Archive

The Legend of the Feathered Robe ー 羽衣伝説

Experience unique storytelling through ballet performance, choreography, solo piano and two-piano works, and the world premiere of an original composition. Award-winning choreographer Yuki Tokuda will showcase her choreography presented in a program inspired by Japanese folklore, “The Legend of the Feathered Robe – 羽衣伝説,” featuring a new work created especially for this project by internationally recognized composer Asako Hirabayashi.

Program

  • “The Legend of the Feathered Robe” by Asako Hirabayashi – world premiere
  • “The Firebird” by Igor Stravinsky
  • “Signes de Blanc” by Edison Danisov – presented under license from G. Schirmer Inc. and Associated Music Publishers, copyright owners
  • “Daphnis et Chloé Suite No.2” by Maurice Ravel

Artists
Choreographer: Yuki Tokuda
Dancers: Andrew Lester and Yuki Tokuda
Pianists: Rie Tanaka and Koki Sato

Saturday, June 1
2:00pm

This show is free to the public, but please register ahead of time for arts board verification of audience attendance.

Yuki Tokuda is a fiscal year 2023 recipient of a Creative Support for Individuals grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board. This activity is made possible by the voters of Minnesota through a grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board, thanks to a legislative appropriation from the arts and cultural heritage fund.

EMBODY PALESTINE 

Sunday, June 2

3:00-5:00pm

EMBODY PALESTINE is a workshop by Leila Awadallah (Body Watani Dance) held in collaboration with Meryl Zaytoun Murman, 2024 McKnight International Choreographer. This workshop will guide participants through embodied explorations as a process of communal reflection on the range of emotions stirred by the genocide in Gaza.

To what extent can we use our bodies to connect with experiences we did not have, but learn about through media? How can the body respond and tend to the traumatic imagery in the news? Meryl will facilitate participants through movement and vocal explorations using gesture, mimicry, and embodiment as a practice of awareness and communication based on a desire to process the human suffering we are witnessing with physical understanding.

In collaboration, Meryl and Leila will share reflections on the interconnectedness of many crises in the region and ways they work within movement spaces to interweave complex solidarities across bodies. How do we resist together? What actions can we take towards a more healing-oriented future?

Dance experience is not necessary, and participants will engage at their own range of intensity.

Advanced registration required. Recommended donation of $5-15 at event. 75% of the income will be donated.

Blended Yoga: Cultivating Strength, Balance, and Stability

Blended Yoga: Cultivating Strength, Balance, and Stability is an 8-week series guided by Sarah Baumert that blends the mindful movement of gentle yoga with the awareness of the Feldenkrais method.

June 3-July 22
Mondays, 6:00-7:15pm CST
Live classes will be taught on Zoom.
All lessons are recorded. Registering for the series gives you access to the recorded lessons indefinitely.

In this blended class, attention is focused on treating your body as a connected system, moving beyond isolated exercises. The first part of the class will focus on functional mobility and strength as we practice balance and stability exercises. The last half of class will bring us into a softer place, with mindful movements for releasing tension, and pain management.

Each class is an original, innovative creation of Sarah’s teaching, blending a more traditional gentle yoga practice with the novel Feldenkrais® awareness practices. Sarah incorporates joint-specific training, functional range exercises, self-massage, breathing exercises, and a compassionate non-competitive mindset. IA true experience of movement therapy!

We will zoom our focus in for eight weeks on improving our balance, stability, and connection with the earth’s surfaces. Allow your body to be your guide. All levels are welcome. This will be a nonjudgemental, un-intimidating space to create friends with your body (yourself!). You will train your sensitivity in such a way that you find yourself feeling more alive, vibrant, and spacious.

Come explore mindful movement that is targeted to improve stability, balance, and strength. Experience this novel way to improve your joint health and functional mobility in a holistic way led by a passionate movement educator.

TU Dance: “an experiment” with Leslie Parker and Collaborators

The public offering of an experiment is a live collaborative improvisation performance drawing from Blackness in experimental music, storytelling, visual art, and dance. This is a Twin Cities Jazz Festival event.

The Twin Cities Black Dance Improvisation Intensive 2024 is an extension of CtR methodology centering on Black, Native, Indigenous, and Artists of Color narratives. The focus is on creatives who are steeped in dance and performance practices to provide more opportunities to deepen awareness of improvisation. BDI Intensive 2024 is open to all bodies and ethnicities including artists, organizers, activists, and co-conspirators of varied dance experiences. All participants of the BDI Intensive are encouraged to perform.

In partnership with Northrop, Twin Cities Jazz Festival, The Cedar Cultural Center, TU Dance, and Barbara Barker Center for Dance. Performances by Black Dance Improvisation Intensive participants and Music Collaborative with Michael Wimberly, Farai Malianga, Dameun Strange, and DeCarlo Jackson. Produced by Leslie Parker Dance Project.

