rocka My Soul in the Bosom of Abraham".[39][40][41]
In 1960, Edele Holz offered Ailey rehearsal space at what would become theClark Center for the Performing Arts. Shortly after the center opened in October of that year, AADT had its first concert. This concert included a November 27, 1960 premieredKnoxville: Summer of 1915, set to music bySamuel Barber and based onA Death in the Family andThree for Now, set to music byJimmy Giuffre andJohn Lewis (pianist), as well as Horton'sThe Beloved and John Butler'sPortrait of Billie. The next year, he premieredHermit Songs (10 December 1961). Originally conceived as a group work, it premiered as a solo for Ailey performed toLeontyne Price's recording of Samuel Barber'sHermit Songs.Hermit Songs, which is based on a loose narrative of a monk's privilege and penance, remained in the AADT's repertoire through 1991.[16]
Ailey's work during this time was different from that of many other modern dance choreographers of the time. By keeping a focus on narrative, he was able to draw an audience from outside New York City and the avant garde.[11]
In the fall of 1961, theUS State Department invited the AADT (under the banner of the Lavallade-Ailey American Dance Company) to tour Southeast Asia and Australia as a part of President Kennedy's Special International Program for Cultural Presentations. This led Ailey to assemble a repertory that the State Department would find appropriate, including a new dance,Been Here and Gone, a suite of folk songs and children's games based onDonald McKayle'sGames (which Ailey had performed in 1956) and his own memories of growing up in Texas. He also assembled a company of ten dancers and four musicians that could travel the world. This tour began on 3 February in Sydney, Australia, and ended on 12 May 1962 in Seoul, South Korea, performing sixty times in thirteen weeks. As necessary, Ailey reworked material to fit the shifting roster of collaborators. Many of the works, includingRoots of the Blues andRevelations were specifically reworked to feature the headlining de Lavallade. The tour had followups at the World Festival of Negro Arts inDakar, Senegal in 1966, East & West Africa in 1967, and theEdinburgh Festival in 1968. Biographer Thomas DeFrantz notes how the Ailey company's status as "the sole exponent of an emerging standard of African American concert dance" allowed the U.S. government to covertly mold the "signature style of Afro-American concert dance". He also notes that State Department propaganda aided in promoting the international celebrity of the AADT.[16]
The relationship with the State Department did not go well and ended after a few years. Ailey struggled with the state department tours, which insisted on marketing the company as an "ethnic" company rather than a modern dance company, and were closely supervised by the FBI - the latter referred to Ailey's homosexuality as "lewd and criminal tendencies" and threatened his company with bankruptcy if he showed any signs of effeminate or homosexual behavior while on tour.[42]
Despite their work with the State Department, the company was able to book only a few performances per season in America. For a major concert at theBrooklyn Academy of Music on 28 April 1963, Ailey reworked movements ofRevelations into "Reflections in D" (set to music byDuke Ellington) which, combined with "Suspensions", and "Gillespiana" made the latest version ofThree for Now. Ailey also premieredLabyrinth, telling the story ofTheseus and theMinotaur, which was later reborn asAriadne.[16]
Also in 1963, Ailey began his professional relationship withDuke Ellington. Ellington invited Ailey to perform inMy People (First Negro Centennial), a travelogue history in observance of the centennial of theEmancipation Proclamation. For the August 19 performance, Ailey coreographed three pieces, "The Blues Ain't", "Light", and "My Mother My Father". While working with Ellington, Ailey and his company were invited to the International Music Festival inRio de Janeiro. For this performance, feeling the occasion required a new work, Ailey premieredRivers, Streams, and Doors.
