Matt Daniels from Thinklab, Inc has shared a couple images on the Thinklab photo stream from the Sunday night film shoot for Bruno Beltrão | Grupo de Rua. Here’s one of them:

[click through to embiggen]

The release date for H3 is pending, but keep checking back for more OntheBoards.tv updates!

From their polo shirts in coral pink and turquoise, to their squeaky Puma sneakers, to their early hip-hop moves, the nine male dancers of Grupo de Rua’s H3 are steeped in the 1980’s. They pop & lock, windmill, run backwards, confront the audience, bump chests. We glimpse a move – was that a moonwalk? The Robot? But H3’s vocabulary is richer than retro, more than mere quotation. Some movement points to hip-hop history: was that a James Brown shimmy? Or, yes, as a reviewer below wonders, are these guys going to break into a Jerome Robbins dance fight?

Athletic frenzies are punctuated by lyrical stillnesses; the dancers’ percussive group energy is balanced by relationships built through quiet, almost shy duets. The relationship between dancers and audience shifts and builds. At first we are on the ground, watching a dance battle. Later, as the company catapults one another into the center of the space from its margins, it feels like we’re getting an aerial view of a giant game of pinball.

When the first neon-colored polo shirt comes off, H3 threatens to culminate in the near-obligatory On the Boards naked dance finale a la Constanza Macras or Jan Fabre, but stops short. And that’s a good thing – H3’s expression of sexuality is not easy; it’s masculine, aggressive, a little dangerous. The ending they do choose is slower, and far, far sexier. Walking backward toward the audience—their eyes trained on us from bent necks—the dancers almost threaten to battle it out again. Except maybe this time they’ll dance it upside-down, backwards, and right in our faces. Because they’re just that bad-ass.

-Jeanmarie Higgins

At this very moment there are about 4 cameras in the theater recording H3 for OntheBoards.tv. More info coming soon about the film’s release!

[Sign that greets audience members on their way into the theater during one of the filming nights.]

If you couldn’t make it to the master class on Saturday, check out this YouTube video of Grupo de Rua member Bruno Duarte leading local dancers in a routine and then taking the stage solo. It’s a short :78, but offers a fun peek into the afternoon.

Here are some of the reviews that have come in so far of Bruno Beltrao | Grupo de Rua at On the Boards:

“The show then explodes into a form of controlled kinetic madness…and never really lets up.” – Seattlest

“…the whirling scuttles, glancing catches in midair, twinings and near collisions feel like a new kind of a movement vocabulary in the making.” – Seattle Times

“It explores the power of connection and the power of the body. It’s all about BEAUTY, TENDERNESS, DELICACY and REFLECTION and it is an unbelievable show. I’d go back every night if I could (seats are very scarce at this point).” – breathlesspace / Seattle Dances

“The first 20 minutes of “H3″ showcased the incredible physical mastery, artistry, and athleticism of 3 of the company’s dancers” – Ak.Ward POV

“If you find yourself at On the Boards seeing a show called H3 be warned, it is REALLY for people who like modern dance.” / “I can safely say that H3 was one the best things I’ve ever seen – at OtB or anywhere else.” – Teen Tix (from reviewer Josh and rebuttals from the commenters)

“…Beltrão’s H3 is an almost Mametian (in terms of its masculinity, rather than its misogyny) exploration of men interacting with men…” – The SunBreak

“The hip-hop dancer’s physicality is so much about strength and the flow of movement within himself, about his own solidity and compactness of movement, that when he does get airborne it is amazing, like watching a rock float, or a stone suddenly spin up in the air.” – City Arts 

 We’ll keep adding reviews as they are published!

Did you see H3? Did you love it? Hate it? Is there a part that stuck with you after the performance ended?

Let us know!

Click on the Comments link below to leave your thoughts and read the opinions of others. Be sure to check back throughout the weekend for patron and press reviews.

You know that moment when you hear a song playing and think you recognize it?  You listen closer, searching for something to help identify it.  Then it hits you all at once that the song you are listening to is a cover of a song you love. Such joyful relief!  That is the same experience to sit and enjoy Groupa de Rua performing this weekend at On the Boards.  Viewers can very easily spot the street hip-hop influence at its core, but what seduces is the genre bending, contemplative and near psychedelic remix of this dance genre we thought we knew.

To say the performance H3 is hip-hop and leaving it at that, is akin to calling Francis Bacon a portrait painter and leaving it at that.  What Bruno Beltrao accomplishes to create is an engaging study of intimacy within a genre that is traditionally battling bravado.   Yes, the strength and physical challenging and breakneck pace of street dancing are there but what is also there is subtle physical touch, dancers physically supporting each other and a quietness, a deep quietness, that brings the audience to a hush.  In fact, the majority of the performance is accompanied by nothing more than ocean waves.  Taken out of the context of thrumming bass, the choreography is allowed to open itself up and go beyond expectation.  Through the vulnerability of not hiding behind a soundtrack, we can lean in to see something quite intimate, almost secret.  I am reminded of the scene in war movies where the hero is holding the body of his fallen friend as he dies and giving to him love and compassion amid the gunfire all around.  It is this same masculine intimacy that is generated amidst sharp angled and breathless choreography that makes H3 unlike anything I have seen in 10 years of dance attendance, and for that, I am grateful.

