“I Am” is structured like a music revue. I might have been seated at a crowded cocktail table at the Blue Note, the rhythms and syncopation of the dancers as finely tuned as the instruments of musicians stationed at the base of the stage: music director Deah Love Harriott on piano, Juliette Jones on violin, and Martine Mauro-Wade and Jaylen Petinaud on drums. The dancers move in a lightning round of wide-flung arms, fleet feet, shimmying shoulders, and hip thrusting, with the kind of muscular buoyancy that allows the feet to keep one tempo while the torso goes wild. In the program, writer Theresa Ruth Howard describes this stylistic mix as “… the diasporic languages of West African dance, Modern, Jazz, Tap, Social, Street, and Hip-Hop styles.” 

The curtain rises on the fierce duo of Destini Hendricks and Onyxx Noel in tennis shoes and halter tops. We eventually meet the entire cast, introduced in ones and twos, all in white workout wear, to rousing drums, the audience enthusiastically cheering each entrance. Brianna Dawkins and Courtney Ross raise their fists in a display of girl power. Travon Williams slinks onstage for a vogueing spotlight. 

Section two, “Existing,” quiets down for a solo of self-discovery by Dorse Brown, bank of fog swirling behind him. He makes an impressive display of spinning on his knees. “Elevation” introduces a flirtatious Alain 'Hurrikane' Lauture, who kisses his hands and slides from a jazzy walk into a series of somersaults. He’s a one-man rock concert when he lays into a one-armed back walkover that looks like he has no bones under his skin. The trio of Miki Michelle, Mikhail Calliste, and SeQuoiia, contrasts the petite Michelle with two men the size of linebackers behind her. She moves like a flow of calligraphy, spinning and hopping with loquacious arms.