Limón Dance Company

Limón Dance Company returns to Northrop on Saturday, January 30, 2027, at 7:30 PM, performing on the Carlson Family Stage. It's their fourth appearance at Northrop since February 2022, and this one brings together two very different pieces of the company's history.

One is a classic from the company's founder: Missa Brevis (1958). José Limón wrote it after visiting war-torn Poland, and he drew on Zoltán Kodály's Missa Brevis in Tempore Belli for the music. This particular staging is a local collaboration—it brings in the Northrop organ, the University Singers, and UMN dance students, so it's not just the touring company on stage.

The other is a world premiere: Akram Khan's reimagining of The Moor's Pavane (1949). The original was inspired by Shakespeare's Othello, and Khan's version is a Northrop Centennial Commission—the choreographer's first new work for an American dance company. It's also the company's second Centennial Commission to date.

To get a sense of where this all comes from, the company itself is an 80-year-old legacy and repertory troupe founded in 1946 by José Limón and Doris Humphrey; it's now led by Artistic Director Dante Puleio. Limón was born in Culiacán, Mexico, in 1908 and moved to New York at 20, where he studied with modern dance pioneers Doris Humphrey and Charles Weidman. His work is known for its dramatic expression and technical mastery, and that's the lineage the company still carries.

So the night pairs a 1950s piece born from the aftermath of war with a brand-new take on a 1940s classic. Limón Dance Company at Northrop, Saturday, January 30, 2027, 7:30 PM, on the Carlson Family Stage.