HOUSTON’S GROUP ACORDE GETS SPONTANEOUS.
With a spirit of collaborative innovation driven by purposeful spontaneity, the four members of Houston’s Group Acorde find beauty in savoring and sharing their creative process.
The artists — contemporary dancers Roberta Paixão Cortes and Lindsey McGill, together with musical co-founders Seth Paynter and Thomas Helton — embrace the rich simplicity of the unknown, relying heavily on improvisation to bring genuine conversations to life onstage.
On Aug. 24, the company will launch an online duet series comprised of three performances followed by Q&A discussions that will be livestreamed for free from the P.E.T Outdoor Theater via Facebook Live. Pairing sensual movement to the silky, sometimes dissonant sounds of the saxophone, the first program will feature the raw energy of Paixão Cortes and Paynter, as they feed off each other’s ideas, using an intentionally unrefined yet authentic approach to establish a shared rhythm in their exploration of the perfectly imperfect. McGill and Helton will then take the stage in September with a program showcasing all four artists together.
“I don’t think, at this point in time, a lot of talking is needed. I think we just need to be in our element and connect that way,” said Paixão Cortes, who moved to Houston from her native Brazil in pursuit of opportunities to become a professional dancer. “It’s like meeting an old friend that you haven’t seen in a long time but you know that you can both do something together that only you can do together.”
The emotional complexity entwined with such an experience is reminiscent of that brought about by the long-awaited, postvaccine reunions of the present. For performing artists, the journey of socially reengaging with fellow creatives and colleagues goes hand in hand with a heartwarming homecoming.
After participating in the Pilot Dance Project’s inaugural, online Texas Latino/a/x Contemporary Dance Festival last April, Group Acorde celebrated its return to the live stage in June as part of Houston Metropolitan Dance Center’s “Summer ExtravaDance” at Miller Outdoor Theatre. The artists — three of whom appeared in person, with McGill joining virtually — performed “In between,” a new work choreographed by Paixão Cortes that draws inspiration from her experience as an immigrant living between two different worlds.
“In these past two years, I have been in that process of rediscovering how I feel at home moving,” Paixão Cortes said of her recent choreographic style. “As a ballet dancer, I’d never really had that experience.”
While these performances offered the artists a taste of normalcy, their upcoming series will allow them to reconnect through what brought them together in the first place — the intoxicating immediacy and intimacy that underlies improvisational work. While collaborating with the Michele Brangwen Dance Ensemble, this common interest opened conversations about how they might create in a way that represents their voices equally. Such discussions evolved into the formation of Group Acorde in 2016.
For the classically trained Paixão Cortes, developing improvisational skills was a process that she has grown comfortable with over the years. Her musical counterpart, on the other hand, finds that playing on impulse defined his initial introduction to learning jazz as a teenager.
“I’d rather be a little raw and a little dangerous because that, to me, is more fun,” said Paynter, who has always maintained a mentality of feel over technique. “I’m the type of artist that processes my emotions through my art. I love the abstract quality of it that I can get lost in.”