Each year when Winter transitions to Spring, we look forward to the exhale that comes as flowers bloom and the river thaws. This year, more than ever, as we attempt to shake the doldrums of a COVID-19 winter, the sunny weather and warming temperatures are breathing both life and hope back into our city. On the sunny afternoon of March 28, Chicago Tap Theatre sprung to life in their latest project, “A Spring in Our Step,” and effectively embodied the emotional boost that comes alongside the seasonal transition. 

There is an expectation, I suppose, of how Black masculinities show up on the Black male dancing body — a frugal approach to the Black experience and a lazy method for extracting the nuances of the sundry facets of Blackness. These expectations of Black men, particularly tall Black men — that we should shroud our opinions in niceties, appear docile and gentlemanly, be the strong physical presence on stage for others to mount, the one charged with doing the lifting — limit Black possibilities, shackling the bounty of our multiplicities and often soothing white anticipation.

Penny Saunders, a former Hubbard Street dancer and choreographer in residence at Grand Rapids Ballet, makes a welcome return as choreographer and sound designer of “In Any Event,” a delightful and penetrating collage of dancers’ stories, orchestrated as monologues in overlapping, choreographed scenes. The new dance film is part of Hubbard Street’s virtual 43rd season.

The University of Chicago’s Reva and David Logan Center for the Arts announced Friday the appointment of Princess Mhoon as strategic program manager, a position developed to lead the Chicago Black Dance Legacy Project.

Composer Amanda Harberg wrote “Hall of Ghosts” in 2020, a piece for solo piccolo created as an elegy to the collective loss of the pandemic, particularly in the performing arts. Premiering Thursday on CSOtv, “Hall of Ghosts” stars Chicago Symphony Orchestra piccoloist Jennifer Gunn and dancer Alyssa Allen of Hubbard Street Dance Chicago. 

The streamable dance film, part of CSO Sessions Episode 16, is available through April 23 with additional selections by Gabrieli and Bach.

Tommy Sutton — a performer and choreographer who worked alongside the likes of Bill “Bojangles” Robinson and Gypsy Rose Lee — founded the Mayfair Performing Company in 1957.  Established during Sutton’s post-performance career, the studio (formerly the Mayfair Academy of Fine Arts) is one of Chicago’s most prominent and prolific dance schools.

One year ago, no one at the Joffrey Ballet saw a silver lining in the cloud that COVID-19 cast over its 10th anniversary season of “Winning Works” choreographic competition which was set to open at Chicago’s Museum of Contemporary Art mid-March of 2020: not the four young choreographers of color who had been chosen from among dozens of applicants to receive a prestigious showcase for their work; not the Joffrey’s Trainee and Studio Company dancers, who had been rehearsing exciting new works for the highly-publicized public performances; not the Joffrey administration.

“Refresh: A Digital Series” is a collection of curated works from Chicago Repertory Ballet that spans from the beginning of the company’s history up to present day, with a new dance film by artistic director Wade Schaaf.