What’s the secret in keeping a company together for 40 years, and why did you decide to step down as artistic director of UBW in 2019, appointing two co-artistic directors, Chanon Judson, who’s been with the company since 2001, and Mame Diarra Speis?

For me—hard times, good times, flush times, times where you don’t know where the next payroll or paycheck is going to come from—you do your work. You show up and do the work. What I love [is that] the organization has been able to spawn so many artists and so much work. For me, I want to make work in a freer space, and just think about me.

What’s so amazing about the Ailey legacy [is that] Judith just carried that organization forward and there comes a point when she left and Robert [Battle] came in. She said, “Okay, I’m going to focus on other things. When you’re focusing on the organization, that’s a different kind of responsibility. Now I want to focus on different things I want to do that might not hold with the organization in the way of the past. 

Which brings me to the inevitable question: Are you writing a book?

I am working on a book. I talked to one publisher [who said], “You’ve got four different voices.” One is my professorial voice, the other is memoir, another that is kind of like the methodologies, and the fourth voice is completely irreverent. We have comedy folk in our family, [and] I have a very humorous side, which is in “Scat!...,” as well. Now I have the ability to be able to focus on the writing, and the individual work that I want to do.

I’m doing a solo performance with a singer for the Whitney [Museum of American Art] January 17-19, that’s part of the Ailey exhibit. I get a chance to work closer to how I started. I did these solos, but not all of them could tour. Some presenters said, “No, that’s a little too edgy.” Now I’m not worked up about it if it tours. If it doesn’t, fine; at least I had a chance to get something out.

Last year you directed and choreographed Jake Heggie’s opera, “Intelligence,” for Houston Grand Opera. What was that like?

I loved it. What I discovered about opera that suited me, was that it works with big emotions. I think that coming up in the post-modern period, where big emotion was not the thing, I always felt like a weird outsider and would sometimes tamp myself down. With opera, you let it fly and extend, and you live it and indulge in it. That’s what I loved about that. And Jake’s writing is so beautiful.

In December, I’m doing Jake’s monodrama, “Earth 2.0,” with the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra. It’s for one singer, Key’mon Murrah, with an orchestra on stage. I hope it’ll get picked up, because Jake’s music is extraordinary; so is Key’mon. And the librettist is Iranian-American writer, Anita Amirrezvani. 

What have some of the troupe’s highlights been for you over the past 40 years?

There are so many, but certainly when Judith [Jamison] called me to do “Shelter.” I was almost speechless. We were a very small company, just kind of starting, and I couldn’t even imagine Ailey doing “Shelter.” The first time, I was so intimidated. I’m sitting next to Judith Jamison and could barely contain myself, [because of] all the [Ailey] stars I had seen perform. 

I didn’t even know how to articulate my process at the time. I would see that the steps looked different, but didn’t know how to get to the root. Working with them again in 1994, I was able to articulate, and Judith told me, “I want you to set it on the men. That cast was Matthew Rushing, Guillermo [A. Asca], Desmond Richardson, Dwight [Rhoden]. That’s when I think I understood how to marry their physicality with my work. 

I don’t think I understood it the first time [setting it] on the women, but the men brought an athleticism that was more familiar to me. It helped me understand how to articulate my work and allow it to take on some kind of physical virtuosity that came out of emotionality. The men married it; the women were so willing. 

What a great memory, Jawole! Finally, I’m wondering what advice you have for young dancers and choreographers? 

You have to understand what it is you want and let that be the drive. I know we all need and want to make money, and I get that, but if it’s your driver, I don’t know that you’re going to be satisfied. There has to be another driver. You find that and you keep going—[whether it’s] small performances, big performances, you need to do it, you keep doing it; and you don’t worry. 

Maybe it’s on a professional level, maybe it’s not. But if you have drive, you do it. And one other thing—take in the world of art and the world that’s going on around you—visual art, theater, music, studying history and culture and anthropology. That’s what was so powerful about Mr. Ailey, and seeing the exhibition, [“Edges of Ailey” at the Whitney], because the arts bring in global and community connections.