Beth Soll — Dancer Choreographer Teacher

I am a dancer and a choreographer. When I’m dancing, I feel the power of gravity and the mysterious surge of space. As I move through time and space, I am conscious of the innumerable thoughts that are flowing through my mind. Dancing is mentally demanding and physically exhausting, but because dance is a social art, there is a lot of laughter during rehearsals and classes. The process of finding and making dances can be life-saving because it asks us to seek an understanding of the infinite mystery of the universe, which offers us both earthly and transcendent gifts. Beth Soll

Beth Soll received her early training from the Romanian modern dance artist Iris Barbura. Later she continued her studies in the European style of dance at the Kurt Jooss School in Germany, the Kreutzbergsschule in Switzerland, and the University of Wisconsin. With her company, which was formed in 1977, Beth Soll has performed in the United States, Europe, and Asia. She has choreographed more than 125 dances and has worked or collaborated with many choreographers, composers, and visual artists. Her work has been supported by Choreography Fellowships and many Dance Company Grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, grants from several Massachusetts state and civic agencies, and funding from numerous corporations. She has taught dance at 10 universities, including Boston University, the Harvard Summer Dance Center, MIT, where she directed the Dance Program for 20 years, and UC Santa Barbara. In 1999, Soll earned a Ph.D. in the History and Theory of Modern Dance from the University Professors Program at Boston University. Her book, Will Modern Dance Survive? Lessons to be Learned from the Pioneers and Unsung Visionaries of Modern Dance was published in 2002.

[Soll’s] dances hinted that it is because we are estranged and imperfect beings that we are
able to imagine and yearn for paradise.
--Jack Anderson, The New York Times.

For Soll, consciousness and movement are one, a totality that hints at Oriental philosophy.
--Lisa F. Hillyer, The Boston Phoenix

When [Soll] moves in her languid, weighted way, one thinks of modern dance’s matriarchal
figures: Martha Graham and Doris Humphrey.
--Pamela Sommers, The Washington Post