Archive: Performances and Events

DanceCo returns to the stage this summer with a series of free, interactive, family-friendly performances. Wolf Tales is a mashup of the familiar fairy tales Peter and the Wolf, Little Red Riding Hood, and the Three Little Pigs. The story is told by the Wolf, who is not big or bad, just misunderstood — and wants to set the record straight!

The show starts with an exciting, kid-focused workshop where audience members can learn and practice interactive parts of the show. Then, the DanceCo Artists take the stage for a 45-minute performance with opportunities for the audience to join the dancers on stage! Get ready to be a part of the magic. 

Saturday, July 6, 10:00am and 11:30am
Father Hennepin Bluffs Park Bandshell
420 Main St. SE, Minneapolis, MN 55414

Saturday, July 13, 10:00am and 11:30am
Lyndale Gardens Amphitheater
6400 Lyndale Ave S, Richfield, MN 55423

All shows are free!

DanceCo is a professional performance company creating original, interactive dance narratives for young people ages 3-103! Directed by Matthew and Brittany Keefe and Karla Nweje. Performed by Emily Compaan, Cassie Edlund, Matthew Keefe, Jennifer Mack, Karla Nweje, Emily Pitts, Leeah Schuhwerck, Zachary Tuazon, and Maria Vitelli. 

To learn about DanceCo and our professional artists, go to www.DanceCoMN.com. 

Come enjoy good drinks, good tunes and good company while supporting Rhythmically Speaking! Join us for our third annual Rhythmically Speaking Happy Hour Dance Party Fundraiser.

Thursday, July 25, 5:00-7:00pm
Summit Brewing. RSVP to the Facebook event.

If you love to go out dancing but find it difficult to rally the required energy at 10:00pm, come! If you love Summit and wanna enjoy their beverages, come! If you think Rhythmically Speaking does some really cool work and you wanna support, come! Enjoy a brew, support our work and dance your booty off: we’ll be providing music curated by all of our dancers as a part of our Dressing Room Playlist!

Here’s how you can support:

• Request your favorite dance tunes for $5.00;
• Donate $20.00 to shut down what’s playing and play your request immediately;
• Buy a $10.00 raffle ticket for a chance to win sweet prizes, including Rhythmically Speaking swag and tickets to our upcoming show The Cohort 2024, Summit Brewing Company swag, Saint Paul Saints tickets, and more!

At Rhythmically Speaking, we believe in the power of moving and grooving together to connect us – tell your friends to come too – and we look forward to sharing the joy and building support of our work with you at this event!

Celebrate Off-Leash Area’s 25th anniversary with its eighth annual Neighborhood Garage Tour!

This year’s tour brings back their energetic and imaginative family friendly production, The Medicine Show of the 25th Century, to St. Anthony, Bloomington and Stillwater. Tickets are by suggested donation of $5-30. Tickets go on sale July 7.

The Medicine Show of the 25th Century is set in the distant future and follows a troupe of technology-hybrid humanoids as they travel from town to town, hawking a cure-all elixir for solutions to the world’s toughest problems. Filled with raucous slapstick, whimsical beauty, and plenty of winks and nudges,The Medicine Show of the 25th Century is Off-Leash Area’s 35th original production.

The tour runs from September 6 through September 22, with eight performances over three weekends. The following dates include:
Friday, September 6 – ASL interpretation
Saturday, September 7 – Audio Description
Sunday, September 15 – Audio Description
Sunday, September 22 – ASL interpretation

Reasons for Moving is an interdisciplinary and multilingual performance exploring the intergenerational scars of geopolitical displacement. Its script collects the writings of the collaborators and their families’ biographies, alongside found text on the circulation cycles of migratory animals and the natural world.

The title comes from the final two lines of “Keeping Things Whole,” by the late Canadian poet Mark Strand: “we all have reasons for moving/I move to keep things whole.” Combining fictional and non-fictional stories, the ensemble investigates painful pasts as much as the present as a path forward. 

