Review by Catherine Coutts

Grupo Corpo is a family affair.  Artistic Director Paulo Pederneiras founded the company – which includes five of his siblings – in 1975, and it is brother Rodrigo who has choreographed the two pieces in this programme: Gil Refazendo and Gira, both grounded in classical ballet and Brazilian folk dance. 

The first piece, Gil Refazendo (‘refazendo’ means ‘remaking’), is in tribute to Gilberto Gil, who is also the composer of the piece. The dancers undulate from the shadows into the light, using their whole bodies to move across the stage. The music shifts from harsh, percussive soundscapes to songs and melodies. The dancing is exquisite, with beautiful balletic jumps:  entrechats, cabriole and many more are danced with great precision and grace, the men seeming to hover in the air before landing. What is noticeable in Gil Refazendo is the lack of interaction between the dancers, who all dance perfectly on time but separately for most of the performance. This is a brave approach, but the lack of variety makes the performance slightly one-dimensional.

The second piece, Gira is inspired by Umbanda (a religion honouring the spirits of indigenous Brazilians and Africans). Costume designer Freusa Zechmeister has continued the flowing costumes that complemented Gil Refazendo so well, but now the dancers lose their white shirts, shorts and trousers and appear to be topless, wearing wide, fluid skirts and red paint on their necks.

Gabriel Pederneiras (another brother!) takes on the lighting for Gira. The expansive Playhouse stage is again clear, with the dancers sitting covered with shrouds in chairs at the edge, a single light above each one, emerging sporadically to perform.  Initially, it is the women who appear in a burst of frantic energy before they are joined by the rest of the cast. Gira contains a lot more interaction than its predecessor and one of the highlights is a pas de deux performed in the spotlight whilst all around the other dancers stand immobile, just out of the shadows. These dynamics elevate Gira to make it an outstanding work fusing different styles of dance and music with the sinister shadows of the afterlife.

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This review is published by Traditional Dance Forum of Scotland as part of our Traditional Dance Criticism Course, led by dance writer and editor Róisín O’Brien and supported by dance scholar and editor Dr Wendy Timmons.

Catherine Coutts is one of the six applicants, alongside Yuxi Jiang, Inesa Vėlavičiūtė, Alena Shmakova, Vassia Bouchagiar-Walker and Yanmei Bowie, who were selected to participate in this pilot edition of the course in 2024.

Gil Refazendo and Gira were performed at the Playhouse Theatre, Edinburgh on 5-7 August 2024 as part of Edinburgh International Festival. This double bill by Grupo Corpo was one of over 10 shows with trad dance roots across the Edinburgh’s summer festivals we hand-picked to be reviewed.

Images courtesy of Andrew Perry, Catherine Coutts and Grupo Corpo. 

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Please find further details about our #traddance campaign at Edinburgh summer festivals here