Remembering MDT Founder Loyce Houlton with Judith Brin Ingber
This month, we celebrate MDT founder Loyce Houlton. It’s been 25 years since her passing, and we’re taking the opportunity to recognize her significant contribution to the cultural landscape of Minnesota and to the world of dance. We’ll gather on Saturday, March 14 for
Celebrating Loyce, sharing about Loyce’s life and work. You’re invited!
In the meantime, we’ve met up with dancer, choreographer, and dance historian Judith Brin Ingber, who was friends with Loyce and around for the early years of Minnesota Dance Theatre.
Listening to Judith’s story, one gets a sense of the breadth of the region’s dance history, the connections made — not only within the local community, but far-reaching to include dance icons from around the world. As the names of Martha Graham, Merce Cunningham, and George Balanchine emerge, you realize Loyce’s gifts as a dance educator, choreographic trailblazer, and arts advocate who made an indelible impression on the region’s dance scene.
Picture It: 1960-something
Originally from Minnesota, Judith studied dance here and then left to train at Sarah Lawrence College in New York in 1963. She suffered a knee injury her junior year that led her to return to the Twin Cities to study arts writing specifically in journalism at the University of Minnesota.
Loyce had been teaching dance at the University and had recently opened her own school in Dinkytown. As Judith observed, “Loyce was transforming an extremely beautiful old building that included a large studio and a balcony overlooking the dance floor, affording a special view of the classes. She was imbuing young people with excitement, and David Voss was at her side.”
At the time Judith came to see what was happening in the new space, Loyce’s daughter Lise was a student in the school. “I watched Lise as a little girl doing a mermaid piece. She was around 11 years old and stunning.” (Lise went on to dance with Stuttgart Ballet and American Ballet Theatre and then returned to Minnesota, where she’s been MDT Artistic Director since 1995.)
The dance landscape until this time had included the Russian ballet tradition with Lorand Andahazy and Anna Adrianova, former dancers with the de Basil’s Ballet Russes, presenting grand ballets such as
Sleeping Beauty
at the Northrop Auditorium and teaching in their Twin Cities’ studios, plus a modern tradition propelled by Gertrude Lippincott, who was a master teacher and engineered bringing the Martha Graham Dance Company and other luminaries to Northrop soon after World War II. Also, Nancy McKnight Hauser, who had performed with the Hanya Holm company in New York, brought her version of Expressionist modern dance to both her Twin Cities’ studios and her Hauser Dance Company.
Judith had been familiar with this Minnesota dance landscape, but on her return to Minnesota she was struck with how Loyce was merging ballet and modern. “Loyce was doing this combo thing.”
In fact, Loyce’s influences included those teachers and choreographers Judith had experienced during her time in New York, primarily Martha Graham and ballet with the George Balanchine-Jerome Robbins mix. Loyce was blending these different approaches at the time she launched The Contemporary Dance Playhouse in 1961, and then in the following year, changed the name to Minnesota Dance Theatre (MDT).
After Judith’s study in the journalism program, she returned to New York to graduate from the eclectic modern dance program at Sarah Lawrence. Then she worked for
Dance Magazine
and also took classes with Merce Cunningham. She performed with Meredith Monk, becoming intimately acquainted with the avant-garde arts scene.
Andrea Schulberg Marvey, Ronald Holbrook, Daniel Seagren
Fast Forward: 1970-something
Judith returned to Minnesota once again in 1970. She had fallen in love and was getting married. At this point, Loyce had refurbished what is now The Cedar Cultural Center for her performances, and for classes she was using Dania Hall, once a Danish community center also located on Cedar Avenue.
Judith taught MDT students at Dania Hall in the summer program. “I recall watching Loyce teach the company class with David Voss and Marcia Halmers (Chapman) leaping side by side making an incredible arc in space with their huge jetes. Loyce’s rehearsals and classes were unforgettable.”
Judith began working at the Walker Arts Center, assisting their first performing arts curator Suzanne Weil with bringing in the boundary-pushing dance that was part of New York’s downtown dance scene. Motivated to give the Twin Cities’ young dancers a platform for showing their own original work, Judith convinced Weil to produce a program they called Young Choreographer’s Evening. (Almost 50 years old, it has continued yearly to this day, known as Choreographers Evening).
By this time, Loyce and Judith had developed a friendly rapport, and Loyce asked her what she’d be creating for the Choreographer’s Evening. Judith had in mind a piece that would need 11 dancers. Loyce said, “Well, take them from my advanced class. Let that be my wedding gift to you.”
Judith reflects, “Clearly, she was supportive of the evening to ‘loan’ me so many dancers and to let me rehearse them in the MDT studios. As I look back on it now that was really an incredible present.”
Judith reflects, “Clearly, she was supportive of the evening to ‘loan’ me so many dancers and to let me rehearse them in the MDT studios. As I look back on it now that was really an incredible present.”
The MDT company was now hitting its stride and toured to Spoleto, Italy. Meanwhile, Judith and her new husband Jerome had moved to Tel Aviv, Israel, where she worked with the Batsheva Dance Company. Judith recalls, “One day, I was crossing the street in our neighborhood. It was a teeny street two blocks from the beach, totally off the beaten path. I see a familiar couple across the street. I say, ‘Loyce?’ And she says, ‘Judy?’ and we both exclaim, ‘What are you doing here?’”
Believe it or not, Loyce and her husband William (known as Dr. Bill) were taking a side-trip from Spoleto and ended up in Tel Aviv on the same side street where Judith and her husband were taking a stroll. The Ingbers took the Houltons out on the town and had a wonderful time, cementing a friendship that had begun as dancers in Minnesota.
Loyce teaching while on tour in Spoleto, Italy
1980-something and Beyond
Eventually, Judith returned to the Twin Cities with their little boy, their second born two years later. She focused her work at the University of Minnesota dance program, directing it and teaching, her association with Loyce and MDT continuing as MDT dancers would come teach for the university program.
Reflecting on Loyce’s impact on Minnesota’s dance scene, Judith notes Loyce’s talent for bringing very important dance teachers to work with her students: Mme. Valentina Pereyaslavec, Francois Martinez, Brian Shaw, Scott Douglas, John Kriza, Mary Hinkson and other teachers from the Graham company. “They all had something new to offer dance students in the Twin Cities. Loyce was interested in working with the ballet people who would accept her blending modern techniques.”
Judith notes how Loyce was able to fill a need for teachers who understood up-to-date technique, which is what Loyce’s daughter Lise exemplified as she became a renowned interpreter at American Ballet Theatre of the works of Glen Tetley, a choreographer also known for his blending of modern and ballet.
“Loyce was very ‘of the moment’ that way. She went to New York often and then brought that New York sensibility to what she was showing and creating, taking influences that were au courant and doing them in her own way. A mark of her success was that her dancers went everywhere: Larry White to Martha Graham, Megan Hintz to Stuttgart, Toni Pierce-Sands to Ailey, Lise to Stuttgart and ABT. It shows what quality dancers Loyce was creating.”
Loyce and Mme. Valentina Pereyaslavec in the rehearsal studio
For more stories of Minnesota’s vast dance history and Loyce’s contribution to it, join us on Saturday, March 14 at 1:30pm in MDT Studio 6A for Celebrating Loyce, featuring stories, film, and live performances by the MDT company and school.
