A recording of a conversation that took place in 2002, moderated by Reginald Yates. We hear the voices of Donald McKayle, Cleo Parker Robinson, and Julie Belafonte in addition to insights and reflections from Katherine Dunham herself.
A recording of a conversation that took place in 2002, moderated by Reginald Yates. We hear the voices of Donald McKayle, Cleo Parker Robinson, and Julie Belafonte in addition to insights and reflections from Katherine Dunham herself.
[Music begins, composed by J.S. Bach, performed by Jess Meeker]
NORTON OWEN: Welcome to PillowVoices, a production of Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival with content from the Pillow Archives. I'm Norton Owen, the Pillow’s Director of Preservation and it’s my pleasure to bring you one of our most memorable Pillow Talks from the past. This is a 2002 event that was entitled “The Legacy of Katherine Dunham,” recorded just a few days after Ms. Dunham’s 93rd birthday. The conversation was moderated by Reginald Yates, who directed a program in the school at Jacob’s Pillow devoted to the Dunham legacy. And the voices you'll hear belong to Donald McKayle, Cleo Parker Robinson, and Julie Belafonte in addition to Katherine Dunham herself.
REGINALD YATES: Good evening, how's everyone? I want to say that everyone on this panel is a living treasure. And I want to use this, use this occasion to thank Miss Dunham, not only for her her strength and her legacy, but her graciousness, her generosity, and the great gifts that she gives to us us each day. She is a paragon of strength, of faith. And not only are we standing on her shoulders, but she has said to us, we have a collective responsibility to express our sense of humanity every day that we live, and not just on the stage, but as we greet each other. In other words, our sense of community, because there's no separation between what you live and what you dance. And in Dunham technique, when she says a way of life, there is expression of your humanity as you're teaching it, as you are dancing it. In Africa, we learn how to respect each other through the dance, we learn manners through the dance, we learn our lineage through the dance. And I know by taking classes in Dunham technique, we're speaking specifically of the bloodline. We're speaking of our heritage, we're speaking of the life force, for example, in the shoulders here. As to say that if movement stops, we cannot live. If breath stops, we cannot live. It is expensive. So we have learned through Katherine Dunham that as she has lived, we can not only live, but we can be prolific human beings first. As to say the human being is before the artist. One question I want to pose to our illustrious guests this moment is, first of all, to think and to also ponder about Miss Dunham's influence not only as an artist, but as a human being, because I'm very, very struck by her humanity, always, her graciousness. And her what I call a binding and enduring love. This love is consistent. And it really she lives by example. And this is profound to me. Every time that I meet her, she is very, very consistent in that. But let us begin by talking about influences not just as an artist, but also as a human being. Anyone can take that.
NORTON OWEN: We first hear from Donald McKayle, a pioneering choreographer who never worked with Miss Dunham personally, but nonetheless had strong feelings about her influence.
DONALD MCKAYLE: Well, I’ll start because I never worked personally with Miss Dunham. Her influence in me was by being in her presence, by being witness to what she was doing, witness to what she stood for. I remember very vividly, not that long ago when she went in a hunger strike, to protest the treatment of Haitians who are being turned back when they were trying to escape from the repression. And she was well into the years, and was I think it was about 50 days or more. And we, people kept begging her, begging her. 47 days. But this was her commitment. Now, how many of us would do that? You know, she puts...she puts her life on the line for what she believes in. And it's 100% and more. And as a young man, when I first witnessed her, I was witness to this in the beauty of this woman as she dance, but also to listen to her speak. She is a great human being as well as a great artist.
NORTON OWEN: Joining the conversation now is Cleo Parker Robinson, whose Denver-based company is itself legendary, having revived a number of Dunham works and brought Miss Dunham to Colorado for a conference of The International Association of Blacks in Dance.
