Dance View Times reviewed our performance of the Bagobo rice cycle. It was a new interpretation of the dance prepared especially for the dance festival. Rita Feliciano writes:
Halau was followed by Likha, a group that presented an interpretation of a Bagobo harvest dance from the Southeastern Philippines. Elegant and formal, with precisely calibrated spatial patterns that controlled the whole dance, the piece featured a hiccupping skipping step that would have would look casual in a less controlled environment. While the work gestures—preparing the soil, throwing seeds, cutting crops—were still legible, their stylization and control elevated them above the mundane. The men performed with long bamboo poles, at one point creating a quasi abstract pattern in a line dance that connected them with each other by means of the poles laid on their shoulders. Live, well performed music and gorgeous costumes, particularly the men's tapestry-like suits and headdresses with ear rings, should also be noted.
