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Woman warrior: Shani Collins embodies the spirit of Ronald K. Brown's evidence--and then some.

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Evidence, the acclaimed, Brooklyn-based ensemble of Ronald K. Brown, swirls, pumps, and springs across the stage. One dancer swerves away from the audience, her powerful swimmer's torso rising from the low dip in back of her costume. Slipping through singer Nina Simone's mix of swing and polish, she faces us again with the sly smile of a cabaret chanteuse. Her jaunty smoothness is pure Simone on an upbeat day. In this dancer, you detect a similar indivisibility of musical chops and knowing attitude.

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The dance is Brown's Come Ye. That woman is the incomparable Shani Nwando Ikerioha Collins. It's a sure bet that when she takes the stage, she will deliver not only the movement but the core, the bedrock, the very meaning and spirit of a dance. In the midst of Brown's sensational performers--everyone steeped in a vocabulary that marries elements of ballet and modern dance, West African and club dancing--Collins always digs deep into the music and strikes sparks, catching and instructing the eye.

"Shani is what we like to call an old soul," says Thomas DeFrantz, who taught Collins in the Hollins University/American Dance Festival graduate program. Before he met this accomplished MFA candidate, he'd long marveled at her performances with Evidence. "She's provocative, compelling, a wondrous interpreter of Ron's work," says DeFrantz, a noted dance author whose area is theory, history, and criticism. "When Shani's in the room, all these spirits come as well. It's a wonderful thing,...

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