CLEO PARKER ROBINSON: Oh, wow. First of all, I mean, I could talk about Miss Dunham forever. And so if I can just speak maybe of that incident. At the time, Miss Dunham was fasting. I was very close to Miss Dunham and, and it was very shocking, that she would decide to fast and she spoke about she had no fear and no fear of death. And so she was very concerned about all of us being concerned about her. And so I thought that was really quite amazing. She stopped fasting finally after President Aristide came to her her bedside and said the Haitian people have asked me to come and ask you to please stop fasting. And I think even then, she was reconsidering whether or not because she really is about commitment as as Donny speaks of. But my experience has been, I guess growing up knowing about Miss Dunham all my life. My father was an actor and of course, inspired by Harry Belafonte and Sidney Poitier. And I grew up dancing doing the Calypso and looking at Donald McKayle in the movies and the films and the everything. And so I always knew about Katherine Dunham, but I never I always dreamt about meeting her and I finally went to New York and began to study with her but found out who she was through her goddaughter there at Alvin Ailey's. And I mean, she was bigger than life, first of all, just but the part I did love and I think that I've been so absolutely inspired by is her compassion. I've we've been around Miss Dunham and I know Alberta Rose is here, and so many of her her I guess, we’re followers, we're teachers. We we are, she's the guru. Yes. Duhnamites. Yes. But we've been there in so many different circumstances in East St. Louis, or in New York or in Chicago. But in East St. Louis, she is committed to the young people. And as I look over here, to the left, I see a younger people who are, first of all young spirits here, but younger, because she is she came to East St. Louis, with her husband, John Pratt. And when she saw the situation there, she was totally committed to changing it. Even if it meant being taken to jail, or whatever she had to do. She was protesting the situation. And she was she was realizing also, that the young men and the young women, the young gangs then really needed another way of expressing themselves. They needed to know that the arts were a way of speaking. And the drum was critical for their own language. And she began to really become a force there. And she still. I mean even when she's here in New York, and was so happy she's there as well, she will go back to East St. Louis, and teach as she did today, because she stays committed to what's going on in Haiti. What has happened in East St. Louis. And she said, because if things can change in East St. Louis, which if anyone of you’ve been there, if you've been there, you know how difficult it is to live there. But if you can make something happen there, you can make it happen anywhere in the world. And that's how she felt. So she didn't pick the easiest place to make something happen. She challenged herself as she does challenge dancers. But I have so much...I do know that she exudes an aura about her that is so loving when she was in Denver working with…oh there she is, Katherine Dunham whoa, yes yes yes [unclear phrases].
NORTON OWEN: At this point, Katherine Dunham herself joins the conversation, and is welcomed by Reginald Yates.
REGINALD YATES: Miss Dunham, how are you? [Dunham: Exceedingly well] Yes, we want to say again that we love you. Yes. We were talking about influences, and Cleo Parker Robinson was speaking about how you have influenced her life and career. And so we perhaps want to go on and talk about that influence….yes.
CLEO PARKER ROBINSON: Well, having Miss Dunham come to Denver, I think and it was in 1990, coming from Haiti, for the, I guess this the third International Black Dance conference. It was magnificent, and she transformed the space. I mean, one of the things that was performed, one the pieces is Miss Dunham’s work L’Ag’Ya, and she had set it on the Ailey company and I had seen "The Magic of Katherine Dunham" performed in New York. And it was a wonderful gift that Alvin had given the conference and to Miss Dunham that April Berry would come from the Ailey company and perform that solo. But I think what was magnificent was not every, not just what happened on stage, but what happened in the hotel when she was rehearsing with Mor Thiam, one of her extraordinary drummers from Senegal, and to witness the most extraordinary... Well, the mind, body, spirit...seeing how holistic it is in what she believes in how you take the mind, and you put it into the power of your body, and you allow the spirit come to come through. And watching that rehearsal, I'll always remember that. And so when she tried to explain it in class the next day after the performance, which was extraordinary, April then came to the front of the room and began to demonstrate L’Ag’Ya, again, and there was a powerful possession that went on in the room, and my studio has never been the same. And then it got ready for Julie Belafonte, and for Tommy Gomez when they came to work with us, setting Choros and with Vanoye Aikens to set Barrelhouse Blues. And so Miss Dunham’s spirit has been there many, many times. And in many ways in every time, she gives so much to the young people that are there to the dancers, and she doesn't just start with the dance. But she takes you on a journey that is so holistic, it expands your mind and your body for sure. But spiritually, you are awakened. And so we are so grateful to be here on your 93rd birthday, Miss Dunham. We do love you. Thank you for your love.
NORTON OWEN: Another member of the panel, Julie Robinson Belafonte was a major Dunham dancer in the 1940s and 50s and interjects a reflection on the day’s events here.
JULIE ROBINSON BELAFONTE: I know Miss...I know Miss Dunham is tired. It's been a very long day. I just want to say Miss Dunham taught an extraordinary masterclass a little while ago. And I don't want to talk about myself, I want to say one thing that I learned in class today, which is such a wonderful word. It's not a word. It's a concept that one should know - your is-ness, what you are. And I'm going to be using that word and quoting her because I think it's profound. And maybe she can elaborate on that or whatever she wants to talk about. But I am going to hand the microphone right over to Miss Dunham. Thank you.
