‘Musical conversation’ features Oakland-based dance company

Catalyst: One by One, a collaboration between the Dimensions Dance Theater and jazz composer Khalil Shaheed, will get its world premiere at CSU Monterey Bay’s annual Heritage Music Festival on April 16.

The 7 p.m. performance will be held in the University Center ballroom on Sixth Avenue and is free. No tickets or reservations are required.

Deborah Vaughan, founder and artistic director of the Oakland-based dance company, has collaborated with world renowned musicians, poets, rappers and other dance companies for decades.

“I’ve been doing it a really long time. The first was back in the 1980s,” she told the Oakland Tribune. “It was a way to continue to present the work from an African aesthetic, which includes everything – drama, dance, song and spoken word. It’s not broken up into little boxes the way we do in America,” she said.

The process for each collaboration is different, depending on the inspiration for the piece. “I might have a message I want to get across or something I am interested in investigating or commenting on,” Vaughan said.

At the heart of her collaboration with Shaheed is the artists’ shared belief that art can shift consciousness and bring about transformation in the lives of those who create, experience and are touched by it.

In Catalyst, Vaughan and Shaheed focus on the underlying idea of tolerance, and our ability to accept difference. The work will be performed with dancers and drummers from Dimensions Dance Theater, with music performed live by Shaheed and members of the Mo’ Rockin Band. Vaughan calls it a “movement-based musical conversation.”

Catalyst celebrates the confluence of dance and music in the region of Morocco and North Africa, where African, Spanish and Arab cultures have co-existed for centuries. Vaughan combines traditional African dance forms with contemporary forms to respond to the music’s rhythms, energy and emotion; Shaheed’s score includes song and instrumentation for both traditional instruments – oud, gimbri and karkabas – and contemporary jazz instruments.

“By interweaving many different threads of music and dance into a rich mosaic, Catalyst honors the beauty that results when we celebrate our differences,” Vaughan said.

The 12 previous Heritage Music Festivals have presented jazz musicians. “We’re looking at a concept of moving toward a world music festival rather than solely focus on jazz,” said Professor Richard Bains, chair of the Music and Performing Arts Department, the festival’s sponsor. “We are looking at multiple disciplines, including dance. Dimensions Dance Theater is a great way to try out this new approach,” Professor Bains said.

Driving directions and a campus map are available here.

For more information or disability accommodations, call Nicole Mendoza at 582-3009. To learn more about the Music and Performing Arts Department at CSUMB, click here.