♪♪ ♪♪ Man: Five, six, seven, here you go.

And jump on up and jump on up and jump on up and buh-buh-nuh and buh-buh-nuh and buh-buh-nuh and buh-buh-nuh, buh-nuh-nuh, bum-bum.

Battle: Alvin Ailey always said what he was really trying to do was hold up a mirror to society so that people could see ultimately how beautiful they are.

We do provide a service either for people to be relieved from some of the chaos or to witness it in another way, that dance could be a form of healing in a time of national tumult, in a global pandemic.

Modern dance is not just about being seen but heard, that yes, we entertain, but we also educate and, in doing so, uplift.

It is living history.

I think it's important, especially for the next generation of audiences, to understand that this is about them, too.

This company was founded on the brink of the civil rights movement.

Seeing "Revelations" and learning about Alvin Ailey was so important because he was another one of those giants.

I'm Alvin Ailey.

I'm a choreographer.

I'm a black man whose roots are in the sun and the dirt of the South.

My roots are in the blues, in the street people whose lives are full of beauty and misery and pain and hope.

♪♪ ♪ Ooh...baby ♪ Battle: It's important to understand the role that the arts played in our resistance in the movement.

There's something in it that is really about passing it and paying it forward.

That was really the sort of genesis of it, of this New Directions Choreography Lab.

It was about spiritual reciprocity, giving back and paying it forward.

When I started the program, the first thing I thought is, "Well, I want to give other people this opportunity.

And what can I do to be a part of some choreographer's growth?"

We live in a society that is so product-driven that process be damned, right?

And understanding that playing around in a studio for a dancer, you know, sort of seeing what happens, can become a revelation.

And what I wanted this space to be was about taking chances, and nobody's judging.

For me, what I wanted to give people was a safe space to fail.

I'm not asking you for a commission that has to be perfect and get great notices and do all of these things.

I'm saying, "No pressure."

You come in, select dancers from the Ailey School.

You get a stipend and also have an adviser.

You know, those are the things that work for me -- having mentors, having advisers, not necessarily to tell me what to do, but sometimes just tell me what they see.

It may open some portal for you that you take that little seed, and it becomes something else along the way.

Person: I think from the very beginning Mr. Ailey was interested in educating young people, and he always wanted a school.

From the beginning, his philosophy was that dancers should train in multiple techniques.

He had a very broad view of what dance should be and what the body could do.

♪♪ Each year students have an opportunity to work with emerging choreographers in the field who bring in different perspectives, styles, different ways of seeing dance.

Four choreographers are selected, two for the fall semester and two for the spring.

♪♪ It's an experimental laboratory.

During the course of this decade, I've seen choreographers who have dancers walking, simply walking around the studio.

I've had others who have them speaking and singing and acting, others who have dancers just breathing.

Being open and receptive.

Being open and receptive.

Being open and receptive.

Being open...

The students are having to adapt between the two choreographers.

And that was part of the point, too.

Just when they sort of think they're familiar with one, they have to shift, shift their mind-set, shift their thinking, their perspectives or whatever is required to work with the other choreographer.

It's a mixed group.

Some may be close to the end of their time at Ailey, in their third or fourth year.

Others may be in their first or second year at Ailey.

Students have a specific type of training at the Ailey School, and sometimes their view of what dance can be or outside of these walls is not as broad as it could be.

So, when we bring in these artists who bring in different perspectives, points of view, styles, forms, it educates the dancers and it keeps them with a very open mind about what the field is now.

Woman: And rolling like a rolling pin.

Allowing what happens to happen rather than making it.

♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