Malashock Dance Offers Tasty Nibbles, I Still Want Dinner

John Malashock’s latest show, “Eye of the Beholder,” is a collection of 14 pieces, most of them duets. The whole thing runs for about an hour, which works out to about four minutes per dance—about the length of numbers on “So You Think You Can Dance.” The effect was like nibbling a lot of hors d’oeuvres at a cocktail party. It’s all tasty, but at the end, you’re still hungry for dinner.

“Eye of the Beholder” nonetheless offered some delectable bites: acrobatic partnering and well-drawn sketches exploring a range of emotions.

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Innocence Meets Irony in Mark Morris’s Idea-Rich “Pepperland”

In a fascinating coincidence, La Jolla Music Society presented two dances this season by a noted choreographer using music from the 1960s, and the two couldn’t have been more different. Paul Taylor’s vapid “Changes,” shown here in January, used music by the Mamas and Papas (seriously?) and reduced the 60s to hippie chicks and bell-bottoms. “Pepperland,” in happy contrast, is a work of substance, a celebration of the youthful creativity and idealism of the 1960s … and a profound, important reflection on what became of those dreams.

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Litvak Dance Makes Stunning Debut

Litvak Dance may be a newborn, but there were no tentative baby steps in the repertory company’s sold-out debut concert last weekend. Litvak exploded onto the stage at UCSD’s Molli and Arthur Wagner Theatre with assured dancers performing work by four choreographers, shifting deftly between styles. And the closing piece by artistic director Sadie Weinberg was so glorious and theatrical, it begs to be shown on a larger stage.

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Shoestring Live Arts Fest Delivers World-Class Dance

The Live Arts Fest put on by Jean Isaacs San Diego Dance Theater is truly a shoestring event—on Saturday, Isaacs was working as a stagehand, handling props. So it’s all the more remarkable that the ten-day festival offered a rich palette of work by international artists, including Christine Dakin, longtime principal with the Martha Graham Dance Company, doing Graham’s legendary solo, “Cante Jondo.”

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