Scotiabank Dance Centre Open House: 10th Anniverary Celebration

Scotiabank Dance Centre celebrates its tenth anniversary this fall with a special extended edition of the popular annual Open House, Thursday-Sunday September 15-18.

Performance: Aeriosa's Being Thursday-Saturday September 15-17, 8.30pm
Aeriosa's spectacular aerial dance events combine the athleticism of rock climbing with the grace and artistry of dance. Choreographer Julia Taffe's new work Being unfolds inside the performance space, and then takes the audience outside to watch the company dance down the seven-storey exterior wall in cascading duets, trios and quartets. Tickets just $10 from www.ticketstonight.ca

Free events: Saturday-Sunday September 17-18, 10am-6pm
Two days of open classes, workshops, studio showings and special events! Participating artists and companies include: Ballet BC, Dance 4U (salsa), Kinesis Dance, Mandala Arts and Culture, Raven Spirit Dance, Shiamak's Bollywood Jazz, and more. Details at www.thedancecentre.ca

International Dance Day April 29

Vancouver celebrates International Dance Day with a series of events highlighting the diversity of BC’s dance scene. Free events include a lunchtime performance of flamenco and other dance styles at the Vancouver Public Library; downtown ‘swing bombs’ with swing champions Tessa Cunningham and Myles Munroe; and studio showings and a photo exhibit at Scotiabank Dance Centre. The evening sees the premiere of taking your experience for mine, a new work by rising choreographer Sara Coffin exploring the impact of digital media on our lives, presented through the Iris Garland Choreographer Award (the performance also runs Saturday April 30 at 8pm). For a full schedule visit www.thedancecentre.ca.

Initiated in 1982 by UNESCO, International Dance Day is marked annually on April 29 with events across Canada and around the world. The date commemorates the birthday of Jean-Georges Noverre (1727-1810), regarded as the founder of modern ballet. Each year The Dance Centre, BC’s resource centre for dance, presents events which celebrate the art form.

Read the official UNESCO International Dance Day message, by Anna Teresa de Keersmaeker, here.

Photo: Karen Flamenco by David Cooper

Co.ERASGA/Complot: EXpose

A powerful new full-length duet exploring sexuality, gender and identity, EXpose brings together two exceptional male solo artists: Vancouver’s own Alvin Erasga Tolentino, Artistic Director of Co. ERASGA, whose sophisticated works have toured around the world; and Martin Inthamoussú, a driving force in Uruguay’s contemporary dance scene, whose passionate works grapple with provocative socio-political ideas. These two charismatic performers seek to expose the complexity of the personal and public territories within the gay psyche, creating a spellbinding theatrical and physical dialogue.

April 14-16 at 8pm at Scotiabank Dance Centre, Vancouver. Post-show artist talkback April 15. Tickets $28/$20 from www.ticketstonight.ca Info www.thedancecentre.caNote: this show includes nudity.

Les Productions Figlio: Conversations

The Dance Centre and the Chutzpah! Festival 2011 present the world premiere of Les Productions Figlio's Conversations. Choreographed by Artistic Director Serge Bennathan, Conversations is an imaginary encounter between the great Spanish poet and playwright Federico Garcia Lorca, who was murdered by pro-Franco militias in 1936, and his assassin, Juan Luis Trescastro. Meshing movement, text, music, lighting and set design, the work examines the poetic and philosophical exchanges between the two men, portrayed on stage by the magnetic Billy Marchenski and Danny Wild.

Thursday-Saturday February 10-12, 8pm at Scotiabank Dance Centre, 677 Davie St, Vancouver. Tickets and info: 604 257 5145 www.chutzpahfestival.com www.thedancecentre.ca

Company Drift: sound machine

The Dance Centre's Global Dance Connections series continues in January with the internationally acclaimed Swiss ensemble Company Drift in sound machine. Consider how science might investigate some of life's more absurd scientific questions: how can the inaudible be made audible? How does a fly scream when it bumps into a burning hot light bulb? What does Mr Fish say to Ms Fish when he asks for her fin in marriage? Company Drift gathers these and other 'inaudible' noises and mixes them with dance, theatre, sound and video to exhibit a dreamlike world that is profound and surreal, tragic and witty, and continually surprising.

Thursday-Saturday January 27-29, 2011 at Scotiabank Dance Centre, Vancouver. Tickets $28/$20 from www.ticketstonight.ca. Info: www.thedancecentre.ca

Presented with the PuSh International Performing Arts Festival: www.pushfestival.ca

Discover Dance! LINK Dance

Dance collides with science in Experiments, Gail Lotenberg’s exciting new work for her company LINK Dance. A collaboration with four ecologists – specialists in the study of movement and behaviour – the work combines fluent dancing with sound, light and video, to investigate how two separate disciplines embrace logic, experimentation and creativity. In this special presentation for the Discover Dance! noon series, Lotenberg introduces excerpts from the work and leads a dialogue with the audience around the concepts which drive it.

Thursday November 25, 12 noon at Scotiabank Dance Centre, Vancouver. Tickets $10/$8 from www.ticketstonight.ca Info www.thedancecentre.ca.