In August 1964, Ailey choreographed a dance,The Twelve Gates, in honor ofRuth St. Denis andTed Shawn's golden anniversary. This performance, featuring Truitte and de Lavallade, and with costumes by Holder, was performed for a single week at Jacob's Pillow. In the fall of 1964, Ailey added "American" to his company's name during a three-month European tour. In 1965, following physical tensions and negative reviews at the Florentine Festival, Ailey retired from his career as a dancer.[16] Ailey paused choreography until receiving a lucrative commission by the Swedish television forRiedaiglia, which was danced to a commissioned score byGeorg Riedel and relied heavily on television director Lars Egler's direction. This dance immediately won the television award the Grand Prix Italia, and was later broadcast in the United States onAmbassadors of Dance.[16]
In the summer of 1968, Ailey received aGuggenheim Fellowship. With these funds, he created his first work set to pop music, choreographingQuintet to six songs fromEli and the Thirteenth Confession. This work debuted at the 1968 Edinburgh Festival, and premiered in New York at the Billy Rose Theatre as a part of AAADT's first Broadway season.[16] The next year, he createdDiversion No.1, including dances toScarborough Fair andOh Happy Day for a program shared withThe 5th Dimension. This work, created to attract audiences to the AAADT's UCLA season, was one of Ailey's most commercial pieces.[16]
In a twelve-day residency atConnecticut College in 1968, Ailey createdMasekela Langage, a piece set inSouth Africa. This work directly addresses racial politics with the intention of drawing a parallel between theApartheid and the shooting to death ofFred Hampton. This politicism was uncommon for Ailey's work. The piece received immediate acclaim, and is regularly revived by the AAADT.[16]
After a successful week-long engagement at the Billy Rose Theatre, the company was invited to become the resident company atBrooklyn Academy of Music in 1969.[42][43] This residency included a revival ofRevelations. While working with BAM, he sponsored free classes for children and young adults "geared to channel formidable youth rage into art".[16] Ailey was dissatisfied with the residency due to cramped quarters and BAM directorHarvey Lichtenstein's racialized business tactics.[16]
In 1970, with few bookings on the radar — and on the eve of a tour to Russia as part of a cultural exchange agreement — Ailey announced at a press conference that he was closing the company. In response, the State Department sponsored an Ailey tour of North Africa to tide things over. That August, the company toured to Russia, where it was ecstatically received. The AAADT became the first American modern dance company to perform in the Soviet Union.[16] Their performances were broadcast on Moscow television and seen by over 22 million viewers. On closing night, because the Russian audiences would not stop applauding, the company gave over 30 curtain calls. Returning home with news of this triumph, the company performed a two-week engagement at theANTA Theater. At this performance, he premieredFlowers, set to music byBlind Faith,Pink Floyd, andJanis Joplin withBig Brother and the Holding Company.Flowers, which featuredLynn Seymour, depicted the death of a rock star caused by drug addiction, inspired by Joplin's death on October 3, 1970, and dedicated to "a slew of rockers making youth-oriented music".[16] By the end of the January 1971 performance, the entire run was sold out. After 13 years, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre was a monumental success.
In August 1972, the company was briefly renamed Alvin Ailey City Center Dance Theater and became a resident company ofNew York City Center.[44] In September of that year, Ailey createdShaken Angels, another rock-based piece. This piece, set to recorded music byAlice Cooper,Pink Floyd, andBill Withers, featuredDennis Wayne and Bonnie Mathis in story about a couple "cornered into a relationship of violence and need, smoking pot and mainlining heroin. The work spilled into the audience as Wayne chased Mathis through the aisles, dragging her onto the stage and striking her with a needle.[16]
In 1973, the AAADT headlined theFirst National Congress on Blacks in Dance, though Ailey sat out of conversations on how to advance the public perception and financial profiles of black dance companies.[16]
In 1975, Ailey restagedRevelations for nineteen dancers for a staging at theNew York State Theater from August 12 to 24.[16]
While Ailey choreographed more than 100 ballets for his dancers, he insisted that the company perform pieces by other choreographers rather than stand as a singular vehicle for his voice.
