José Limon

I want to talk about José Limon, because I had the opportunity to take master classes with two of his dancers, Betty Jones and Fritz Ludin. Through them I could learnt a little bit of his work. José Limon was a pioneering modern dancer and choreographer. He moved in New York in 1928, where he studied under Doris Humphrey and Charles Weidman, two Masters of the modern dance. He founded his own company in 1946: The Jose Limon Dance Company. Betty Jones is one of the dancers of his company. With his company, he developed his repertory with Doris Humphray and he established his style that was become the Limon technique. I was very lucky to take the master class with Betty Jones and Fritz Ludin because they are very old, and they don't give lots of classes now. Furthermore we have to take benefits of their knowledge before they die. The class was amazing, Fritz is almost 72 and he still did all the jumps for boys, and all the stretching. Betty is almost 80, and she showed all the exercises. When it was Fritz who gave the class Betty was taking it, and vice versa. It was really impressive, because sometimes you are tired or you don't want to work, but when you saw them you have to! And when I saw them, I can say that I'm sure that dance preserves your body.