Ballet BC
Festival Week 8 | Wednesday, August 13 – Sunday, August 17 | Ted Shawn Theatre
First Appearance Since 2019 | U.S. Premiere
Formed in 1986 and based in British Columbia, Ballet BC is well-known in Canada and around the world for pushing the physical and emotional boundaries of contemporary dance with performances that are “visually stunning and emotionally profound” (PBS). The company returns to the Ted Shawn Theatre stage for the first time since 2019 with a program that includes the U.S. premiere of BOLERO X by Shahar Binyamini, SWAY by the company’s artistic director Medhi Walerski, and the U.S. premiere of Obsidian by Bobbi Jene Smith and Or Schraiber.
Ballet BC presents a diverse repertoire in its international tours, as well as its regular runs at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre in Vancouver. Collaborating choreographers include William Forsythe, Sharon Eyal and Gai Behar, Medhi Walerski, Ohad Naharin, Crystal Pite, Johan Inger, Imre and Marne van Opstal, Adi Salant, Jiří Pokorný, Micaela Taylor, Marco Goecke, Fernando Hernando Magadan, Dorotea Saykaly, and Aszure Barton. “We are a company,” says Ballet BC, “that aims to create dance at its most essential: visceral, powerful, thought-provoking, and transformative.”
“Visually stunning and emotionally profound.”
BODYTRAFFIC
Festival Week 2 | Wednesday, July 2 – Sunday, July 6 | Ted Shawn Theatre
First Appearance Since 2022
With a compelling style that reflects the “invention, attitude, and urban edge” (Boston Globe) of its Los Angeles home, BODYTRAFFIC returns to the Pillow with a program that dives into the power of memory sparked by unexpected reminders. Whether it’s a painting, song, or sensation, the associations we make with the world around us forge lasting connections that provoke deep feelings of nostalgia.
For Festival 2025, BODYTRAFFIC will perform a program featuring Blue Until June—set to the songs of Etta James by their new Creative Partner Trey McIntyre—alongside works by Juel D. Lane and Matthew Neenan. This will be the company’s Ted Shawn Theatre debut, having previously performed on the outdoor Henry J. Leir Stage in 2022, and in the original Doris Duke Theatre in 2013 and 2015.
Founded in 2007, BODYTRAFFIC tours the country and the globe spreading the joy and positive spirit of their home city. Dance Magazine named the company one of “25 to Watch” in 2013, and this past year, Forbes magazine wrote that BODYTRAFFIC’s “incredible” work in the decade since has “made the case for how Los Angeles is becoming a home for great dancers.”
“invention, attitude, and urban edge”
Huang Yi
Festival Week 9 | Wednesday, August 20 – Sunday, August 24 | Doris Duke Theatre
Pillow Debut
Named by Dance Magazine as one of the “25 to Watch” in 2011, Taiwanese dancer, choreographer, and inventor Huang Yi creates partnership between humans and robots. Huang will appear for his first-ever engagement at Jacob’s Pillow to present Ink, in which he and audio-visual pioneer Ryoichi Kurokawa dismantle and reconstruct the lines from a hundred artworks in renowned calligrapher Tong Yang-Tze’s Silent Music series.
Exploring textures of movement, sound, visual art, and space, Huang and his dancers perform alongside stunning holographic projection and two industrial robots. Mixing movement with mechanical and multimedia elements to create dance that corresponds with the flow of data, Ink makes each performer, whether human or machine, a dancing instrument.
Ink was co-commissioned by the National Taichung Theater and National Theater, Taipei in Taiwan and had its world premiere in June 2023.
Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater
Festival Week 9 | Wednesday, August 20 – Sunday, August 24 | Ted Shawn Theatre
First Appearance by Full Company Since 1963
An unrivaled force since 1958, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater is one of the most acclaimed dance companies in the world. With a repertory that boasts close to 300 works by more than 100 choreographers, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater has performed in more than 70 countries on six continents, and has been designated by the United States Congress as a “vital American Cultural Ambassador to the World.”
This summer at Jacob’s Pillow, for the first time in 62 years, the full company of extraordinary dancers will bring to life audience favorites and thrilling new works by choreographers for whom Alvin Ailey paved the way, reminding us that dance is both a reflection of our past and a guide to our future.
Alvin Ailey began his close association with the Pillow in 1954 as a performer, choreographer, and acting director of the Lester Horton Dance Theatre, and he first brought his company here in 1959. He adapted Revelations from its original form for Pillow performances in 1961, and this landmark work—which has been internationally celebrated ever since—will be part of the company’s mixed program this summer, along with Amy Hall Garner’s CENTURY (2023) and Lar Lubovitch’s Many Angels (2024). Additionally, the company will perform Cry (1971)—the signature work that Alvin Ailey created for Judith Jamison—on opening night only, Wednesday August 20.
