Lynn's
Lynn E. Frederiksen is a hearing-impaired modern dancer/choreographer who was born in St. Croix, USVI and has been dancing and teaching in MA for several decades. She holds a BA in Biology and an MA in Environmental Affairs from Clark University, and an MFA in Dance from Smith College. From 1992 to 2007, she was a member of the dance faculty at Tufts University and currently is an adjunct professor of theater arts at Clark University in Worcester. With Paul Kafka-Gibbons, she co-founded Lynn & Paul Dance in 2007 to explore the possibilities of duets and in the same year became a member of Jeanne Traxler’s PB&J Dance Company. Elements of Afro-Caribbean culture and dance—as well as classical dance of India—are threaded through Lynn’s work. At Clark University she teaches African Inspirations: A Dance Collaboration, using Pearl Primus' Fanga and Buschasche to explore the "conversation" between music and movement in African and African diaspora dance. Her interest in the music-movement dynamic found form most recently through working with pianist Liza Kitchell and clarinetist Mark Chenevert on At the Pace of Dawn--A Climate Change Trilogy, presented at Clark University on January 29, 2019.
Lynn is also a writer: With Wittenberg University professor Shih-Ming Li Chang, she co-authored a multimedia educational resource, Chinese Dance: In the Vast Land and Beyond. The book, with an interactive website and annotated database of over 500 online videos, was published by Wesleyan University Press in 2016. Recently Lynn and Shih-Ming were commissioned by Human Kinetics Publishing to develop Cultures of Dance Around the World, a textbook and on-line teaching resource for college-level dance courses in the US. Lynn's poetry and prose has been published in The Caribbean Writer, and her poem "Courage of Egrets" received the Marvin E. Williams Literary Prize in 2016.
Choreography:
"Material by the Meter" Presented as part of "Interwoven," a dance faculty concert with Audra Carabetta and Lynn E. Frederiksen at Clark University, January 28,2020
An exploration of possibilities posed by fabric, a 9/8 meter, and political discourse.
Choreography: Lynn E. Frederiksen in collaboration with the dancers.
Original Music: Liza Kitchell (Piano, composition) and Mark Chenevert (Clarinet)
Dancers: Jim Banta, Lynn E. Frederiksen, Paul Kafka-Gibbons, Ellen Pigott
"Age of Discovery" Parts 1 & 3 Presented as part of "Interwoven," a dance faculty concert with Audra Carabetta and Lynn E. Frederiksen at Clark University, January 28,2020
The discoveries that result from the meeting of worlds are at once global and individual, arcing from historical events (Part 1-Discovery) to the meanings of individual relationships within the family (Part 3-Hands have to do this). “Age” is both an era and a life stage.
Choreography: Lynn E. Frederiksen
Collaboration & Performance: Lynn & Paul
Music: Part 1: Una sañosa porfia by Juan del Encina (1485-1530)--A lament for the fall of Granada
Improvisations on “Ayo visto lo mappamundi”-“I have seen the map of the world” Anon. Italian, 1450s. Performed by The Waverly Consort
Part 3: A “Translation” of Edmund Waller’s poem, Of the Last Verses in a Book. Text written and spoken by John Minigan and Lynn E. Frederiksen
Guitar Improvisation by Colin J. Minigan
* Parts 1 & 3 were developed through the Dance Complex’s Shared Choreographers Concerts, 2009 and 2008 respectively. The entire trilogy was first performed in December 2010. https://youtu.be/MeJiqb7mKDs
By Other Means Presented as part of "Interwoven," a dance faculty concert with Audra Carabetta and Lynn E. Frederiksen at Clark University, January 28,2020
Inspired by Pearl Primus’ “Bushasche,” a “war dance for peace,” this work uses variations of a nine-beat meter to explore conflict resolution.
Choreography: Lynn E. Frederiksen
Original Music: Dillon Zahner
Dancers: Zoe DiPinto, Aidan Giasson, Sarah Spitz (Clark Dance Society members) https://youtu.be/kzDmfoBod00
"At the Pace of Dawn--A Climate Change Trilogy" and other dances presented at Clark University, January 29, 2019.
At the Pace of Dawn—A Climate Change Trilogy
Choreography: Lynn E. Frederiksen
Music: Composed and performed by Liza Kitchell and Mark Chenevert
Dancers: Lynn E. Frederiksen and Paul Kafka-Gibbons
Amanda Ng Yann Chwen and Josephine Schneider
Part 1: Drought
Dancing at the pace of dawn
I will take time
As time has taken me
I will take time
To water trees that wait leafless in the wind
I will take time to its common end
And begin again LEF 2015
Part 2: Into the Flood, Saltation
Saltation: The jumping motion of particles transported by a fluid. From the Latin saltare, meaning “to dance.” The 7-beat phrase of the title undergirds the music.