Reasons for Moving is especially relevant for local audiences, given Minnesota’s long history with displaced and displacing populations — hosting and uprooting is part of its fabric.

Performer/collaborators are: Kalala Kiwanuka-Woernle, whose mother first left Uganda for the UK, and then arrived in the US on a student visa; Mai Moua Thao, whose parents are refugees from Laos by way of Thailand; and Skye Reddy, whose family lost their ancestral homelands in the colonial Partition of South Asia. Directed by Cláudia Tatinge Nascimento with media and sound design by Eliot Gray Fisher, lighting design and technical direction by Thomas Barrett, and costume design by Lynn Farrington.

Don’t miss the final performances. Closing June 30!

The Summer Sound Garden returns to Silverwood Park for the first time since its premiere on the island in Silver Lake in 2018. Dancers Sarah Baumert, Suzette Gilreath, Erika Hansen, Megan Mayer, and Leslie O’Neill perform their roving site-specific scores along the shorelines, boardwalks, and amidst the majestic trees of this enchanted place. Designed and directed by composer JG Everest, the event will also feature site-specific poetry by Chavonn Shen, Teresa Ortiz, and many more, along with site-specific photography and visual art.

The Summer Sound Garden is a free, family-friendly, self-guided durational event that features a site-specific sound installation of 60+ small, wireless speakers, each playing a different part of the whole piece of music and distributed throughout the entire island, with live accompaniment by roving musicians and dancers, site-specific poetry, and a summer song by Blue Lady and the Free Range Orchestra & Choir. Each small speaker is housed in various handmade vessels – wooden birdhouses, felt sculptures – creating a dynamic, immersive experience that is described as “a concert you can move through.”

Saturday, June 29, 12:00-4:30pm
Rain date: Sunday, June 30
Event is free, but registration highly recommended in order to share weather and program updates.

This activity is made possible by the voters of Minnesota through a grant from the Metropolitan Regional Arts Council, thanks to a legislative appropriation from the arts and cultural heritage fund.

DanceCo returns to the stage this summer with a series of free, interactive, family-friendly performances. Wolf Tales is a mashup of the familiar fairy tales Peter and the Wolf, Little Red Riding Hood, and the Three Little Pigs. The story is told by the Wolf, who is not big or bad, just misunderstood — and wants to set the record straight!

The show starts with an exciting, kid-focused workshop where audience members can learn and practice interactive parts of the show. Then, the DanceCo Artists take the stage for a 45-minute performance with opportunities for the audience to join the dancers on stage! Get ready to be a part of the magic. 

Saturday, June 29, 10:00am and 11:30am
Capri Theater Paradise Hall
2027 W Broadway Ave, Minneapolis, MN 55411

Saturday, July 6, 10:00am and 11:30am
Father Hennepin Bluffs Park Bandshell
420 Main St. SE, Minneapolis, MN 55414

Saturday, July 13, 10:00am and 11:30am
Lyndale Gardens Amphitheater
6400 Lyndale Ave S, Richfield, MN 55423

All shows are free!

DanceCo is a professional performance company creating original, interactive dance narratives for young people ages 3-103! Directed by Matthew and Brittany Keefe and Karla Nweje. Performed by Emily Compaan, Cassie Edlund, Matthew Keefe, Jennifer Mack, Karla Nweje, Emily Pitts, Leeah Schuhwerck, Zachary Tuazon, and Maria Vitelli. 

To learn about DanceCo and our professional artists, go to www.DanceCoMN.com. 

Ray Terrill Dance Group presents the 22nd annual Dances at the Lake Festival—two free concerts at the Rose Garden at Lake Harriet, open to the public.

Friday and Saturday, July 19 and 20, 7:00pm

The festival features a variety of dance forms performed by both professional adult and youth companies. The “stage” for the shows is the large grassy area between the two fountains near the Rose Garden at Lyndale Park Gardens. Audience members are invited to bring a lawn chair or blanket and some snacks, drinks or a picnic to enjoy the unique opportunity of seeing dance performed at the Rose Garden.