KATHERINE DUNHAM: Thank you. And now you are going to activate me. I will sit here and do my best to answer whatever you'd like to know about me. And these wonderful people who are here with me, will speak up. If I'm wrong, you'll correct me if I'm right, they'll second me. And here we are, we're in...we're in a conference, at a kind of a meeting where we all have to find out about each other. Find out about each other, about ourselves about me, about you. Let's get into it. Shall we?
REGINALD YATES: I do first want to recognize the presence of Mr. Walter Nicks. Could you please stand here? And also, Mr. Joe Nash sitting in the back, historian. Now questions for Miss Dunham. Please stand.
AUDIENCE MEMBER 1: How's it like dancing against racism?
REGINALD YATES: How is it like dancing against racism?
KATHERINE DUNHAM: As much as it's sometimes not easy at all, but let me tell you something, if we need perfectly honest about it, it was a good thing. It gave me impetus. It aroused my adrenaline and gave me a focal point that I might not have had had I been just one of those you know, pale-faced easygoing people. I always had something to fight for. And I thank racism for that. I don't think it's what it's done to some people who haven't been able to rise up and above it. But but those of us who've been able to stand up and say fuck you, we...Sorry. Well, you know, sometimes, sometimes there are no words excepting "the word."
REGINALD YATES: Any other questions please? Yes, let's move on, all right. Any other questions?
KATHERINE DUNHAM: Oh, of course, we're here for questions. I'm not here to lead. I'm here to follow.
AUDIENCE MEMBER 2: Hi, my name is Ken Singer, and I would like share a story, which happened to me in 1962. I was living in the Chelsea section of New York, recently moved there and went to a place called the Hudson Guild, which was a guild house. And a group of kids stayed together of all colors. It was the middle of the Civil Rights Movement, it was very interesting time for white students in an all-Black neighborhood [unclear fragment], and a very interesting group formed. And after a year or two of getting to know each other in a way that we became close friends, we decided we are going to do something special. And we put together a group to go South to visit colleges and schools to talk. And Katherine Dunham sponsored us. If it wasn't for her, it would have never happened. And to this moment, it is still the most meaningful things in my life, I'm sure of all the other kids that went on it who, but she arranged for us -- we went to Howard University, went to North Carolina A&T. And then we went to Washington and Lee University, which was an all-white school where Blacks have never been allowed on the campus except in a working capacity. And we were up till midnight, having an unbelievable session. And as the story goes, according to the local newspaper, the local theater, movie theater was integrated a month later. These things wouldn't have happened if it wasn't for Katherine Dunham having the impact. And I always wanted to say thank you so much.
KATHERINE DUNHAM: I want to thank you for what you did for me. Because you are among those early groups of people who stepped forth and gave me a feeling this is something to fight for, these are people who will be with me, and you were with me, you are with me. I...I cannot thank you enough those people who had the courage to do this. Your doing-ness gave me my is-ness. Thank you.
REGINALD YATES: Yes, thank you. Another question, please.
AUDIENCE MEMBER 3: In 1970... in 1969, I was in Haiti, and I lived in your villa. You were somewhere else in the world. And...and I would love...it was very beautiful. And I would love for you to talk about a little bit of your time in Haiti. And I'm also curious, when did you leave and didn't go back to Haiti? And if you could talk about the work you did there.
KATHERINE DUNHAM: Haiti has been, I guess my second home, my country, and has so much of deep honest love for me and I for it, that Haiti will always be there no matter what happens. There are not good things happening in Haiti now I might as well...we know that, we all know it. But we know that Haiti is strong and I my hope is that it will survive what is happening now. When I went there, my first thought was to know the people—that was 1934-35—to know the people, what they were all about, and the love them and they love me. And after that year after year after year, I went back and finally settled on a place that's called Habitation Leclerc, it's where Pauline Leclerc settled and that's where you stayed. I'd like to feel...I like to feel that I can be well, comfortable, creative— all of these things in Haiti. I don't feel it today. I don't feel it because there are those who have decided to live by greed, striving for power and more power and forgetting that that fundamental basic love that this country has. These people are slowly eating away at the core. Not at the external but at the core, and this troubles me. I want to feel that Haiti is as I knew Haiti. Then I say, well, why should it be? No place is...no place is. And we look around the world and we see what's happening, and we expect something to happen in Haiti that we don't particularly like. The people are poorer, the rich are richer. But it’s...that’s true of the entire world. People are poorer and the rich are richer. So all I can in Haiti is that I love it. I love it then and love it now. I am not sure how much good I would do by going back there. And that's what keeps me from, from going back. I will, of course, go back. But I don't know that I am the person who would have the strength to be able to adjust to the negative influences in Haiti. I have to get that strength from outside, I have to get it from you. You have to give me enough strength and enough willpower so that when I go back, I will be able to help. If I went back today, I don't think I would help. I know what you mean about the beauty, about the loveliness about Leclerc where Pauline Bonaparte lived. But let us be realistic. Today, Haiti represents a power base. This power base could be used in a very positive way. Haiti is the key, the entrance way to the Caribbean, the whole Caribbean complex, which leads into South America. Haiti has great importance as a guiding spirit for this area, but also as...also as a preventive of destruction. And that's where I don't agree with Haiti today. I do not feel that Haiti is living up to its potential as a gateway to positive things in the Caribbean and South America. It is leading to me, leading up to an obstruction to development. I don't like to say it, but I feel it's true. And I am willing to do everything in my power to keep Haiti from living and leading a destructive life. I hope that you will, because you have known it at other times, will be among those that will join me in this...in this struggle. It's a real struggle.
