Friday night (February 15) the Union College Department of Music presented Branches of Words a program of dance and music set to the poetry of Hafez. Siena's Mahmood Karimi-Hakak collaborated with Ellen Sinopoli in directing the program. He voiced Hafez's Persian poetry as the dancers embodied it. The effect was extraordinary. The sound echoed the movement -- not only in grace but also in physicality -- for the Farsi was as highly textured, solid and physically three-dimensional as the dancers' efforts.
The program was well-paced, varying from poetry-dance to poetry-music to pure and exhilarating percussion of Zorki Nelson. Deeply moving was "I show Myself as I Am" with single dancer Sarah Pingel and Zoe B. Zak's classical accordion that drew out every form, every tension, every pulse. Reprised from last year's program two years ago was Munir Beken's Pottery Shards, this time laid into Hafez "Those who Stood up for Tolerance"; a new title "Into Dark Moods" gave it an even greater impact.
The fine Union College Music Hall allowed all the music, all the movement, all the poetry to move cleanly about the space and into our imaginations. I can't help but feel very jealous that we at Siena cannot offer our audiences the same opportunity to realize, with Hafez, that "These Things were Offered . . . as Blessings."
REVIEWS:
http://blogs.timesunion.com/reviews/?p=351
http://www.union.edu/N/DS/edition_display.php?e=1467&s=7657
