2023 is a milestone year for the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater (Aaadt) and its artistic director emerita Judith Jamison. On May 10, Jamison celebrated her 80th birthday, and on Nov. 29, the dance company will hold its annual opening night gala celebrating its 65th season; founder Alvin Ailey and a group of Black dancers first performed under the Aaadt name in New York City in March of 1958.
“Numbers and ages really do matter,” says Jamison, a Philadelphia native who began dance training at the age of 6 at the Judimar School of Dance. “I love when people say, ‘The number doesn’t matter.’ Oh, yes it does when you’ve been dancing most of your life. It matters a whole lot because your body is catching up to what craziness you were doing as a dancer. At 80, everything doesn’t work the same way. And that’s the challenge, finding out, what can I do?...
“Numbers and ages really do matter,” says Jamison, a Philadelphia native who began dance training at the age of 6 at the Judimar School of Dance. “I love when people say, ‘The number doesn’t matter.’ Oh, yes it does when you’ve been dancing most of your life. It matters a whole lot because your body is catching up to what craziness you were doing as a dancer. At 80, everything doesn’t work the same way. And that’s the challenge, finding out, what can I do?...
- 11/27/2023
- by Brande Victorian
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
The Shubert Organization and Career Transition For Dancers along with the host committee Andy Blankenbuehler, Graciela Daniele, Mercedes Ellington, Donna McKechnie, Jerry Mitchell, amp Chita Rivera welcomed The Broadway Dance Community for a Buffet Dinner amp Between-Shows-Get-Together at Sardi's, Eugenia Room 234 West 44th Street on Wednesday, May 20, 2015 500pm-700pm. This event is generously underwritten by The Shubert Organization. Past client Andy Blankenbuehler award-winning choreographer of the hit musical Hamilton addressed the group on his relation with the organziation and how beneficial they have been for him and thousands of others.
- 5/21/2015
- by Linda Lenzi
- BroadwayWorld.com
Musicians from the Jazz at Lincoln Center All-Stars band, currently in the 7-time Tony-nominated Broadway musical After Midnight, visited Duke Ellington's grave at Woodlawn cemetery, where a crowd gathered to honor his legacy on the 40th year anniversary of his death. They played Mood Indigo, and Mercedes Ellington Duke's granddaughter placed a wreath at the gravesite. They finished with a triumphant Ellington classic, Take The A Train.
- 5/25/2014
- by Stage Tube
- BroadwayWorld.com
On Tuesday evening, 9-time Tony award winner Tommy Tune hosted a dinner for the musical After Midnight to celebrate their 7 Tony Award nominations at his home on the Upper East Side. Guests for the evening included Andre Leon Talley, Ruben and Isabel Toledo, Mercedes Ellington, William Ivey Long, Rick Miramontez, Jean Doumanian, David Rockwell, Warren Carlyle and After Midnight producer Scott Sanders. Check out photos from the evening below...
- 5/22/2014
- by BWW News Desk
- BroadwayWorld.com
The York Theatre Company James Morgan, Producing Artistic Director Andrew Levine, Executive Director present the New York premiere of Storyville, a New Orleans musical, with book by Ed Bullins, music and lyrics by Mildred Kayden, direction by Bill Castellino,choreography by Mercedes Ellington and music direction by William Foster McDaniel. The show opened earlier this week and BroadwayWorld was there for the festivities. Check out photo coverage below...
- 7/26/2013
- by Jennifer Broski
- BroadwayWorld.com
It wasn't your typical weekday commute on the New York City subway. To celebrate the 110th anniversary of the birth of composer and bandleader Duke Ellington last week, his namesake orchestra played in the subway station at 125th Street and St. Nicholas Avenue in Harlem--not far from the Apollo Theater, where Ellington himself once often performed--and, even more appropriately, on a 1930's-vintage, green A train. Led by its musical director, Ellington grandson Paul Mercer Ellington, the orchestra performed many songs, including, of course, Ellington's signature standard, Billy Strayhorn's "Take the A Train," written in 1939. Watch: Among the crowd of listeners was another Ellington grandchild, granddaughter Mercedes Ellington, a choreographer and dancer. "When I was a little girl my grandmother used to take me to the Apollo, and just sit me in the audience. I used to watch a...
- 5/7/2009
- by Jane Levere
- Huffington Post
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