Though AAADT was formed to celebrate African-American culture and to provide performances for black dancers, who were frequently denied opportunities due to racist mores of the time, Ailey proudly employed artists based solely on artistic talent and integrity, regardless of their background.[45] In addition to his work as artistic director and choreographer with AAADT, Ailey also choreographed ballets for other companies including American Ballet Theatre,[46] Joffrey Ballet,[47] Royal Danish Ballet,[48] and The Metropolitan Opera.[49] For American Ballet Theatre, he createdThe River (1970), one of several choreographies he set to the jazz music ofDuke Ellington.[50]
Throughout his career, Ailey continued to pursue work as a commercial theater choreographer, re-stagingCarmen Jones (August 1959) and Jamaica (1960) forSummer stock theater and staging dances for the theatrical reviewAfrican Holiday (1960) andDark Side of the Moon (May 1960). These commercial engagements remained segregated, with African-American casts generally hired to entertain mostly white audiences.[16] Ailey also studied acting withStella Adler from 1960 to 1962, acting in non-dancing roles in dramatic plays includingCall Me by My Rightful Name (January 1961) with costarsRobert Duvall andJoan Hackett, andTiger, Tiger Burning Bright, also startingRoscoe Lee Browne,Al Freeman Jr.,Claudia McNeil,Diana Sands, andCicely Tyson. These plays all constructed race as a societal force and "agent of division".[16]
In 1964, at a direct request fromLangston Hughes, Ailey directedJerico-Jim Crow with William Hairston. His one attempt at Broadway choreography,La Strada (musical), opened and closed in one performance on December 14, 1969.[16]
In 1969, Ailey founded the Alvin Ailey American Dance Center with the famedMartha Graham Dance Company principal and choreographerPearl Lang as his co-director of the school. Their aim was to provide access to arts and dance to under-resourced communities. They started off in Brooklyn with 125 students. A year later the school relocated to Manhattan behind theLincoln Center complex. In 1984,Denise Jefferson assumed directorship. Under her leadership, the school developed a Bachelor of Fine Arts Program in partnership with Fordham University in 1998.[51]
The school was renamed The Ailey School in 1999. Several years later, the school moved into The Joan Weill Center for Dance. Following Jefferson's death in 2010,Tracy Inman andMelanie Person assumed stewardship of the school as co-directors of the school. In 2012, after leading Ailey 2 for 38 years, Sylvia Waters retired. The second company's resident choreographer and associate directorTroy Powell took over her role as artistic director. With the addition of the Elaine Wynn and Family Education Wing, the Ailey school is still growing and is now the largest place in New York City committed to training dancers.[51]
From her joining in 1965, the dancerJudith Jamison served as Ailey's muse.[52] In 1971 she premieredCry, which he dedicated to his mother and black women everywhere.[53] She took over as artistic director following his death in 1989.[54][55][56]
Other important figures in the company include Sylvia Waters, who in 1974, after performing with the company for six year was asked by Ailey to lead The Alvin Ailey Repertory Ensemble — a junior company, known today as Ailey 2, that prepares leading students for professional dance careers[57][58] - andMasazumi Chaya, who danced with the company for 15 years then became rehearsal director, and was appointed associate artistic director in 1991.[59][60]
Ailey was uncomfortable with the label "Black choreographer" and preferred being known simply as a choreographer, while also acknowledging to theChicago Tribune in 1987: "Of course there is something black in my work: me and my 56 years."[61] Ailey, who was gay and bipolar,[62] was known to be private about his personal life.[61][63]
Ailey died from anAIDS-related illness on December 1, 1989 at the age of 58.[64] He asked his doctor to announce that his death was caused by terminal blooddyscrasia in order to shield his mother from the stigma associated with HIV/AIDS.[65]
On December 9, 1989, more than 4,000 mourners attended his funeral at theCathedral of St. John the Divine. The funeral, which lasted two hours, featured his friendMaya Angelou reading an oral interpretation of her poem "For Alvin Ailey", drumming byMax Roach, a reading of a statement from PresidentGeorge H. W. Bush, and eulogies byCarmen de Lavallade, Judith Jamison, and New York City MayorDavid Dinkins. The funeral also included performances of Ailey's choreography on a makeshift stage constructed around his casket. These includedDudley Williams performing "Song for You", Donna Wood dancing an excerpt from "Cry", and excerpts fromRevelations performed by Mari Kajiwara, John Parks, and members of his dance company.[12]
Ailey was buried in Los Angeles.[66]
After his death, Ailey’s personal papers were housed at theBlack Archives of Mid-America in Kansas City, Missouri.[80]
In 2021, the documentaryAiley by director Jamila Wignot was released in the United States.[81] Wignot first discovered the work of the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater by attending a performance while she was a student atWellesley College; in her documentary more than twenty years later, Alexandra Villarreal ofThe Guardian writes, "What emerges is a towering figure who won worldwide acclaim with art steeped in personal experience, yet was too afraid to openly share his full identity even in death."[81]
Though Ailey's work has been met with popular and critical acclaim, there have been detractors of his theatrical style. Marcia Siegel accused the company of "selling soul",[82] and of amplifying and transforming the emotivity characteristic ofMartha Graham and his modern dance teachers into "metaphors of the American black experience" ,while creating a positive stereotype of "supremely physical, supremely sensitive beings" at the expense of "genuineness".[83]
Ailey responded to such criticism by stating, "The black pieces we do that come from blues, spirituals and gospels are part of what I am. They are as honest and truthful as we can make them. I'm interested in putting something on stage that will have a very wide appeal without being condescending; that will reach an audience and make it part of the dance; that will get everybody into the theater. If it's art and entertainment — thank God, that's what I want to be."[44]
