RESEARCH REVIEW NS VOL.7 NOS  1 & 2  1991

ALVIN  AILEY

a revolutionary in dance

A historical and biographical  sketch

of his choreographic works.

Francis Nii Yartey

Alvin Ailey (Jnr.) has been described as neither a modem dancer nor a Negro dancer
but a Negro-Modern dancer.1 Perhaps this can be explained in the way he blends the strong
modern dance background he had with his black heritage, notably Jazz. So expertly does
he do this that:

The more one sees of Alley's  choreography  the more one admires  it,  the more it
seems to grow on you...  You watch Revelation and it appears  to be such a natural
extension  of  the music that hardly a sense of 'choreography stands  between the
natural-moving dancers and the music, but later watching it again and again'  one
begins to see the craft that has gone to gild  nature.2
His approach to dance bore a close affinity  with the African conception of dance as
a many faceted entity. Alvin's dance programme presentations offered breadth and variety
just as a music or concert conductor would present at a given musical concert. And this was
at a time when dance audiences tended to favour, a Jose Simon, Weidman, Martha Graham
or Katherine Dunham technique.

Like an African dancer he could relate to other forms and find inspiration, insight and

excitement for study, enjoyment or experimentation.

Alvin Ailey was born in Rogers, Texas, on January 5,1931. His labourer father, Alvin
E. Cliff Ailey and his mother, Lula, separated when young Ailey was only a child. Living
with his mother most of the time, Alvin Ailey was very much influenced by the rituals of
the Baptist Church and the beauty of the Blues in the poverty-striken area where they lived.
His  love  for  dance did not manifest  itself until  he moved with his mother to  Los
Angeles, California, where he came into contact with the techniques of Lester Horton, one
of the first modern dancers who captured the West Coast of America. Alvin Ailey enrolled
in Lester's  Technique  class,  only to  quit  after a short time  even though  he was  being
supported financially by Horton. He enrolled as a Spanish Language major at the University
of California (U.C.L.A.) and after two years of college, decided dance was his language.
He went back to Horton in 1949 to become a member of the company's chorus and stage-
crew.

Alvin Ailey's debut as a dancer took place four years later when he performed in the
revue Bal Caribe. 1953 may be considered the turning-point in Ailey's career as a dancer
and choreographer. Four years after he had started his dance career with Horton, Ailey was
entrusted with the fate of the company at the death of Horton in 1953; after justifying his
ability to choreograph and handle people with two scenarios St. Francis  of Assissi and

< orning Mourning. The -company's in- 

-  ,  {>erfonn at Jacobs Pillow the following
... ear and the subsequent offers Ailey hinu...  . ;.-<"••  -a dance companies and movie makers
to choreograph and dance were clear indicate r  •  : ^ even though he was very young in the
modern dance world, he was beginning to mak<  >n impact not only in the dance world but

in the related areas.
With the Horton Dance Theatre, Alvin Ailey taught and also directed the Horton's
ren's Theatre. He was quite busy at this time. He choreographed and presented a group
on the Creation of the World by Milhaud with music by the San Diego Symphony
iestra. This was around the same time he was having his first ever dancing role in the
.  Aa Carmen Jones. In  1954, Ailey was invited to New York by Herbert Ross to appear
together with Carmen de Lavallade, also a pupil of Horton, in the Broadway production of
the musical House of Flowers. This opened the gate for him to enter into the dancing world
of such celebrated modern dancers as Anna Sokolow, Doris Humphrey, Martha Graham,
Charles Weidman. He also studied ballet with Karel Shook.

Before the end of 1957, Ailey had danced and appeared with Anna Sokolow, Sophia
Maslow, Donald MacKayle, and Harry Belafonte. It got to a point when Alvin felt it was
about time he formed his own dance company. So in the early part of 195 8, the Alvin  Ailey
American Dance Theatre was formed; in December that same year, the company gave its
first full scale concert at the YMHA. The programme included Cinco Latinos, Blues Suite,
and Ariette Oubliee. This programme was followed in the fall of 1960 by what was to be
the beginning of what John Butler saw as unusual for  a modern dance company including
the works ofother choreographers in its repertoire?  This broke... the policy of  one-man's
company - an egocentric fault  that has in the past  marred many dance companies  both
modern and  ballet.4

On the programme for this historical performance were Lester Horton's The Beloved,
Portrait of Billie by John Butler. Hitherto the company had performed works like Rooms
by Anna Sokolow, Lament by Louis Johnson, Oronzo Dedication by Lester Horton, and
works of Talley Beatty, Geoffrey  Holder, and Paul Sansardo.

