Virtuosic Dancers Bring Passion, Power & Brazilian Rhythms
Dance Victoria is presenting Brazil’s nationally acclaimed, wildly popular dance company, Grupo Corpo, as part of its Virtual Home Season from February 25 through to February 28, 2021 on dancevictoria.com.
Grupo Corpo, known for its unique fusion of the precision of ballet with the laid-back allure of Latin American influences, will share two signature works created by resident choreographer Rodrigo Pederneiras: Parabelo and Dança Sinfônica.
Founded in 1975 in Belo Horizonte by Paulo Pederneiras, Grupo Corpo is a company that embodies Brazil in all its diversity and infuses ballet with traits rooted in Brazilian culture. With scores specially written for each production, Grupo Corpo’s creations are renowned for their highly refined stage and lighting designs, innovative costumes and compelling choreography.
Parabelo, the “most Brazilian and the most regional” of the company’s works, is suffused with the culture of north-eastern Brazil and its back country, the poor and arid sertí£o, whose music and dance freely mixes folk traditions from indigenous Brazilian, European, and African sources. Parabelo opens with the slow pounding of hammers, evoking not only toil, but the weapon of the northeast sun, the “sol parabelo”, that is so hot it kills. Expect exuberant hip swaying and foot stomping, and an explosive, energetic finale.
“Parabelo draws inspiration from the art of the northeast, a very poor region where life is really hard, but the paintings people do there are full of colour, and the music is absolutely happy—the dances too. That, for me, is a great paradox. It’s almost the opposite of what their lives are like,” explains Pederneiras.