Note: the full length production Experiments can be seen at Scotiabank Dance Centre November 25-27 at 8pm. For details visit www.linkdance.ca or www.thedancecentre.ca.
Photo: Peter Eastwood

Discover Dance! Goh Ballet Youth Company

The exciting young dancers of the renowned Goh Ballet Youth Company perform a rich selection of classical ballets for the October edition of The Dance Centre’s Discover Dance! noon series. The company is comprised of senior students from Vancouver’s internationally-renowned Goh Ballet Academy, which has produced five generations of notable dancers and international prize winners since its inception in 1978: its graduates dance with leading companies across North America, Europe and Asia. The program will feature excerpts from Anna-Marie Holmes’s critically acclaimed Nutcracker as well as original contemporary choreography, the signature Red Ribbon Dance and other works ranging from the classical repertoire to modern works by the choreographers of today.

Thursday October 28 at 12 noon at Scotiabank Dance Centre, 677 Davie St, Vancouver. Tickets www.ticketstonight.ca Info www.thedancecentre.ca

Photo by David Cooper

New work by Helen Walkley October 1-2

One of Vancouver’s most distinctive and compelling dance artists brings an evocative new work to the stage this week. Helen Walkley’s How is sleep beautiful? is a richly-textured memoir which explores wishes and dreams, love and aspiration, family and confusion, and death as a transformation. In a career spanning three decades, Walkley has become known for creating original and deeply felt works, and for her extraordinary stage presence and eloquent, supple dancing. Created in collaboration with composer James Maxwell, lighting designer John Webber and sculptor John Noestheden, How is sleep beautiful? is her first full-length work since 2006.

Fri-Sat October 1-2 at 8pm at Scotiabank Dance Centre, 677 Davie St, Vancouver. Tickets $28/$20 from 604.684.2787 http://www.ticketstonight.ca/. Info http://www.thedancecentre.ca/.

Scotiabank Dance Centre Open House September 25, 2010

From tap, contemporary and bellydance to flamenco, salsa and classical East Indian dance, the annual Scotiabank Dance Centre Open House offers a host of dance styles in a day of open classes, studio showings and events. Highlights include open rehearsals of works in progress by leading Vancouver companies Kidd Pivot Frankfurt RM and Co. ERASGA; introductory open classes with Lava (bellydance), Jennifer Bishop (tap), Eleonora Acuña (flamenco), Shiamak’s Bollywood Jazz, Dance 4U (salsa), and more; a ballet master class with former National Ballet star Rex Harrington, streamed live on the internet from Toronto; a screening of dance films from the Festival Transatlantique Montreal/Quartiers Danses, part of an ongoing exchange with the Festival; and Lift, a photographic essay by Lynne Spencer documenting the work of ballet dancer and choreographer Simone Orlando. Admission is free: all welcome.

Saturday September 25, 11am-5pm at Scotiabank Dance Centre, 677 Davie St, Vancouver. Full schedule and details: http://www.thedancecentre.ca/

Photo: Mandala Arts and Culture/Sudesh Solanki

Arab Latin Fiestas

Back from a 3-year hiatus, the Arab Latin Fiestas were created by female business owners Chen Lizra of Latidos Productions and Mona Chaaban of Mona's Fine Lebanese Cuisine, to stimulate the senses of diners and spectators with the sounds, smells, and tastes of the sensual Middle Eastern and seductive Latin worlds. The events were attended by 300 people each night during the event's 3-year run in 2005-2007. The 5th and 6th edition of the events will be on Friday, May 14, and Friday, June 18.

The event schedule is as follows:

7pm-9:30pm - Dinner (fixed menu, reservations required)
9pm - Hookah room opens
9:30pm - Show #1 (Karen Flamenco May 14, Belly dancers Shivaun Corry & Lana Gabor June 18)
10-11pm - Music and dancing
11pm - Show #2 (Belly dancers Shivaun Corry & Lana Gabor May 14, Portal a Tango June 18)
11:30pm-2am - Music and dancing

Location: Mona's Fine Lebanese Cuisine, 1328 Hornby Street, Vancouver
Tickets: $7 with purchase of $30 fixed menu dinner, or $15 for shows only. Minors welcome.
Purchase at www.latidosproductions.com/services_private_lessons.php or call 604-708-2170.
Dinner reservations at 604-689-4050.

Links:

Latidos Productions: www.latidosproductions.com
Mona's Fine Lebanese Cuisine: www.lebanesecuisine.shawbiz.ca
Karen Flamenco: www.karenflamenco.com
Portal a Tango: www.portalatango.com
Arab Latin Fiesta promo video: www.latidosproductions.com/nowplaying.php?p=2&videofile=ArabLatinF320&vw=320&vh=255
Past Arab Latin Fiesta photos: www.latidosproductions.com/photo_gallery.php


Event information and photos provided courtesy of
Sandra Garcia
Publicist, Middle Child Marketing
sandra@middlechildmarketing.com
604.721.0030
www.middlechildmarketing.com

International Dance Day

From contemporary to flamenco and salsa to hula hooping, Vancouver celebrates International Dance Day with a series of free and ticketed events at Scotiabank Dance Centre on Thursday April 29. Initiated in 1982 by UNESCO, International Dance Day is marked annually on April 29 with events across Canada and around the world. The date commemorates the birthday of Jean-Georges Noverre (1727-1810), regarded as the founder of modern ballet.