This year’s festival showcases professional artists and youth dance groups originating from Minnesota:

Alys Ayumi Ogura and Anna Andaházy Salazar, Saint Paul, MN — Alys Ayumi Ogura, Artistic director
Ashley Ballet Arts Academy, Ballet Arts Youth Ensembles, Golden Valley, MN. — Ashley Burkland, Artistic Director
Christopher Watson Dance Company, Minneapolis, MN — Christopher Watson, Artistic Director
Jawaahir Dance Company, Minneapolis, MN — Vanessa of Cairo, Artistic Director
KASM Dance Collective, Twin Cities, MN — Sarah Hauss, Artistic Director
Keane Sense of Rhythm Youth Tap Ensemble, Saint Paul, MN — Cathy Wind, Artistic Director
Kinetic Evolutions with Walter Chancellor Jr., Minneapolis, MN — Sarah LaRose-Holland, Artistic Director
Minnesota Ballet Collective, Lakeville, MN — Isabella Rubietta, Artistic Director
Nritya Kalakshetra Academy of Performing Arts, Woodbury, MN — Sivanuja (Anu) Balaji, Artistic Director
Ray Terrill Dance Group, Saint Paul, MN — Ray Terrill, Artistic Director
Sansai Yonsei Kai, Japanese Dance Company, Saint Paul MN — Linda Hashimoto, Artistic Director
Youth Dance Ensemble, Burnsville, MN — Dixie Rairamo, Artistic Director

Come enjoy good drinks, good tunes and good company while supporting Rhythmically Speaking! Join us for our third annual Rhythmically Speaking Happy Hour Dance Party Fundraiser.

Thursday, July 25, 5:00-7:00pm
Summit Brewing. RSVP to the Facebook event.

If you love to go out dancing but find it difficult to rally the required energy at 10:00pm, come! If you love Summit and wanna enjoy their beverages, come! If you think Rhythmically Speaking does some really cool work and you wanna support, come! You can dance your booty off, enjoy a brew and support our work! We’ll be providing music curated by all of our dancers as a part of our Dressing Room Playlist!

Here’s how you can support:

• Request your favorite dance tunes for $5.00;
• Donate $20.00 to shut down what’s playing and play your request immediately;
• Buy a $10.00 raffle ticket for a chance to win sweet prizes, including Rhythmically Speaking swag and tickets to our upcoming show The Cohort 2024, Summit Brewing Company swag, Saint Paul Saints tickets, and more!

At Rhythmically Speaking, we believe in the power of moving and grooving together to connect us (so tell your friends to come too!), and we look forward to sharing the joy and building support of our work with you at this event!

Reasons for Moving is an interdisciplinary and multilingual performance exploring the intergenerational scars of geopolitical displacement. Its script collects the writings of the collaborators and their families’ biographies, alongside found text on the circulation cycles of migratory animals and the natural world.

The title comes from the final two lines of Keeping Things Whole, by the late Canadian poet Mark Strand: “we all have reasons for moving/I move to keep things whole.” Combining fictional and non-fictional stories, the ensemble investigates painful pasts as much as the present as a path forward. 

Reasons for Moving is especially relevant for local audiences, given Minnesota’s long history with displaced and displacing populations — hosting and uprooting is part of its fabric.

Performer/collaborators are: Kalala Kiwanuka-Woernle, whose mother first left Uganda for the UK, and then arrived in the US on a student visa; Mai Moua Thao, whose parents are refugees from Laos by way of Thailand; and Skye Reddy, whose family lost their ancestral homelands in the colonial Partition of South Asia. Directed by Cláudia Tatinge Nascimento with media and sound design by Eliot Gray Fisher, lighting design and technical direction by Thomas Barrett, and costume design by Lynn Farrington.