In addition, programming on the outdoor Henry J. Leir Stage during this week will feature works by artists connected to the lineage illuminated in the Whitney Museum of American Art’s recent Edges of Ailey, the first large-scale museum exhibition to celebrate Ailey’s enduring legacy. Artists include Yusha-Marie Sorzano in her Pillow debut, a presentation of Sacred Songs by Matthew Rushing and Ailey Extension dancers, and the Pillow debut of HopeBoykinDance. Events on the outdoor stage are ticketed separately.
Forged during a pivotal moment in the Civil Rights Movement, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater was established to uplift the African American experience while transcending boundaries of race, faith, and nationality with its universal humanity. With dancers of all backgrounds, an extraordinary library of works, and wide-ranging collaborations with choreographers, it was truly the first modern dance company of its kind.
“A vital American Cultural Ambassador to the World.”
Elle Sofe Company
Festival Week 5 | Wednesday, July 23 – Sunday, July 27 | Doris Duke Theatre
U.S. Debut | U.S. Premiere | Live Music
Hailing from Norway, Elle Sofe Company make their U.S. debut with Vástádus eana – the answer is land, a “powerful” (Vancouver Sun) and critically-acclaimed performance that combines dance with yoik, a traditional singing style of the Sámi people who are Indigenous to the northern parts of Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Russia.
Supported by polyphonic music and costumes inspired by traditional clothing, the piece is inspired by political demonstrations, Sámi spiritual practices, and formation dance. Vástádus eana – the answer is land explores community and kinship between people, nature, and the earth. The yoik, composed specifically for the performance, serves as a musical pillar throughout a performance that reflects on the power of standing together and the awareness of the earth we all stand on and share.
Company founder Elle Sofe Sara is a featured artist at the Arctic Arts Festival in Harstad and a winner of the 2019 Moon Jury Award at the Imagine Native Film Festival. Now coming to the U.S. for the first time, Vástádus eana – the answer is land has toured internationally, and received the 2021/2022 Norwegian Critics Award for Dance.
Sekou McMiller & Friends
Festival Week 6 | Wednesday, July 30 – Sunday, August 3 | Ted Shawn Theatre
World Premiere | Live Music
With a musical flair and explosive energy, dancer and choreographer Sekou McMiller is at the forefront of Afro Latin Dance performance and education. His unique fusion style, rooted in Afro-Caribbean traditions and laced with a range of dance techniques from the African diaspora, brought Jacob’s Pillow audiences to their feet dancing last summer as Sekou McMiller & Friends performed on the outdoor stage.
For Festival 2025, in his Ted Shawn Theatre debut, McMiller will present the world premiere of Urban Love Suite, the latest incarnation of his dance and music project Afro Latin Jazz and Soul Experience. A joy-filled rhythmical journey through African American, Afro Latino/a/e and West African music and dance traditions, Urban Love Suite celebrates the cultural love affair between Black and Brown peoples, through encounters in cityscapes including Harlem, the Bronx, Dakar, São Paulo, Los Angeles, and Chicago. This world premiere is supported by the Joan B. Hunter New Work Commission.
McMiller’s diverse career as a dancer, choreographer, and educator has garnered him broad recognition worldwide. His choreographic work has been featured at Jazz at Lincoln Center, Dance Chicago, The Actors Fund Theater, New York City Center, Ailey CitiGroup Theater, Symphony Space, Edison Ballroom, and the United Nations General Assembly. He has appeared in films including In the Heights, performed off-Broadway, and performed and choreographed for Pitbull and Madonna and for top Latin music artists including Gilberto Santa Rosa, Willie Colón, Tito Rojas, and Tito Nieves. He has also performed at numerous Jacob’s Pillow special events, participated in the Pillow Lab residency series, and served as Choreographer/Director of the Musical Theatre program at The School at Jacob’s Pillow in 2024.
“Innovative, cutting edge, and soulful are just a few words to describe Sekou McMiller.”
The Sarasota Ballet
Festival Week 4 | Wednesday, July 16 – Sunday, July 20 | Ted Shawn Theatre
First Appearance Since 2015 | World Premiere
Beloved among ballet fans the world over, The Sarasota Ballet returns to Jacob’s Pillow for the first time in ten years. Pushed to new heights under the leadership of director Iain Webb, assistant director Margaret Barbieri (both formerly of The Royal Ballet), and executive director Joseph Volpe (formerly of the Metropolitan Opera), the company has garnered a reputation for its truly diverse repertoire of works.
