Jamaican dance company dedicates performances to founding artistic director

Brooklyn Center for the Performing Arts at Brooklyn College will dedicate its upcoming March 6 at 8 p.m. and March 7 at 2 p.m. performances by the National Dance Theatre Company of Jamaica (NDTC) to the memory of the company’s Founding Artistic Director, Rex Nettleford, who passed away February 2, 2010.

NDTC returns to Brooklyn next month with a new generation of young artists who, since the ensemble’s last visit two years ago, have come to embody the company’s dual principles of renewal and continuity, working to integrate a strong hold on the ancestral legacy of Jamaican music, movement and rituals with a ready response to contemporary life.

The repertoire includes Tintinnabulum, a social-commentary piece on sons and mothers, peer group pressure and youth violence created by Nettleford, who was principle choreographer for the company. Both presentations will end with the New York premiere of another piece by Nettleford entitled “Apocalypse,” which explores the anguish and the hope of contemporary Caribbean life.

Using the traditional ritual of Zion Revivalism, a community bypasses traditional law enforcement and instead invokes ancestral spirituality to reform the violence-prone wrongdoer.

Shows will be at the Walt Whitman Theatre at Brooklyn College, 2900 Campus Road. For more, call 718-951-4500. Tickets are $40 and $30.