A review of this piece would be incomplete without a nod to the lighting design of Renato Machado.  The discrete use of stark lighting focuses our attention on the detailed nature of the choreography.  Dancers flash in and out of light allowing us to digest snippets of the whole before being moved to another part of the stage.  His creative use of distance and spot lighting causes the audience to literally see trails off limbs as they go through intense, repetitive and speedy choreography.  Additionally, and in total contrast, Renato uses low lighting that bathes the stage in soft dusks that create a yearning in us to connect to the dancing.  You can almost feel the entire audience lean forward.  This level of lighting skill, working both extremes to move our eyes to best appreciate the choreography is masterful.

In the end, H3 is most likely not at all what you’ll expect from “A Brazilian Hip-Hop Troupe.”   Bruno Beltrao and his company have created a piece full of technical talent, new choreography and sincere intimacy…and bravado.

-Shango Los

With Bruno Beltrao’s H3 you don’t get the large group unisons choreographed to rhythm-heavy rap as you would with a traditional hip hop dance piece, or a plethora of head spins, windmills, and air flares you may see in a breakdance exhibition.  Instead what you get is sketches of the street and a taste of the jungle.  Seven dancers clad in comfortable attire of jeans and polo or T-shirts enter a dim arena, the borders of which begin as clearly defined and eventually are thrown into disarray.  There seems to be a hesitancy, a survey of the environment before the small groups of dancers start moving arms and feet through gently flowing or sharply angular, sinuous pathways.  Those not dancing sit randomly around the sides as if watching a street demonstration or waiting their turn.  We hear the sounds of cars in the street, the squeak of basketball shoes and chatter of Portugese echoing in a large hall.  Dancers explode into aggressive torrents and return to a compacted personal space of highly stylized gesture and shuffle.

They create a gritty galaxy of reckless revolutions, colliding asteroids, and micro nebulas.  No one is in charge, yet alliances form and clusters multiply.  They prepare like they’re about to perform a spinning breakdance move, then run in tight circles around each other at high speeds.  Contact and partnering between dancers is used create clever anatomical illusions and break the laws of human physics.  This includes two dancers appearing to be one person walking in profile, and dancers running at each other full force, jumping, and grabbing the other to change direction mid-air.  We are given brief tableaus of postures and positions reminiscent of street culture or breakdance moves cut off before execution.  The dancers accumulate together in washes across the stage either running/jumping backwards or doing a spinning crawl on hands feet.  Although there are some breakdance stunts (including one head spin and one air flare during the entire evening), they are used sparingly and only to accentuate a quick paced duet or in the middle of one of the many segments of chaos.  H3 is a very clever, artistic piece of detailed choreography showing enormous attention and restraint in what could have easily become just another talent showcase with a group of incredibly physical and daring dancers.  Get your tickets quick if it’s not sold out already.

Thanks for the opportunity.  Congrats on a killer show OtB!

-Danny Herter

Grupo de Rua just arrived at OtB and begin warming up for tonight’s performance by playing some soccer:

[photo by Jess Massart]

ETA – This is the second time that we’ve had some kind of sports happening on our Mainstage. Can’t remember the first time? Head on back to the Badminton Royale blog archives.

ETA x2 – Commenter Sara E points out that this is only the second time this season that sports have entered onto the Mainstage. See her great examples of other OtB sports moments throughout the years in the comments.

It’s been quite a season at On the Boards this year, and this month has been jam packed so far with some awesome dance. Starting with Olivier Wevers’ Whim W’him and the group’s sold-out showings of 3 Seasons a couple weeks ago, this week brings dance from the other end of the dance spectrum (and also, other end of the world) with Brazilian chorographer Bruno Beltrão and Grupo de Rua’s H3. With stellar reviews pouring in from all over the globe, this fast-paced and aggressive work brings nine men (I repeat, NINE men) to the stage to battle it out on the floor, abstracting hip-hop theatrics and intense physicality into “a minimalist, almost meditative interpretation of hip-hop in which the movement itself becomes its own pulsating rhythm.” Q. What happens in the space between hip hop and contemporary dance? A: This show. Did I mention there will be nine men onstage?

From the short clip of H3 on the YouTubes, Vancouve BC’s Kidd Pivot and the 605 Collective immediately come to mind. Really technically badass, people. H3 could very well be among one of the most energetically charged and talked about shows of the season. Sold out Friday and Saturday, but don’t let that stop you from seeing it, tickets still available Thu and Sun. Call the box office now! Nine men!

-Mike P