This summer, the company returns to the Ted Shawn Theatre with a mixed program including a piece by Sir Frederick Ashton and a world premiere by American choreographer Jessica Lang, the Virginia B. Toulmin & Muriel O’Neil Artist in Residence at Sarasota Ballet, who has presented three previous world premieres at Jacob’s Pillow with her own company, as well as two premieres with other groups.
The Sarasota Ballet is recognized for its unparalleled active repertoire of the choreography of Sir Frederick Ashton, and is known worldwide as the main exponent of his ballets outside of the United Kingdom. The company has presented an expansive range of over 180 ballets by acclaimed choreographers, including George Balanchine, Sir David Bintley, Gemma Bond, Sir Matthew Bourne, Michel Fokine, Sir Kenneth MacMillan, Twyla Tharp, Antony Tudor, and Christopher Wheeldon. The company works to infuse their community and beyond with the highest quality and diversity of dance in America. According to The Guardian’s review of the company’s 2024 tribute to Sir Fredrick Ashton at The Royal Opera House: “the whole programme, danced with grace and care, is a history lesson and a delight.”
“The whole programme, danced with grace and care, is a history lesson and a delight.”
The Center Will Not Hold: A Dorrance Dance Production
Festival Week 1 | Wednesday, June 25 – Sunday, June 29 | Ted Shawn Theatre
Live Music
Jacob’s Pillow fan favorites and close collaborators Michelle Dorrance and Ephrat Asherie kick off Festival 2025 with a lively celebration of street, club, and vernacular dances, born from their many years of creating together. Originally crafted in 2022 as a short duet, The Center Will Not Hold premiered as a 30-minute piece at New York City Center’s 2023 Fall For Dance Festival.
Now, in this reimagined evening-length work, Dorrance and Asherie offer an eclectic ensemble of 11 performers, each deeply rooted in regional music and movement—from tap dance and hip hop to breaking, house, Chicago footwork, Detroit jit, litefeet, Memphis jookin’, and body percussion. The Center Will Not Hold features original music composed by Donovan Dorrance with live percussion by world-class drummer and percussionist John Angeles.
Jacob’s Pillow has long been an artistic home for Michelle Dorrance, a tap performer, choreographer, teacher, and the Artistic Director of Dorrance Dance, which has headlined at the festival nine times, most recently in 2021 and 2023. An artist “with a transcendent strength of spirit” (The Washington Post), Dorrance received the Jacob’s Pillow Dance Award in 2013 and a MacArthur “Genius” Award in 2015. Ephrat Asherie is a b-girl dancer and choreographer whose works are hailed as “a magnificent celebration of movement and art” (Charleston City Paper). She has performed at Jacob’s Pillow numerous times since 2013, and her company, Ephrat Asherie Dance, developed its break-out work Odeon in the Pillow Lab in 2017 and had its world premiere at Festival 2018. Both based in New York City, Dorrance and Asherie have also served as Program Directors at The School at Jacob’s Pillow.
An artist “with a transcendent strength of spirit”
DADDYAF | David Roussève
Co-Presented with MASS MoCA
Celebrated dance-theater artist David Roussève’s DaddyAF is an intimate meditation on life’s purpose, created and performed by a queer African American acutely aware of the finite time he has left on the planet. Like strands of DNA, it connects elements encoded in his body, including 600 years of genealogy, a roller coaster journey with HIV, and the shattering loss of a husband — while revisiting movement from 35 years of dance-making to explore the meaning of ‘virtuosity’ for a 64-year old body.
DaddyAF is a National Performance Network Creation & Development Fund Project co-commissioned by Center for the Art of Performance at UCLA, Kelly Strayhorn Theater, National Center for Choreography at The University of Akron, and MASS MoCA with Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, more information at npnweb.org.
DaddyAF was created with support from Danspace Project, UCLA’s Chancellor’s Research Fund and The Chancellor’s Arts Initiative. DaddyAF is made possible with generous support from the New England Foundation for the Arts’ National Dance Project with lead funding from the Doris Duke Foundation and the Mellon Foundation, and a MAP Fund creation grant.
WATCH DAVID ROUSSÈVE ON DANCE INTERACTIVE
In Halfway to Dawn, performed at the Pillow by the company REALITY in 2019, David Roussève draws upon the music and life of Billy Strayhorn.
This program is supported in part by the Irene Hunter Fund for Dance at MASS MoCA in association with MASS MoCA.
