Battery Dance Festival (New York City’s longest-running, free, public dance festival) presents a free virtual program celebrating the work of Canadian dance makers — Citadel + Compagnie, Kaeja d’Dance, RUBBERBAND, The National Ballet of Canada, and Tanveer Alam — in partnership with the Consulate General of Canada in New York. A link to the 7 p.m. broadcast will be posted at batterydance.org on Thursday, March 26. The video of “Canadian Voices in Dance” will be available to watch for 30 days after the premiere and will expire on April 22. 
Here’s the line up of performances:
Citadel + Compagnie
The Man in Black
“The Man in Black” is a celebration of American working class-grit and of the man whose voice embodied it so well, Johnny Cash. James Kudelka takes six Cash songs and transforms them into outwardly simple yet choreographically sophisticated dances, creating an ode to the human spirit, proud and resilient.
Kaeja d’Dance
between sun and sand & between snow and sky
Conceived by Karen Kaeja, Karen and Allen Kaeja celebrate the effort to find light and flight during the pandemic in two different seasons. Music composed by Edgardo Moreno and Christina Litt Belch. 
RUBBERBAND
Ever So Slightly
“Ever So Slightly” explores the behavioral mechanisms and reflexes we develop against the ceaseless flow of irritants that bombard us in our daily lives. Most of us long for calm and resilience, but how do we get to a zone where noise and aggressivness no longer have a place? Simultaneously delivering delicacy, brutality, finesse, and high-voltage action, Victor Quijada conveys all the energy contained in urgency, revolt, chaos, and flight.
The National Ballet of Canada 
In Between 
Praised as a “polished, cohesive ballet” in The Globe and Mail, “In Between” debuted with The National Ballet of Canada in 2018 with original music by Canadian composer Adam Sakiyama. Choreographer Alysa Pires has now adapted the piece for film, focusing on a single dancer, Second Soloist Christopher Gerty, rather than the original cast of four, re-imaging the choreography as a poignant solo. Inspired by the pull between two places, In Between conveys a sense of yearning and restlessness that feels especially prescient in the context of the coronavirus pandemic.
Tanveer Alam
Tarana
The “Tarana,” choreographed and performed by Tanveer Alam, is a composition of Hindustani classical music in which vocal syllables are based in Arabic and Persian phonemes (units of sound) structured within a rhythmic cycle and melody. The movements are abstract and based in the vocabulary of the North Indian form of Kathak with influences from Tanveer’s training in contemporary dance. This Tarana is set to the midnight Raag, Darbari Kanada, and is composed by the renowned composer Atul Desai who originally wrote it for Kathak guru Kumudini Lakhia. Tanveer offers this work as an example of how the art of Kathak continues to evolve and grow within the bodies of its diasporic practitioners — with love and honesty.
In anticipation of the program, Battery Dance Artistic Director Jonathan Hollander sat down with the artists to discuss their works. Their interviews can be found on the Battery Dance Festival website, too.