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Home » MANCC Artists Ralph Lemon and Pam Tanowitz win Bessie Awards

MANCC Artists Ralph Lemon and Pam Tanowitz win Bessie Awards

Published November 1, 2016
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Pam Tanowitz and Ralph Lemon

Photo by Chris Cameron

Performer Okwui Okpokwasili is assisted by Kristen Bernier, FSU student, during Ralph Lemon’s MANCC residency for Scaffold Room. Photo by Chris Cameron

Maggie Allesee National Center for Choreography (MANCC) is pleased to announce that the New York Dance and Performance Awards (a.k.a. the Bessies) have been awarded to two MANCC Artists, Ralph Lemon and Pam Tanowitz. Living Legacy Artist Ralph Lemon won the award for Outstanding Production for his work, Scaffold Room, and MANCC Visiting Artist Pam Tanowitz was selected by a distinguished panel of dance leaders, including Yoshiko Chuma, Liz Gerring, and Bill T. Jones, to receive the Juried Bessie Award. The 32nd annual Bessie Awards ceremony was held on October 18, 2016 at the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Howard Gilman Opera House.

Ralph Lemon was in residence at MANCC to work on the development of Scaffold Room in February 2014. Check out Lemon’s MANCC webpage for details of his residency, including the reflection of FSU School of Dance student, Kristin Bernier, who served as a studio assistant during the residency. This award was Lemon’s third Bessie, having won previously in 1987 and 2005 as a choreographer for Two (1986) and The Geography Trilogy, which included Geography (1997), Tree (2000), and Come Home Charley Patton (2004).

Pam Tanowitz will have her first MANCC residency in February 2017 in support of her project, New Work for Goldberg Variations, an evening-length piece for piano and a sextet of dancers, inspired by the live performance of Bach’s iconic score, interpreted by pianist Simone Dinnerstein. Dinnerstein, one of the foremost interpreters of the Goldberg Variations in recent years, brings her nuanced understanding of the demanding score to the project. Receiving the Juried Bessie Award for her work the story progresses as if in a dream of glittering surfaces was Tanowitz’s second Bessie win, the first being for Outstanding Production for her work, Be in the Gray With Me (2009). Opening Nights Performing Arts is co-commissioning Tanowitz’ New Work for Goldberg Variations and will be presenting the work as part of Opening Nights Performing Arts Fall 2017 season.