QDance Company, Re:Incarnation Review ★★★★★

The culture of Nigeria – its music, traditions and beliefs – is vibrant and complex, and whereas Re:INCARNATION communicates much of its colour and vibrancy, some of the concepts it alludes to don’t travel so well.

Re;INCARNATION is the work of Qudus Onikeku for his QDance Company, the product of six years of continuous movement research and workshopping with young dancers in Nigeria.The result is a show built around three fundamental concepts of ancestral Yoruba tradition: Birth (Ibi), Death (Aku) and Re-birh (Atunbi).

A spectral line of colourful clothing hangs against the backcloth, and on either side of it sit two musicians: drummer Daniel Ifeanyi Anumudu and Simeon Promise Lawrence who plays guitar and synthesiser.

In a Prologue which, a slide projection tells us, celebrates difference, nine dancers – three women and six men – burst onto the stage, an explosion of colour with heads and torsos bound by bright yellow sashes and pants of different strong hues.

At first they huddle in a square of red light, but then spread out to cover the stage.Their exuberant movement combines tribal dance, a touch of breaking, robotics and funk and has an element of mutual challenge, each solo dancer egged on by the others to more and better. A brief scene of simulated sex leads to the birth of child.

The dancers walk upstage, change into outlandish clothes and we’re into Part I, Birth.

The tone here is the vibrant cacophony of the streets of Nigeria’s largest city, Lagos, where young people socialise, banter and generally have fun amid the sensorial overload of colour, chatter, music and all manner of street noise, including traffic.

So far, so enjoyable.

But then a man falls into a prolonged fit, writhing on the ground surrounded by the clothes the others discard as they walk off stage.

QDance, Re:INCARNATION. Photo: Tristram Kenton

We’re now into Death territory, and this is more problematic. An extended section set, perhaps, in the underworld, it is highly symbolic, invoking principles and beliefs that remain obscure to the outsider.

A pair of men covered in white dust could be spirits or demons; children’s voices are heard; a solemn group clutching large wooden sticks circle around the man rhythmically thumping the ground. One woman walks a slow diagonal across the stage mimicking a chicken, wings flapping, yellow feet scratching the ground.

This section is far too long and too obscure to hold the attention.

By Rebirth, though, the connection is re-established. A woman stands downstage reciting precepts for good living – ‘if you forgive, you’ll be forgiven’, ‘cuss and you will be cussed’ – while the others cover her and themselves is shiny black goo.

They resume their collective dancing, now apparently purified by fire and looking a little like ebony tribal carvings. It’s a joyous end to a fascinating piece which, running at 90 minutes without an interval would nevertheless benefit from judicious editing, particularly in the middle section.