Author: twoluck web support

AKRAM KHAN COMPANY Bahok

(North American Premiere) February/March 2010

TOUR DATES 2011 9-Feb Irvine Barclay Theatre 12-Feb Arts Power! UC San Diego 16-Feb Arts & Lectures, UC Santa Barbara Feb 18, 19 & 20 Yerba Buena Center, San Francisco 24-Feb Music Hall Center for the Performing Arts, Detroit Feb 26, 27 & 28 Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago 3-Mar University of Minnesota, Minneapolis THE OzAsia Festival's stated aim of celebrating beauty and cultural diversity could hardly be better fulfilled than in Bahok, a stunning work from the acclaimed Akram Khan Company, receiving its first Australian performances. Adelaide Now Oct 2009

“It's the first time that Khan has choreographed a show in which he does not himself appear, and it seems likely to set a precedent. Neither he nor, indeed, his audience need worry, however, when his chosen dancers convey so much of his distinctive mercurial movement, whimsy and wisdom.” The Independent “Khan's choreography is adept at blending classical ballet and contemporary dance techniques, but it is the visceral speed and agility of kathak (his dance roots) that power the most amazing sections. In one, near the end, the dancers, arms frantically rotating like propellers, practically achieve lift-off. In a similar vein, Nitin Sawhney's brilliant score taps into spiritual and corporeal energies with an equal sense of excitement and elegance.” The Times (London

bahok was originally a collaboration with the National Ballet of China, the first of its kind between a UK contemporary dance company and a state-funded national company in China. Featuring an original score by Akram Khan’s long time collaborator Nitin Sawhney, bahok brings together a new company of eight dancers from Spain, Slovakia, India, South Korea, Taiwan (Republic of China) and South Africa. In one of this globalised world’s transit zones, they come together. They try to communicate, to exchange their stories, their memories of home. “The dancers are the writers of the show. They are the ones who bring the source material. We search for the little stories that they bring with them and exploring these short stories of each individual, we find a bigger story. That’s what fascinates me, to explore these personal stories of these individuals on stage, in order to discover and reveal a more universal one.” (Akram Khan) bahok premiered in Beijing in January 2008, and gained rave reviews and international acclaim on its subsequent world tour. Following this success, bahok is embarking on its second tour in 2009/2010. This adventure began in 2006 with the National Ballet of China. At that stage all that existed was the commitment to try something new, an enthusiasm for an idea and the ambition to convert this idea into something that could be beautiful and meaningful.Needless to say there were challenges in bringing together the resources of a large flagship national ballet company with that of a small independent contemporary troupe halfway across the world. There were obvious ones such as language, culture, movement styles, availability but also less obvious ones such as the hope for reinvention, developing new expectations and reflecting inner and outer aspirations. We had to learn a lot of new rules, demand more of ourselves and develop more sophisticated means of cooperation. Our team and that of the National Ballet of China were up to this task, and I’m extremely proud of what we collectively achieved. Collaboration for us is not just a means of artistic possibility but a great opportunity to learn from other cultures and disciplines. It is through this learning that I find the greatest satisfaction. Ironically, you end up both knowing more and less about yourself at the same time, but whatever happens it stops you from remaining static, from relying on familiar information and gives you a constant sense of motion. What could be better than that? Farooq Chaudhry | Producer Artistic director/Choreographer Akram Khan Composer Nitin Sawhney Dramaturge Guy Cools Co-producers: Sadlers Wells Theatre, London, British Council, The Liverpool Culture Company with Merseyside, Dance Initiative, DanceXchange, Birmingham, Theatre de La Ville, Paris, Tanzhaus NRW Dusseldorf, National Arts Center, Ottawa, China Now, London

Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre “Twelfth Night”

North American Fall Tour 2003

“Bliss, sheer bliss” “I can think of no better way of starting the British summer”

The Daily Telegraph UCLA Live, Los Angeles October 22 8pm October 23 8pm October 24 8pm October 25 2pm, 8pm October 26 1pm, 7pm October 28 8pm October 29 9pm October 30 8pm October 31 8pm November 1 2pm, 8pm November 2 1pm, 7pm Minneapolis Guthrie World Stage Series November 6 10.30am, 7.30pm November 7 7.30pm November 8 1pm, 7.30pm November 9 1pm Theater Square, Pittsburgh November 12 7.30pm November 13 11am, 7.30pm November 14 7.30pm November 15 1pm, 7.30pm November 16 1pm University Musical Society, Michigan November 18 8pm November 19 8pm November20 8pm November 21 8pm November 22 2pm, 8pm November 23 1pm, 8pm Chicago Shakespeare Theater November 26 2pm, 7.30pm November 28 2pm, 8pm November 29 2pm, 8pm November 30 2pm December 2 7.30pm December 3 2pm, 7.30pm December 4 7.30pm December 5 8pm December 6 2pm, 8pm December 7 2pm December 9 7.30pm December 10 2pm, 7.30pm December 11 7.30pm December 12 8pm December 13 2pm, 8pm December 14 2pm