Alvin Ailey, well read and highly sophisticated, was usually always ready to learn
something new and ready to share what he had with others. This influenced his company
members. A London critic once wrote, Ailey is the most generous of artists and his desire
seems always to give, to share. Anything the company had with them they would show to
people who cared; they wanted to share their technical skills as well and, in return eagerly
learned what they could.U5

After  seeing a performance by the Ghana Dance Ensemble in  1967, Mr. Ailey was
very  much  impressed  and  wanted  to  express  it  in a  more  positive  way  than  a  staged
performance. Characteristically, he offered to share his dance experience with this young
African Dance Company. In the process of taking a two-hour class, he said afterwards, he
had been highly impressed with the speed with which these young dancers adapted to fresh
and new movement ideas and forms other than their own African experience. He tried some
of the movements from the dancers of a traditional dance group to the surprise and delight
of his newly found  friends.

Alvin Ailey distinguished himself as a dancer, choreographer, and as a man of the
people. As a dancer, he was in tune with his body, mind and soul. Doris Hering described
him as  ... exceptional  He reminds one of a caged lion full  of lasting power  that can be
released at will.6 This is so true; seeing Alvin Ailey dance, myself, I got the impression that
the stage was his world and movement was his life and he had a firm control of the two.
Arthur Todd has this to say about him: Alvin Ailey has mastered all the techniques  and

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virtuosity one am  wish. He moves with a personal magnificence that in breathtaking and,
pf  many, is the greatest mate dancer in his field today.7  Alvin danced with his company
until  1965, when he decided to devote his time to choreography and the direction of the
company.

In February 1962, under the sponsorship and administration of the State Department
and A.N.T.A., respectively, the Alvin Ailey American Dace Theatre made a thirteen-week
tour of the Far East. In Australia the company proved that dance was really an international
language, for, as was reported, the company was so eloquent in the language of dance that
it created a tornado of clapping, stamping, and cheering. The audience, uninhibited  as
the dancers on stage, would not let go}  Just after this tour, Ailey choreographed Feast of
Ashes for iheHarkness Ballet. This piece whichmade Ailey the first choreographer to blend
classical ballet with modern dance,9 was originally intended for the Robert Jofrrey Ballet.
The company toured the United States extensively until September,  1964, when it set off
on its second international tour - its first in Europe. The outcome of this tour, mainly in
Hamburg, London, and Paris, was perhaps  the greatest sensation on the continent since
Jerome Robbins Ballet  USA in 1956.10

The company's second tour of Europe took place in February,  1966. In April of the
same year, a wish was partly fulfilled  for Alvin Ailey when he took his company to Dakar,
Senegal to perform at the Negro Arts Festival at the Negritude Exposition, This wish was
fully realised in  1967 when the company toured nine African  countries including Ghana.
Ailey considered this tour to Africa - source of his basic material Jazz - as a cultural coup
because it was not only the most rewarding part of the tour to be among Africans  but, as
he put it, I came home with a healthy respect for  my African heritage. Just as Africans have
distortedviews  of American life, we too - Negroes and Whites alike - have a distorted view
of  them}1

Having had first-hand experience with both the African  life and the American life,
Alvin Alley stood as a unique choreographer who took source materials and turned them
into theatre work of extra-ordinary beauty and excitement.'2 He believed in the combina-
tion of all dance forms -jazz, ballet, modern, etc. - with instrumental music, song and acting.
He also  expressed many dramatic themes and moods in the 'theatre' he was dreaming of
- this is the African  way. Ailey was able to achieve this aim by passing these elements
through the furnance of modem dance.13 His extraordinary piece of all times, Revelations,
clearly demonstrates this idea. Revelations is a dance in which a whole religious experience
is enacted in three parts - Pilgrim of Sorrow, Take me to the Water, and Move, members.
Move.  Man has reached the summit of his sins and Ms cup is overflowing with misery. He
tries desperately to be forgiven but forgetting the important fact that he has to be cleansed,
as the Bible says, he has to be born again. Salvation  finally  comes when he hears of the
holy words of God and he (the sinner) gives himself up to be baptized in the River Jordan,
la his happiness and gratitude to God, he sings and dances to express that sentiment.