REGINALD YATES: Any other questions?
AUDIENCE MEMBER 4: Good afternoon, my name is Wray Gunn and I live in Sheffield...I'm up here all year. In the excerpt the other night at the gala, you gave a concert and I can't remember the city, and you said that you will not return there until people like you who sit and watch the show with people like you. Now, following up on that, could you just take us through and let us know where you saw the first evidence that those feelings have changed? And you went back to the city, that city, that town they went back to and you recall and…
KATHERINE DUNHAM: Let me say this to you. I cannot tell you from where the change will come. I can't tell you what it will be. I can only say that I know until within me that Haiti is itself strong enough to bring about a change. I feel that there will be a change for positive things if you say what do we want those of us who know and love Haiti, what do we want? We want economic and social well-being. People to feel that they can earn a living. They can enter the world of trade, the economics of the rest of the world. That they can live well, that they can live well socially. And is it this whole thing of mulatto versus Black or white versus Black and so on. The thing that is racism, which is there, it's incipient, but it's there, that we get rid of this, we start thinking of people as people. What more can I say to you than that I am quite prepared to devote what remains to me in life to assisting the growth of man, wherever man needs assistance. I don't say just Haiti. I don't say just, you know, the United States or wherever. But all over the world, man needs help to become man. I am willing to devote myself to that in every way possible. And Haiti is only a part of this whole complex. That is me.
JULIE BELAFONTE: And could you reiterate your question again sir, please?
KATHERINE DUNHAM: I think I know what he means. I know. I know. Yes, I was. I didn't know how segregated it was. I didn't know to what extent the racism when I found myself on one occasion. I know you've heard about the occasion when I was in Lexington, Kentucky, and the audience was totally segregated. I did not...foolishly, I didn't think about this, because I was so busy with the company and that have saved me so many, many times, I just just too busy to get into what I consider the small things. This turned out to be a big thing. It turned out that no Black people could sit in the orchestra seats. And I after going through a whole lot of...a whole lot of resistance, threats, you name it. I did everything possible, to be able to get on that stage and feel good about it. And I couldn't, I couldn't win then. Therefore I decided if I couldn't win at the beginning, I'd win at the end. I did the show. They loved it. Maybe the show was better than it had ever been because everybody was uptight. And we told them we would never come back until we could appear...before people were sitting next to each other, people of my color were sitting next to people of their color. A lot of people in the audience didn't know it, they had no idea that this was the case. And this is one thing I have to say you have to be very very careful about racism. There is conscious, active, violent racism. And there's a kind of racism that is simply pure ignorance, people just don't know. And they don't know and they don't think and they follow and all of a sudden they're faced with something which is against their Christian principles, social values, everything. But they did not know that until it was put before them. That night I decided to put this before them, pinned on the back of my one of my fancy little...little skirts. "No Whites Allowed." It was a sort of rude thing to do, I know….And I said to them, until we could sit next to you I wouldn't come back. And then after that they got to thinking about it. And they said, well, we want Paul Robeson and we want Marian Anderson, and they got themselves together and they sat next to each other and none of it rubbed off so they were very happy.