SHAKESPEARE’S GLOBE ON TOUR

In fall 2011 Shakespeare’s Globe brings its unique On Tour program to the US, reviving a hit from summers 2009 and 2010: The Comedy of Errors. The travelling players breathe new life into one of Shakespeare’s best loved comedies with a stripped down style, delivering theatre at its bawdy, brilliant best. Shakespeare’s Globe on Tour reinvents Elizabethan touring theatre for the 21st century. Using a stage design inspired by images from the time, the Globe’s travelling players recreate all the fun and excitement of early theatre. Just as with the old King’s Men, they don’t perform in theatres but in a plethora of picturesque and historically resonant settings.

“The Globe was born out of a touring company culture, and that culture remained vital to it while it flourished. We are delighted to be exploring again the tradition of taking Shakespeare into non-theatrical spaces.”

Dominic Dromgoole, Artistic Director of Shakespeare’s Globe

FROM THE AUDIENCES:

‘The performance is one I will never forget’

….Rebecca Day, Leeds Castle, Kent.

‘It was truly fabulous. So stimulating, it almost changes you as a person’

Sylvia Hope, Richmond, Yorks. FROM THE PRESS:

“…bursting with physical energy and touching realism, passion, intelligence and promise.”

The Scotsman

“… with tight, fluent team-work and much nifty doubling, the play is brought to muscular life by just eight actors.”

The Independent

FROM THE VENUES:

“An unmitigated success!”

Victoria Wallace, Managing Director of Leeds Castle

“We really enjoyed having [the show] at Lydiard Park. Fantastic performance and lots of excellent feedback from the audience.”

Emma Valentine, Lydiard Park, Swindon

ABOUT THE PLAY

Take one pair of estranged twins (both called Antipholus) and one pair of twin servants (both called Dromio), keep them in ignorance of each other and throw them into a city with a reputation for sorcery and you have the chief ingredients for theatrical chaos. One Antipholus is given gold in the street and invited to dinner by a woman who thinks she’s his wife; the other is barred from his own house and rebuffed by his jeweller. Caught in between, the Dromios are soundly beaten for disobeying each other’s orders. Fast-paced, hilarious and seemingly irreverent, the young William Shakespeare explores themes in this comedy that recur again and again in his later work; mistaken identity, coincidence and the importance of family.

Available for US touring November/December 2011

FRANCESCA GAGNON

the Voice of Alegria

Alegria: a state of mood, a state of mind, Spanish for ‘joy’....... Francesca Gagnon - the Voice of Alegria is a comprehensive work for symphony orchestra that draws from several Cirque du Soleil productions including Alegria, Cortéo, Kà, Quidam, Saltimbanco and Delirium that evoke the essence and most memorable moments of Cirque du Soleil. One of the many elements that sets CIRQUE DU SOLEIL apart ... is its MUSIC.
ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER, CA If CIRQUE DU SOLEIL is indeed the eighth wonder of the world, GAGNON is the otherworldly herald who made everyone notice. ENTERTAINMENT TODAY, Los Angeles Francesca Gagnon has a very particular voice, powerful, raucous, bewitching ; a virtuosic performance. A must hear, a medley of Janis Joplin and Edith Piaf. LA PRESSE (Montréal, QC)

SHAKESPEARE’S GLOBE THEATRE From London presents ANNE BOLEYN

A New Play by Howard Brenton

Directed by John Dove

Hunting through an old chest, the newly crowned James I discovers the controversial legacy of Anne Boleyn, Henry VIII’s notorious second wife. Time jumps back 70 years, when the witty and flirtatious Anne was in love with Henry, but also with the most dangerous ideas of her day. Conspiring with the exiled William Tyndale, she plots to make England Protestant – forever. A celebration of a great English heroine, Anne Boleyn leaps between generations to reveal the debt the outrageous but scholarly James owed to Anne when he shrewdly reconciled England’s religious factions by creating his common, ‘authorized’ Bible. Anne Boleyn returns to the Globe after a sell-out run in 2010. Award-winning playwright Howard Brenton’s previous work includes In Extremis at Shakespeare’s Globe. From the director of the 2005 hit ‘original practice’ production of Measure for Measure starring Mark Rylance. **** ‘The Tudor pack at their most snarling, scheming, ribald, pleasure-seeking and gaily entertaining.’ Daily Telegraph ****  Bulges with theatrical vitality.’ The Guardian **** ‘Howard Brenton's lively new drama illuminates the Globe in John Dove’s exuberant production.’ Time Out **** ‘John Dove’s elegant production with period chamber music is rich, invigorating, historical drama.’ Daily Mail **** 'Absorbing.' Independent on Sunday **** 'Engaging.' The Times **** 'Compelling.' Financial Times Available for US touring Fall 2011

