Take Me Home, Country Roads: DanceAspen’s CRESCENDO Celebrates Community and Music

DanceAspen is reaching a crescendo point. The scrappy, dancer-created contemporary ballet company, which launched in 2021 following the shuttering of Aspen Santa Fe Ballet, has cultivated a dedicated local fanbase and grown through intentional community engagement and a strong professional network. The seven-dancer group has performed over 35 world premieres since its creation.

DanceAspen’s latest performance, CRESCENDO, runs August 27–28 at Aspen’s Wheeler Opera House, spotlighting the company’s growth and collaborative spirit. With an overarching theme of music, the mixed bill includes the North American premiere of Samantha Lynch’s A Boléro, Alejandro Cerrudo’s PACOPEPEPLUTO, a new arrangement of choreography by Cayetano Soto, and a preview of an upcoming world premiere, Take Me Home.

The last, a multi-choreographer project set to music by acoustic legend John Denver (who lived in Aspen for much of his career) will be performed to live band accompaniment. This month’s preview features movement by Penny Saunders alongside DanceAspen artists and in-house choreographers Jonah Delgado and Matthew Gilmore. Fellow dancemakers Jamar Roberts, Pam Tanowitz, and Noelle Kayser will join them for the full-length premiere in February 2027.

For each of DanceAspen’s programs, founder and executive director Laurel Winton seeks out choreographers who work well with the dancers and aren’t afraid to try something new. “They’re not people who’ve figured out a formula and produce the same work everywhere,” she says. “Whether they’re established or up-and-coming, they’re curious and are always looking for more from their artists and work.”

With CRESCENDO, that began with Samantha Lynch, a Norwegian National Ballet principal dancer, rising choreographer, and former classmate of Winton’s at San Francisco Ballet School. Once Winton learned of Lynch’s A Boléro, a highly physical pas de deux set to Ravel’s iconic score, she immediately envisioned DanceAspen’s artists performing it. Bringing the work to Aspen was an undertaking, she says—largely because it involved constructing a massive box, the company’s biggest set piece yet—but it was worth it. “A Boléro became what I built this whole program around,” she explains. For managing director Allison Walsh, it’s also a point of pride: “I think it’s really cool that Laurel’s bringing this up-and-coming female choreographer to North America for the first time. There aren’t a lot of small companies that can say that.”

Next came PACOPEPEPLUTO, Alejandro Cerrudo’s eight-minute piece to songs by mid-20th-century crooner Dean Martin. (It will be the company’s first Cerrudo work.) Then Winton worked with Spanish choreographer Cayetano Soto to compile highly “music-driven” portions from his existing ballets into a new arrangement, playfully named SAVOURY BITES. And while Walsh says John Denver’s music runs through Take Me Home, the piece also draws on the singer’s deep connection to Aspen: “The main metaphor comes from aspen trees—they look like separate entities, but the entire grove is connected by the same root system. It’s exploring themes of home. Our home.”

For the preview, Penny Saunders, Jonah Delgado, and Matthew Gilmore have created 18 minutes of loosely narrative material to hits like “Take Me Home, Country Roads” and “Rocky Mountain High.” Saunders explains that for both the excerpt and full-length production, each choreographer has taken on certain songs (she’s tackling the most with six), and the process is highly collaborative among the dancers and creative team. “We’re all talking about the music and costumes together in a way that is very grassroots,” she says. For Saunders, who with Roberts recently participated in another multi-choreographer project, for BalletX, it has also felt natural. “DanceAspen is a small organization, so everybody pulls their weight in a beautiful way.”

As the program approaches, Winton and Walsh are taking the opportunity to reflect on the company’s evolution. “We’ve been able to do this because of the support of the Aspen community, which has really embraced us,” says Winton. “We’ve been able to grow and give our dancers raises each year. I think it’s just wonderful, this collection of the right people coming together to build this crescendo of work.”