Alvin Ailey choreographically set the first part, Pilgrim of Sorrow, to show how man
tries fruitless!}' to run away from his sins by spinning his dancers to the four comers of the
stage - the four cardinal points of the earth. To show the unbearable situation in which the
sinner is, he has the dancers fen themselves while waiting to be saved. The second act, Take
me to the  Water, River Jordan, in which the ritual of forgiveness is performed, is created
by simply waving long strands of white cloth and as the dancers move, the holy water - River
Jordan - flows continuously into new life. The emancipation from the fires of Hell in the third
act, Move, Members, Move, is celebrated with movements which seem more improvised14
than choreographed, yet so blended with the music of the spirituals that one can almost see

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the music and hear the dance.

The Hermit Songs, Aivin Ailey's best solo piece, has the same approach, but unlike
Revelations, he used more abstract movements in this piece. Another difference  between
the two works is the position of the main character. In The Hermit Songs, Ailey carves out
not a sinner but a monk - a saint who goes through self-judgement  and consequent self-
flagellation for his sinful past, while in Revelations, the sinner, less concerned with the sins
he has  committed, waits for God to judge him. The  Hermit  Songs  maybe said to be  a
reflection of Alvin Ailey's life. No wonder he created it for himself. The only dancer known
to have performed this solo successfully and convincingly as Ailey was William Louther,
a member of Ailey's company and a former pupil of Lester Horton. The role, apart  from
being one of the most arduous solos in the company's repertoire then also demands a great
deal of technical ability and a strong coaviction of the performer.

Alvin Ailey might not have read Bertold Brecht atthe time he was choreographing The
Hermit  Songs, but a London critic, Noel Goodwin, looked at the religious role the monk
plays in the piece and wrote: The manner in which Ailey makes us stand aside and watch
his character comment, asitwere,  onhis character, is almost Brechtian. He is not showing
a man of God but a man in relation to God and the result is most intriguing...  The Hermit
is possessed  not by God but by His own vision of God.15

The immensity of the communicative value and for that matter, the educative value
of Alvin Ailey's works are unequalled. He related the history of an oppressed people of the
world in Been Here and Gone, and the Root of the Blues, and explained the sharp militant
and political reaction of the oppressed in Masekela Language. Though many people would
aaturalty  expect these works, particularly the latter, to deal directly  with the  American
blacks,  characteristically  for  Mr.  Ailey,  however,  its framework  and  message  are
universal rather than specific in a sectarian way. It may be about blacks. It maybe about
whites. It is political  in a non-political  manner.16  Perhaps this is why more people have
seen Alvin Ailey Dance Company than any other American Dance Company.17

Another  area in which Ailey worked was the idea of having  a  multi-racial  dance

company. Explaining Ms concept of multi-racism, Ailey said,

A multi-racial company that makes a connectionwith  the American  dance,  pastand
future,  and very strongly, with the Black past and future.  But lam  tired of the idea
of segregated  companies.m

He did not express this idea theoretically. Time magazine observed this and wrote,
Ailey  Company is perhaps  the most thoroughly integrated ensemble in all the  American
performing  arts - stylistically as well as  racially}9

Until February,  1974, Alvin Ailey's company had been facing financial problems - a
disease which has been plaguing many dance companies especially modern dance compa-
nies. In what was termed the bargain of the Century, the company was awarded an amount
of thirty-five thousand dollars ($35,000) by the New York City Parks Administration to
perform five concerts in five locations around the city during the 1974 summer session.20
This amount was believed at the time to be the largest allocation ever to be given to a single
dance company by the US Administration.

