For Betty (1970)

FOR BETTY (1970)
Choreography: Bill Evans
Dancers: Justin Bass, Lauren Curly, Efren Corado Garcia, Tyler Orcutt, Ursela Perry, Lacie Scott
Music: Antonio Vivaldi
Dedicated to Dr. Elizabeth R. Hayes
In the late 60s, when I was serving as chairman and one of three artistic coordinators of the still new Repertory Dance Theatre, I invited my mentor and friend Betty Hayes, director of modern dance at the University of Utah, to serve on our advisory board, a group of esteemed Utah dance pioneers with whom we met monthly. In one of those meetings, she suggested that we need a "joyful and exuberant" piece in our rep, which was at time on the heavy side--featuring works by Anna Sokolow, Glen Tetley and John Butler.
In response, I found Vivaldi concerto that made me feel like dancing and made a dance in which we literally JUMPED FOR JOY. Each dancer in the piece executes something like 500 hops, leaps or jumps in this piece. The original cast was Kathleen McClintock, Gregg Lizenbery, Lynne Wimmer, Tim Wengerd, Manzell Senters, Eric Newton and altenate Karen Steele.They were an amazing group of powerful young dancers.
We premiered the work in an informal showing at the U of Utah Student Union, and Betty was in attendance. I was shocked afterward when she said nothing. A day or so later, my friend Ann Merlo ran into Betty at the laundromat and asked her what she thought of her piece. She started to cry joyfully and said, "I thought it was for Betty Jones."
When Dr. Hayes received the National Dance Association Heritage Award in Seattle in 1977, the Bill Evans Dance Company performed For Betty at her ceremony. She wrote me a lovely note afterward, which said in part, "I was touched to the bottom of my heart and also so proud of all of you! It is a treasured part of my memory book. thank you again for 'my'dance, too, and love to you all!" Betty.
When Betty retired from full-time teaching, the Department of Modern Dance staged a concert in her honor and invited me to restage For Betty.
It has been performed many, many times for several companies, including Concert Dance Company of Boston; Chicago Moving Company; Fairmount Dance Theatre, Cleveland; Maryland Dance Theatre, College Park; Virgina Tanner’s Children’s Dance Theatre; Lawton
(Oklahoma) Civic Ballet Company; BEDCO; University of Utah Modern Dance Department (1985 and 2006); Western Washington University, Bellingham; Chamber Dance Company, University of Washington, Seattle (two different productions); UNM Dance Company; Dancers’ Company, Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah; Senior Professional Program/School of
Contemporary Dancers, Winnipeg; SUNY College at Brockport Department of
Dance; Mt. Holyoke College, South Hadley, Massachusetts; Muhlenberg College, Allentown, Pennsylvania, and other groups.

This video is of the last restaging of For Betty I have done for RDT. They have kept the work in repertory over more than 50 years. 2017
Bill Evans, April 2, 2021