Part 3: Aftermath
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0k6QgVhVzM0 (First section, "Drought," starts at 10:40, after 2 other solo dances)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l4xYwjwc3nU (Continuation of "Drought," entirety of "Flood," beginning of "Aftermath"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PLkMYHlfFxk (End of "Aftermath" and the dance 0:00 to 6:50)
"Aftermath," (Excerpt from At the Pace of Dawn) choreography Lynn Frederiksen, score composed and performed by Liza Kitchell and Mark Chenevert; danced by Lynn Frederiksen and Paul Kafka-Gibbons. At Kelley Donovan's Third Life Series, Somerville, MA, February 22, 2019. Videographer James Falvo.
"Aftermath" (Excerpt from At the Pace of Dawn) choreography Lynn Frederiksen, score composed and performed by Liza Kitchell (piano) and Mark Chenevert (saxaphone); danced by Lynn Frederiksen and Paul Kafka-Gibbons. At Dance For World Community, June 8, 2019, Cambridge Massachusetts.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LpKdvQKBzl0
"Faces"
Solo performed by Lynn Frederiksen to original music “After Rain” composed by Colin Minigan (commissioned and performed by Apple Orange Pair) for "Tiny & Short: A Drop in the Bucket" produced by The Dance Complex, September 2018. Video by Maximal Image.
https://vimeo.com/291173719
PW: TS18Lynn
"Into The Flood Saltation"
Score composed by Liza Kitchell and Mark Chenevert. Choreographer Lynn Frederiksen. Performed by Liza Kitchell, Mark Chenevert, Lynn Frederiksen and Paul Kafka-Gibbons at the Armory, Somverville, MA, 2017, at THANGsgiving 2017.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pR9FVkI6JBo
Performance at the Cambridge River Festival, June 2nd, 2018.
https://paulhkg.wistia.com/medias/88y5u1siae (first half of video)
"Drought"
Score composed by Liza Kitchell. Choreographer Lynn Frederiksen. Performed by Liza Kitchell, Lynn Frederiksen and Paul Kafka-Gibbons at the Armory, Somverville, MA, 2016, at THANGsgiving 2016.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GTphdHoZK2k&t=148s
and
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5TWk4tcX0JQ
"Suess Fish Brick"
Performed at the Peabody School in Cambridge, MA, on the occasion of Dr. Suess' birthday, 2016.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mhxmlXy5_wM
"Age of Discovery"
Part 1 of "Age of Discovery" is pair of over-lapping solos and the first of 3 sections. The middle section ("The salt is left behind") was completed in 2010 and is danced to sound effects that include wood; metal or hands twisting against wood and rope; wind sounds; tumbling rocks; and water. The third section ("Hands have to do this") was completed in 2008, and was performed to a solo voice singing the tenor line of Randall Thompson's "Two Worlds."All three sections were modified when merged into a single work for the December 2010 performance. The first and thirds sections were performed in 2009 and 2008, respectively, at The Dance Complex in Cambridge, MA as part of the Shared Choreographers Concerts, a mentored program. Along with the collaborations with my partner Paul, the mentoring process was highly valuable in the creation of the dance.
As the title and music suggest, the dance contains images from 1492—and specifically from the post-Columbian history of the Caribbean and the dynamics of slavery—but the meeting of worlds and the discoveries that result over time are at once global and individual, following an arc from historical events (Part 1) to the meanings of individual relationships within the family (Part 3). "Age" is both an era and a life stage. The middle section is the transition from the old world to the new, exploring images of circumnavigation, transfer of momentum between medium and vessel, and exactly what is left behind when we are taken from one world to another. The cloth props (which I call "pelts") allow us to explore how we move from viewing things as a means to an end and begin to recognize their inherent life and meaning.
Age of Discovery
Choreography:
Lynn E. Frederiksen
Collaboration and Inspiration:
Paul Kafka-Gibbons
Performers:
Lynn & Paul
Music :
Part 1: "Discovery" *
Una sañosa porfia by Juan del Encina (1485-1530) A lament for the fall of Granada
Improvisations on Ayo visto lo mappamundi-I have seen the map of the world
(Anon. Italian, 1450s)
Performed by The Waverly Consort
Part 2: "The Salt is Left Behind"
Sound score developed by Paul & Lynn
Part 3: "Hands have to do this" *
Musical and spoken excerpts and "translations" of Edmund Waller's poem,
Of the Last Verses in a Book
Song: Randall Thompson, Two Worlds
Spoken: "Translations" by John Minigan and Lynn
Guitar Improvisation: Colin J. Minigan
*Choreography for Parts 1 and 3 were developed through the Dance Complex's
Shared Choreographers Concert process, 2009 and 2008, respectively.
Special thanks to Jeanne Traxler and John Minigan for technical assistance with lights and sound, to Joe Burgio for sharing the evening with us,
and to Andrew Eisenberg for the use of this space!
Saturday, December 11th, 8 pm
381 Congress Street, 2nd Floor, Boston 02210
Performance of "Age of Discovery," (Part 1) Dance Complex, May 9, 2009.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3unt_ykzoA&feature=youtu.be
Performance of "Age of Discovery," (Complete) at floft, December, 11, 2010.
http://www.veoh.com/watch/v81476177QMSDt5dY
continued:
http://www.veoh.com/watch/v81476486XKWCP8y3
Performance of "Hands," May, 2010.
link temporary missing
"Coral"
Performance at Nave, May 21, 2011.