June 22, 2024
Free. At the Cedar Cultural Center.

Intensive Workshop Schedule
Leslie Parker Dance Project brings together improvisers in the Twin Cities who practice various models of improvisation from around the world to participate in three weeks of practice.

June 3-6, 2024
Workshop Session with Ishmael Houston-Jones
TU Dance Center, 2121 University Avenue West, Saint Paul, MN 55104

June 10-13, 2024
Workshop Session with Merián Soto
Northrop Dance Studio, 84 Church Street SE, Minneapolis, MN 55455

June 17-20, 2024
Workshop Session with Leslie Parker and Cynthia Olive
Barbara Barker Dance Center, 500 21st Avenue South, Minneapolis, MN 55455

More information and registration.

Interstella 5555: A Daft Punk Discovery Audition

Group dance auditions for upcoming MN Fringe show Interstella 5555: A Daft Punk Discovery, a performance that brings Daft Punk’s 2001 album Discovery to life on stage.

Audition: Tuesday, June 4
5:00-5:45pm or 5:45-6:30pm
TU Dance Center, Studio 1

Daft Punk was a French electronic music duo formed in 1993 in Paris by Thomas Bangalter and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo. Their album Discovery came with a feature-length animated film titled “Interstella 5555: The 5tory of the 5ecret 5tar 5ystem” in which four alien musicians are kidnapped from their home planet by an American record producer who disguises them as humans and forces them to perform for the masses. The story involves no dialogue and is accompanied solely by the album’s music. The use of Daft Punk’s film “Interstella 5555” and album Discovery blend synergistically to prompt the audience questions about humanity, intergalactic relations, capitalism, the music industry, and the price of fame.

Seeking dancers, movers, actors, and performers alike who are excited about music, performance, and unconventional storytelling. Come ready to move in a group audition. If you would like to audition but neither of these dates work for you, please contact me via the email below and send in a video audition!

Performances:
Barbara Barker Center for Dance, 500 21st Ave S, Minneapolis, MN 55455
Friday, August 2 at 10:00pm
Saturday, August 3 at 8:00pm
Tuesday, August 6 at 5:30pm
Friday, August 9 at 7:00pm
Sunday, August 11 at 1:00pm

Rehearsal Schedule:
TU Dance Center, 2121 University Ave W, St Paul, MN 55114
Monday, July 1: 5:00-8:00pm in Studio 1
Tuesday, July 2: 5:00-8:00pm in Studio 1
Friday, July 5: 5:00-8:00pm in Studio 2
Monday, July 8: 5:00-8:00pm in Studio 1
Tuesday, July 9: 5:00-8:00pm in Studio 1
Friday, July 12: 5:00-8:00pm in Studio 2
Monday, July 15: 5:00-8:00pm in Studio 1
Tuesday, July 16: 5:00-8:00pm in Studio 1
Thursday, July 18: 5:00-8:00pm in Studio 1
Monday, July 22: 5:00-8:00pm in Studio 1
Tuesday, July 23: 5:00-8:00pm in Studio 1
Thursday, July 18: 5:00-8:00pm in Studio 1
Tech TBD

Compensation: Stipend will be provided depending on box office revenue.

For further questions, please contact Shayla Courteau: shayshayc123@gmail.com, (612) 558-7042.

Off-Leash Area Presents The Knave of Knives – The Duchess of Dawn

At once dreamlike, unsettling, and absurd, Off-Leash Area’s new show, The Knave of Knives – The Duchess of Dawn, introduces two strange and haunting figures from an otherworldly court who engage in a fantastical struggle for power over the multiverse. Taking place in an immersive installation surrounding both stage and audience, the show is performed with movement and music/sound, inspired (loosely) by string theory, and is populated with melancholy stuffed animals and mysterious trophies, dispersed among the fragile threads of a clandestine karmic history.

Created and performed by Jennifer Ilse and Paul Herwig, co-artistic directors of Off-Leash Area.

June 7-9, 7:00pm
Tickets on sale now.

Admission is by suggested donation between $10-$30. Seating is limited to approximately 40 seats and the garage fills up fast, so make your reservation early! You can also make your donation at the door by cash or card via Square.

Stick around afterward for popcorn, drinks, and conversation by the fire!

BRKFST Dance Company Presented by Northrop

BRKFST Dance Company presents two wildly different works of art in celebration of their 10-year anniversary. BRKFST continues to “show us the future of dance” (Star Tribune) with STORMCLUTTER, a world premiere co-commissioned by The Cowles Center and Northrop, with composition by company member Renée Copeland. Their unique style of breaking and storytelling shines through in a restaging of Dancers, Dreamers, and Presidents by composer Daniel Bernard Roumain. 

