Foot in the door

2007 Chicago Dancing Festival

Where: Millennium Park Pritzker Pavilion, near Columbus Drive and Randolph Street, Chicago

When: 7:30 p.m. Wednesday

Tickets: Free admission

Info: (312) 742-1168 or www.millenniumpark.org

When trumpeting Chicago's world-class arts scene, the city's theaters, museums and classical music institutions have inevitably been cited time and time again. But frequently dance wasn't included on that vaunted arts list.

Choreographer Lar Lubovitch wants to change that. To build up dance even more in Chicago, Lubovitch and dancer/choreographer Jay Franke have created the Chicago Dancing Company, an institution that aims to produce a Chicago Dancing Festival each summer.

Though a native Chicagoan, Lubovitch found it necessary for himself to go to New York to have the kind of career he wanted in dance.

"I've always wanted to come back and be a part of the growing dance community here," said Lubovitch, who is artistic director of the 39-year-old New York-based Lar Lubovitch Dance Company. "Chicago is becoming more and more a vital dance center."

In its maiden festival foray, the Chicago Dancing Company has teamed up with the Museum of Contemporary Art to attract seven distinguished U.S. dance companies (including the Windy City's own Joffrey Ballet and Muntu Dance Theatre of Chicago) to perform in a free concert at Millennium Park's Pritzker Pavilion.

"I think it's very exciting for us because there has been such tremendous growth in the Chicago dance community over the past two decades," said Joffrey Ballet executive director Jon Teeuwissen. "We have a really full spectrum of dance here, not only in contemporary and classical, but also in African dance to traditional Irish dance -- it's really a healthy and full dance community here."

Joan Gray, executive director of Muntu Dance Theatre of Chicago, said her company is honored to be part of the new Chicago Dancing Festival and feels that it will open a few eyes to dance.

"I think that any festival that brings in a diverse array of performing artists is going to be a benefit to the community," Gray said. "Especially providing an opportunity to see companies audiences might not normally be able to see."

Oddly enough, Lar Lubovitch Dance Company isn't on that list, though Lubovitch's choreographic skills will still be represented in the Chicago Dancing Festival. Ballet Florida performs Lubovitch's 2005 dance "Elemental Brubeck," a piece originally created for the San Francisco Ballet that celebrates the great jazz composer/musician Dave Brubeck while drawing inspiration from 1950s MGM film musical stars like Gene Kelly and Cyd Charisse .

In the past decade, Lubovitch's awareness of Chicago's burgeoning dance scene has grown from teaching master classes at Columbia College Chicago and from setting high-profile pieces for prominent local dance companies.

Lubovitch appears as himself in Robert Altman's 2003 Joffrey Ballet-focused film "The Company." (Lubovitch is seen teaching his 2001 ballet "My Funny Valentine" to the ballerina played by Neve Campbell of "Scream" fame). Lubovitch has also created world premiere pieces "Love Stories" (2005) and "Crytoglyph" (2007) for Hubbard Street Dance Chicago.

Though the 2007 Chicago Dancing Festival lasts only one performance, Lubovitch hopes to expand the festival to three performances next year and to attract international dance companies to Chicago as part of the mix.

"It's time for dance to take its place amongst the other major arts of the city of Chicago," Lubovitch said. "We hope that someday (the Chicago Dancing Festival) will become one of the top summer dance festivals in the world."