Every arts company posts a mission statement – art, community, blah – but few live their values with the blazing commitment of Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater. The revered New York troupe, returning to London after four years, holds its place in the conversation about race, belief and community in America – and as the nation fractures, it seems ever more crucial.
Ailey was a jazz man, and the choreographers that followed him typically select scores that slap. Most recently, Are You In Your Feelings? has Kyle Abraham choose Drake, Lauren Hill and Kendrick Lamar. Under a beguiling lick of neon, it’s party time. The flirt is on: eyes lock, couples in raspberry and emerald glide together and apart. Preening guys smooth their hair and roll their shoulders; the women, devastatingly unimpressed, swipe the air to Erykah Badu’s I’ll Call U Back.