STORMCLUTTER is an exploration of relationships and ongoing efforts to resolve opposing states of interpersonal tension. Misunderstanding, compassion, resentment, egoism, love, loss, betrayal—moving through or attempting to compartmentalize complex dynamics between family and friends and the emotional baggage collected over time becomes an overwhelming task, while maturation requires people to accept that which they cannot change. BRKFST members illustrate the efforts individuals may take when working to resolve the inner chaos that triggers feelings of dissociation, paralysis, and isolation.

BRKFST interprets Dancers, Dreamers, and Presidents as a commentary on American life that is filled with a mix of ambition, passion, blame, justice, hope, and love. And while this country is deemed the “land of the free,” it is riddled with systemic problems that seem impossible to overcome. For many, the “American Dream” remains just that—a dream.

Saturday, June 8, 7:30pm
Sunday, June 9, 2:00pm

Rescheduled from April 27-28 at The Cowles Center.

Katha Dance Theatre Presents Ganga: A Choreographic Odyssey

Katha Dance Theatre (KDT) is pleased to announce the world premiere of Ganga: A Choreographic Odyssey at E.M. Pearson Theatre!

With this production, director/choreographer Rita Mustaphi is premiering a film screening and live Kathak dance combination to create a unique cultural spectacle. The dance film, Ganga to Mississippi, was filmed in both India and Minnesota. The Minnesota section was created in collaboration with Sharon Day, an Ojibwe leader and Indigenous activist, artist, and writer, and Jane Ramseyer Miller, former artistic director of One Voice Mixed Chorus. In Ganga: A Choreographic Odyssey, the brand-new live component, North Indian Kathak dance will be performed with a non-traditional South Indian Carnatic music accompaniment; the show’s composers come from South Indian Carnatic and North Indian Hindustani classical music traditions. Set to live music by these and other acclaimed guest artists, the live portion will be performed by KDT’s Company dancers and apprentices.

Ganga uses Kathak to convey the universal importance of protecting and conserving water sources. It portrays the mythological creation of the river Ganga (or Ganges), depicting Ganga as a nourishing river of life, a source of religious significance, but also as one of the world’s most polluted rivers that needs saving from environmental destruction. Using the storytelling artform’s trademark rhythmic footwork, pirouettes, and gestural and facial expressiveness, Ganga emphasizes how the crucial role the Ganges plays to Asian Indians is similar to the role the Mississippi plays to Minnesotans – especially to indigenous communities. Using these mythological and real-life frameworks, Ganga calls for systemic change and urges audiences to take action against pollution.

A roster of acclaimed guest musicians accompanies KDT’s Company on the live portion of the performance. They include Nirmala Rajasekar (vocals), Satyaprakash Mishra (tabla), Jayanta Banerjee (sitar), and Sriram N. Iyer (Mridangam), with percussion by Abhinav Sharma (MN).

June 14, 7:30pm
June 15, 7:30pm
June 16, 2:00pm (ASL-interpreted)

Tickets
General Admission: $35
Students and Seniors 65+: $20

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

TU Dance Center: Children and Teen Beginner Summer Programs

The TU Dance Children and Teen Program introduces the joy of creative movement and beginning dance technique. Classes, divided by age, provide a comprehensive base on which to expand by developing body awareness, coordination, balance, flexibility, strength, and musicality. Click here to download the 2024 Creative Movement Daily Schedule and the 2024 Beginning Program Daily Schedule.

Youth Beginning Level: June 17-29
This 2-week program is entry level for students typically aged 9-12 and will focus on the techniques of Modern, Ballet, Hip Hop, and African Dance. Students will learn basic fundamentals of dance technique along with exploring their individual artistic expression.
Registration Deadline: June 12, 2024

Teen Beginning Level: June 17-29
This 2-week program is entry level for students typically aged 13-16 and will focus on the techniques of Modern, Ballet, Hip Hop, and African Dance. Students will learn basic fundamentals of dance technique along with exploring their individual artistic expression.
Registration Deadline: June 12, 2024

Creative Movement: July 22-26
During this 1-week program, students ages 5-8 will experience the connection between movement and creativity through rhythmically driven classes aided by live percussion.
Registration Deadline: July 17, 2024

Wayfinding: Dance Film Sharing and Discussion

Join us for Wayfinding, a creative conversation and informal dance film sharing featuring short films by 2024 McKnight International Choreographer Meryl Zaytoun Murman and Winona artist Sharon Mansur. The films will explore their shared Arab/SWANA (Southwest Asian and Northern African) heritage, gender and sexuality, and diasporic bodies; a guided discussion will center on these themes. The discussion will be facilitated by Winona State Professor, Mary Jo Klinker.

This event is part of a month-long residency in Winona and the Twin Cities. There will be a variety of events that allow Murman to share her multiple artistic practices.

Full residency schedule and more information.

Tuesday, June 18

7:00pm

This free event will be co-sponsored by Art of the Rural.
Reservations are strongly encouraged.