This exciting project brings together Franz Osten's finest, most accomplished and stunningly beautiful Indian silent film from 1929, 'A Throw of Dice' with British Asian NitinSawhney, one of Great Britain’s most influential and versatile creative music talents. The film has not been on general release in over 70 years and is an undiscovered treasure from the British Film Institute Archives. Based on the pivotal gambling episode from the Mahabharata, 'A Throw of Dice' is a love story that tells the tale of Ranjit and the nefarious Sohan, two kings with a passion for gambling and for the same woman, Sunita. The HD quality film will be projected behind a symphony orchestra, with the addition of a downstage ‘band’ consisting of piano and celesta (to be played by the composer, Nitin Sawhney), tabla, flutes and vocalists. The orchestra can be a resident orchestra or a touring orchestra depending on the venue. The stage will be blacked out to further enhance the collaboration of film and music (see image below). Complete sound and light plots are provided to ensure the high quality of auditory and visual experience.Technical Rider is available with full instrumentation and projection requirements. It is possible to present this project in an outdoors venue as was produced in London’s Trafalgar Square to huge acclaim in August 2007 with the London Symphony Orchestra.An enraptured audience of 10,000 people attended. London’s Barbican Center – April 2006   “Behind the stage was a screen, showing the 1929 German-Indian movie A Throw of Dice … In front of the screen were the massed ranks of the LSO, with conductor Stephen Hussey wearing headphones to keep the orchestra in sync. In front of them were Sawhney himself, wearing a long black tunic and playing keyboards, and members of his band on anything from tablas to guitar.” “Osten's film was an engaging, and often charming early epic, making use of massed crowd scenes and an array of exotic animals, from tigers to elephants to camels. Nitin's score involved equal confidence and variety, constantly changing mood and pace, switching from delicate Indian scat vocals to sweeping strings, or from guitar to sudden stirring brass. It was, by necessity, a sometimes frantic technical exercise, but there were passages in which he had time to develop his themes, using the Indian-influenced flute playing of Ashwin Srinivasan and the tabla percussion of Aref Durvesh against the enthusiastic work of the LSO, with stirring, Celtic-sounding melodies added into the mix. “This was great film music … it showed how the increasingly assured Sawhney is breaking down the barriers between pop, classical and world music.” The Guardian Trafalgar Square – August 2007   “Sawhney's score for A Throw of the Dice is fusion at its best - meaning that he has blended Asian-style soloists so effortlessly with the sounds of a symphony orchestra that you cease to notice anything unusual is happening. Sawhney has a real talent. It will be fascinating to watch what else he does with it.” Julian Lloyd Webber – Telegraph

KNOTS by COISCÉIM"

"This exhilarating devised production, directed by Liam Steel, is the most accomplished to date...the performers astound in their ability to perform complex choreography while acting with complete emotional commitment." Karen Fricker, The Guardian

COISCÉIM, under their artistic director David Bolger, has been creating and presenting cutting-edge and innovative contemporary dance since 1995 and has established itself as the premier dance company in Ireland. The name, from the Irish word for footstep is pronounced ‘Kush Came”. In 2005, Bolger invited the ex-DV8 performer and co-creator/co-director of STAN WON’T DANCE, Liam Steel, to direct KNOTS based on the writings of R.D. Laing, the radical Scottish pyschoanalyst. What emerged was an award-winning full-evening (70 min) work bursting with high-octane choreography in a show which is often brutal, touching and at times hilarious.Six performers struggle with the inherent tangle that is the complexity of human relationships. In Laing’s book “Knots” the dynamic twists, turns and convolutions in our relationships are played out in dialogue scenarios. The director and cast used these scenarios as their starting point to create a work which fuses text and movement to the same ground-breaking effect as Steel’s SINNER. KNOTS was an immediate and enormous success with both the public and the critics, winning “Best Production Dublin Fringe Festival 2005”.

Boasting vigorous talent and an impressive, European-style repertory, this exhilaratingly fine company, founded only three years ago, has already made a splash in the contemporary ballet scene. Young, hip, and cutting-edge, New York’s Cedar Lake is on the rise! Featuring the works of recognized, emerging choreographers, this ensemble exhibits daring and athletic movement, while integrating ballet with contemporary and popular dance styles. Cedar Lake’s mission to join the ranks of America's leading contemporary ballet companies is fast becoming both a reality and a thrilling dance adventure audiences are passionately embracing. Presenting an innovative and modern repertoire that is committed to the talent of recognized and emerging choreographers, the captivating company enthusiastically presents its daring athleticism and extraordinary visual excitement whenever taking the stage. Cedar Lake’s choreographic journey plays with pure movement – sharply sculpted – with constant contrasts between live action and multi-media visuals. Explosive dancing, provocative imagery, exhilarating contemporary musical collaborations and exceptional dance technique are just a few of the thrilling elements that are swiftly defining the distinct and stimulating personality of this vibrant young company.