ONE of our most treasured annual rituals is attending the National Dance Theatre Company (NDTC) pre-dawn Easter Sunday concert. For the last decade, it has been our stand-in for church services celebrating the Resurrection. It’s always a rousing and festive occasion, between the spiritually inspired dance performances and the charismatic choir leaning in to their full gospel sound. Audiences leave bopping, smiling and elated. NDTC gets you in a celebratory mood.

In this past 2015 Easter performance, the troupe had just returned from a very gruelling schedule in New York and a number of the men were visibly exhausted. You could see it with some of the shaky holds and uncharacteristic missteps.

One of the more memorable pieces in the company repertoire is a male-female duet in white called Vision choreographed by Clive Thompson. This year it is danced by Mark Phinn and the always-exquisite prima ballerina Kerry-Ann Henry. The dance is a glorious and sensuous interplay between a man and a woman learning to understand, appreciate and support each other and building towards unified movement as a couple. The beauty of Vision lies partly in how it progresses seamlessly through ground and aerial movements. Man and woman, Earth and air, dark and light are not opposites but synchronistic complements. There are several moments in the piece when the male dancer is required to bear down and support the female dancer in order for her to soar. It was at one such critical juncture that disaster nearly struck.

Henry had to stand full-weight on Phinn’s thighs, while his legs were bent perpendicular, and extend her body into the air. Phinn was visibly shaking in both his legs and his arms that held her shins. The theatre was filled with the unstable air of impending doom. I was sitting between art enthusiasts Barbara Gottgens and Karen Neita and almost in sync they both pressed hard against me — the fear that Phinn would drop Henry was palpable. The silence of the audience revealed the collective concern. All were trying to send psychic strength to Phinn: Just hold on for a few more beats. It was a high-drama moment. And then the prima ballerina Kerry-Ann Henry did something that I will never forget. She threw caution to the wind and leaned full-on into the position, almost as a dare. There was not an ounce of hesitation and, even as Phinn shook beneath her, she held her body and arms boldly outright and outstretched. She was determined and resolute. It was not cerebral, it was not sensible, it was otherworldly. It was as if, by conspiring with the gods, she commanded them to give Phinn the strength he did not have to hold her and thereby, in essence, she held herself. I feel goose pimples even now as I reflect on that extraordinary moment.

What makes a star in any art form is a complex mix of mastering the craft through years of dedication, passion and commitment at every turn and a full embrace of the art. Darren Aronofsky’s 2010 film Black Swan starring Natalie Portman tells the story of a ballerina so committed to her craft that she dances herself to death driven by her obsession to perfect the part of Tchaikovsky’s Black Swan from Swan Lake.

What Kerry-Ann Henry delivers is world- class. It’s the world-class that can stand on the hallowed dance stages in New York or London. She is THAT good! We have not seen this calibre performance in NDTC since Patsy Ricketts, Judy Pennant or Melanie Graham.

It’s in both her grand jetés and her smallest, almost imperceptible gestures. It’s in her facial expressions. It’s in the lyrical way she listens and moves to the music, as if she is hearing it for the first time. When she is the lead she takes command of the stage. When she is supporting she still takes command of the stage, not because she is trying but because she simply beams dance.

Interestingly, her astonishing charisma on stage belies an almost reserved persona offstage — She is more of a listener than talker, though she has strong well-thought-out opinions. She is not tall, yet she is statuesque. Present but never intrusive, she is comfortable and secure. She exudes such fragility that one almost feels protective of her. Not that she needs protecting; she is highly accomplished intellectually. In addition to being the ballet mistress of the National Dance Theatre Company, Kerry-Ann Henry is currently the director of the School of Dance at Edna Manley College. She has an undergraduate degree in Actuarial Science from the University of the West Indies. In some circles she is known as a master statistician. The dancing diva’s got brains and brawn! She did her post-grad studies in Theatre, Dance and Development at the University of East Anglia, UK. She has worked locally and abroad, including in The Lion King on the West End, London. She is also a very popular judge on the local television dance programme Dancin’ Dynamites.

After experiencing her exhilarating Easter performance, I had an idea that we should take her into the streets of Kingston and place her into iconic settings. Communing icon to icon! An all-day photo shoot, which even under the best conditions can be quite dreary, with Henry’s infectious energy and enthusiasm turned into a really wonderful affair. She was always game, up for anything, and moved in and out of characters large and small. If we said climb that statue, she merely asked how high. She walked in and out of noonday traffic. She changed costumes un-self-consciously in the most obscure places. Dancer photo shoot as city adventure! From standing in the middle of Knutsford Boulevard to embracing the Bob Marley statue to seducing Edna Manley’s Negro Aroused as a mermaid. She tun it all up! Up!

There were several memorable photographs, but my favourite was the masked angel, in which she stands on top of a set of stairs that are the only remains of a building destroyed by fire. Above her swirl plush clouds and she looks almost as if she will fly off the stairs and lead us into the heavens out of the squalor of the destruction below. The best artists do that in tough times.

In the current NDTC troupe, she has no male equal. The stars in the universe have not yet aligned to reproduce another Clive Thompson or Barry Moncrieffe. The men in general seem less committed: a little more dance and a little less dumpling may be required. No matter, you should not let this season pass without an opportunity to bear witness to one of Jamaica’s greatest artists. If you have not been to NDTC in some time, or have never been at all, this season’s programme is a very good one to get (re)acquainted with the company. Larger than life with a supreme commitment to the art form, Kerry-Ann Henry is this summer’s not-to-be missed experience. She is the star in our midst.