To  many,  nothing  could  be  more  appropriate  to  show  the  position  held  by  this
wonderful  company in the dance world than the words expressed by Mr. Edwin L. Weisl,
Jnr., of Parks Administration, that

... for  New  York to lose Alvin Ailey would be a lot more serious  than it  would be
for  it to lose one ofitstreasured  landmarks...21

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I

New York did lose Aivin Ailey when he passed away in 1989 and left a treasured

landmark of dance innovations for New York and the world.

To Africans who knew him in America where he was struggling for recognition with
performances at the " Y ", he represented courage and faith in his ultimate success. During
his tours in Ghana, he revealed a kinsmanship-relationship between the American Blacks
and the Black Africans  and strengthened the bonds of brotherhood rooted in a common
heritage.

One work which is still remembered featured the great dancer Judith Jamison who
incidentally is directing the company at the moment after Ailey's death in dances based on
the Blues and Jazz, at once gay, colourful and captivating in which umbrellas and ribbons
formed part of the creative effort and not just as props. Spiritually these dances found ready
response in the audience who applauded and cheered the performers. One felt proud to share
a common heritage with this great artist whose belief in the brotherhood of all mankind and
a non-racial world was portrayed in his Dance creations, as an article of faith and a message
to the world at large. He never forgot a face. He has left us a rich heritage of inspired and
inspiring works by which we shall remember him.

1)  William, Peter. Blues and all that Jazz

FOOTNOTE

Dance and Dancers. Vol. 15, No, i 1 (November  1964), page 25.

2)  Barnes, Clive. Second  Time round for  Ailey  Dance and Dancers. Vol. 16,

No. 6 (June  1965) page 33.

3)  Moritz, Charles. Current Biography. New York: The Wilson W. Co.,  1968,

page 13. Dancing Times. Vol. 55, No. 656 (May 1965), page 397.

5)  Clark, Mary. Ailey's Other Programme  Dancing Times. Vol. 55, No.  651

(December  1965), page 126

6)  Lynne, Gauley  Emery. Black  Dance.  Brooklyn New York. National  Press

Books (1980), page 273.
Ibid.

7) 
8)  Moritz, page 14.
9)  Time Magazine, February 26, 1973. page 67.
10)  Moritz, page 14.
11)  Ailey, Aivin. African  Odyssey Dance Magazine. Vol. 42, No. 5 (November

12)  Manchester, P.W. Aivin Ailey  Dancing Times. Vol. LV, No. 649 (January

1968), page 87.

1964), page 87.
Peter, page 25.

Ibid

13) 
14)  Barnes, page 33.
15) 
16)  Emery, page 276
17) 
Ibid., page 272.
18)  Baker, Robb. Black Dance-Seventies:  Two Directors After Dark. Vol. 6, No.

10 (February  1974), page 62.

19)  Music and Dance Time Magazine. (February  1973), page 66.
20)  Weisl, EdwinL.Jnr. Dance Magazine. Vol. XLVIII, No. 4 (April 1974), page

3.
Ibid.

21) 

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BIBLIOGRAPHY

Ailey, Ahfe, African  Odyssey Dance Magazine. Vol. 42, No. 5 (November  1968)

Baker,  Robb, Black  Dame  - Seventies:  Two Directors  After  Dark.  Vol.  6,  No.  10

(February  1974)

Bames,C]ive,Seccnd  time round for Ailey Dance and Dancers. Vol. 16, No. 6 (June 1965)

Clark, Mary, Ailey's  Other Programme  Dancing Times Vol. 55, No. 651  (December

1965)

Harold, Robert, The Splendid AlvinAiley  Dancing Times.VoI. 55, No. 656 (May 1965).

Lynne, Fauley Emery, Black Dance. California: National Press Books (1972).

Manchester, P.W., Alvin Ailey.  Dancing Times. Vol. LVNo. 649 (January  1964)

Moritz, Charles, Currant Biography. New York: The Wilson W. Co. (1968)

Music  and Dance Time Magazine. (February 26,  1973). pp. 66 - 67.

Weisl, Edwin L., Jnr. Dance Magazine. Vol. XLVIII, No. 4 (April  1974).

William, Peter, Blues and all that Jazz.  Dance and Dancers Vol. 15, No. 11 (November

1964).

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