AUDIENCE MEMBER 5: [unclear]…is there still racism in dance today or is there….[unclear]
KATHERINE DUNHAM: To be perfectly honest...and that's my purpose tonight...I do not think that racism has stopped rearing its ugly head in this country. We may not recognize it, some people. And I don't mean we I mean, you may not recognize it, but it's here. Now, why? It's here because of this whole need for control and power control. That is a way of life of this, of these United States. We want power. Just stop and think about it. Think about what's taught in our classes in school, the kinds of things that are taught, think about our recreation, what we love what television tells us to love, and television tells us to hate. And this, we are in the control of a power control. We simply believe that we have the right to have everything that we feel that we want to have, and what tells us what we want to have? Think about it. We want to have that kind of shoes, this kind of drink, that kind of food, this kind of underwear, that kind of love life. Look at it, I'm telling you...think about it. And you will see that we are being told what to want and what not to want, what to love what not to love, what to believe in what not to believe in. This is our life today. Now this way of thinking is totally opposed to what man is supposed to be about. If you look back, and I am now in the, my middle stage of my life. I'm sorry. Sorry to disappoint you. I am thinking in terms of what used to be...all right, we will grant that that family is not able to support family in today's life. We know that. Your kids wake up in the morning and go to school, they're out of the house, they're out of your sight. You don't know what they, I would almost say control, but I don’t mean it...out of your sight. But you don't know what they're doing until they come back home. See what I mean? The family has very little meaning today in our society. The village, which I'm looking at now with great interest has...is beginning to lose this meaning altogether. You know, those are hardly any villages, there are a lot of villages they've lost their meaning and their value. But what we do have is these great urban centers, cities. We have cities, we have power control. We have corporations. We have curriculums that are dictated to who tells this principal of a school what this class will study at nine o'clock this morning. Think of who tells them...corporations. What makes a corporation? A corporation is made up of people who didn't know how to get to the top any other way excepting to walk on the shoulders of those below them. They've got to get to the top, top of wealth, top of control. Now you know how I feel about corporations. This is what our lives are made up of. What do our children study in school? Do they learn what you want them to learn? Do they learn the beauties of this or that path? Or the other path? Or how this might be better for them than that might be? How to be happy? Do they learn how to be happy? No. They learn how to cut, splice, fit, sew, hammer, nail, do, do, am I right? [Audience: Yes] And this is the way we live. There was a question, someone asked me a question.
REGINALD YATES: The question was, is there still racism in dance? She was speaking specifically about dance. Yes.
AUDIENCE MEMBER 5: Is it better, or is it completely equal? I worry about that.
KATHERINE DUNHAM: I would say that dance is as influenced by the media as in anything else. I'd say that if you enjoy seeing a program of XYZ, it's because somebody told you this is what you should like to see. How much of what you want to see, know, and love and how much of what moves you do you see and is available for you to see? Now, like, go to some little Off Broadway something or see some little...there are people struggling, really, really struggling to show what they feel man needs, but they can hardly make it. It...it costs a lot to live today. And in order to do we have to live. If you're going to walk across the street, you have to have the strength with which to walk across the street, right? If you're going to do a dance program, you have to be able to pay rehearsal time, union fees for rehearsal, performance fees, costume fees, lighting, stage management, stage equipment, tickets, I could go on, you know? This is what you need to know if you want to show what you're doing today. What do you do, you are a creative artist. Oh, I want to show what it's like, to feel to be in love, we’ll say. You get busy and you start out. By the time you get through, what you show is what they want to see, not what you want to show. Do you realize that? That's what's happening. There's not much that we can do about it, except being aware. If you want to show love between a 16-year old and an 18-year old, we’ll say, it’s got to be that he's 18 and she's 16. Don't forget that he's a he and she's a she. And to be perfectly honest, it’s gotta be the same color. So you asked me about racism, and I say where do you find a consensual love between people of different color. Very seldom. If you do, it creates a scandal. It creates a whole mess of things that have to live down, live through. You can show it in tiny little Off Broadway stage and after you do what have you accomplished? Absolutely nothing. Because you've only managed to pay for the cost of putting it on and so forth. And in the end what is these two people stand there – a Black woman and a white man usually, as it's been since the old plantation days. And now and then you find a white woman and a Black man because he's supposed to be so powerful. Now, these are people...where are they going to live? Racism. I don't know where they'll find an apartment that will willingly take them in that is not geared toward the eccentric, the exotic. Alright, maybe they'll find a place in, oh say down downtown New York. And where we'll call the mixed couples live. Maybe they'll find a place there to live, maybe. Can they walk into here and say listen, I need a three-room apartment and here's the money for six months. No. They can't do it. There are growing efforts to make life possible for what we call mixed couples. The very...the fact that they need to even be thought about answers your question. Your question is, is racism still alive and well in these United States of America?
[Music begins, composed, and performed by Jess Meeker]
NORTON OWEN: That’s it for this episode of PillowVoices. Thank you for joining us today. On behalf of Jacob’s Pillow we look forward to sharing more dance with you through the films, essays, and podcasts at danceInteractive.jacobspillow.org and of course through live experiences during our Festival and throughout the year. Special thanks to the National Endowment for the Arts for helping launch this podcast series. Please subscribe to PillowVoices wherever you get your podcasts and visit us again soon, either online or on site.