Each year The Dance Centre hosts events which celebrate the art form: this year participating companies include Spanish Passion Productions, Co. ERASGA, MovEnt, Pixie Hoops, No Hitting Collective, Dance 4U, SYS Style and more. For a full schedule of events please visit http://www.thedancecentre.ca/.

Photo: Spanish Passion Productions by Jasmin Nguyen Phuoc Hoang Trang.

Discover Dance! Flamenco Rosario March 25

The Dance Centre's popular Discover Dance! noon hour series returns in March to showcase the brilliant footwork and breathtaking virtuosity of flamenco, with an exhilarating performance by Flamenco Rosario. Flamenco Ayer Y Hoy (Flamenco Then and Now) traces the development of this dance form with a program of traditional and contemporary flamenco, introduced by Artistic Director Rosario Ancer and Musical Director Victor Kolstee and performed by company dancers. www.flamencorosario.org

Thursday March 25 at 12 noon at Scotiabank Dance Centre, Vancouver. Tickets $10/$7 from http://www.ticketstonight.ca/ 604.684.2787 Info http://www.thedancecentre.ca/

Dance with Chutzpah!

This year is the 10th anniversary Chutzpah! Festival. In additional to an impressive line-up of international theatre and music performances this year, the Festival is renowned for bringing cutting edge contemporary dance companies to Vancouver and it looks like this year is going to be no exception. Aszure Barton & Artists will be returning to Chutzpah! with her full company of nine dancers for a breathtaking and explosive repertoire show (presented with The Dance Centre). Gallim Dance with opening guest company Sidra Bell Dance New York, both based in New York City, make their Vancouver company premieres.

Aszure will be presenting two works. Busk (2009) The word busk comes from the Spanish root word buscar, meaning "to seek"; buskers literally seek the fantasy of fame and fortune. Busk retains Aszure's signature style of precise whole-body expression inflected with an intense and intimate awareness of the fine line between humour and sadness. Blue Soup (2009) is a bubbling mosaic drawn from Barton's notable past creations. This work celebrates distinct personalities and hyper awareness of body, spirit, and sound. Defying the idea of dance as simple spectacle, Blue Soup invites the audience to visit a self-contained, deeply textured and bizarre universe. This choreography has been hailed by the critics and the public internationally.

The work Gallim Dance will be presenting, I Can See Myself In Your Pupil, is a suite of dances set to the vibrant music including the Israeli band, Balkan Beat Box (also appearing in concert at Chutzpah! March 18 at 8pm, The Venue on Granville St). In bundles of outrageously combustive energy the dance exposes the accursed but ever-present awkwardness of attempting physical intimacy.

Opening for Gallim Dance is Sidra Bell Dance New York. The company's repertoire features pieces that are simultaneously haunting, emotionally transporting, complex, dynamic, articulate, sensual, highly physical, risky, elegant, fantastical and darkly romantic.

Tickets, more info about all the shows and a downloadable copy of the Program Guide are available on the Chutzpah! Festival website chutzpahfestival.com

Pulse: Claire French & Julie Lebel

Claire French and Julie Lebel present a mixed program of contrasting solos for the seventh edition of Pulse. French's Inside Outside In is a poetic solo danced by Laura Hicks that explores the link between thinking and doing, while Outside Out, performed by Heather Laura Gray, takes an updated look at the leading ladies of the Hollywood musicals era. Julie Lebel's Field Notes was created through walks on Côte-Nord in her home province, Quebec. Dance, music and video stimulate the senses to challenge the distinction between body and environment in the places where we belong. http://www.restlessproductions.com/ http://www.ensembleindependant.org/

Friday & Saturday September 18 & 19 at Scotiabank Dance Centre, 677 Davie St, Vancouver. Tickets $20/$15 students, seniors, Dance Centre/CADA members from 604.684.2787 (service charges apply to phone bookings) or click here to book online. Pulse is an assisted presentation program of The Dance Centre.

Photo: Field Notes by Julie Lebel. Dancer: Karine Gagné Photo: Nicolas Minns

Scotiabank Dance Centre 8th Annual Open House

The eighth annual Scotiabank Dance Centre Open House takes place on Saturday September 19, 11am- 5pm. From contemporary and flamenco to hip hop and classical East Indian dance, this event is a great opportunity to see and try a wide range of dance, with free open classes, studio showings and workshops. Highlights this year include an open rehearsal on the outside of the building by Aeriosa Dance, LINK Dance's Breakfast Dances, classes with Mandala Arts and Culture, SVS Style and others, a screening of films from the Festival Transatlantique Montreal/Quartiers Danses, and more. Click here for the full schedule.

Photo: Aeriosa Dance by Tim Matheson

Presented with the support of Scotiabank.

Dancing on the Edge Festival 2009

Dancing on the Edge Festival 2009, Festival of Contemporary Dance, is happening from July 9th to 18th. Check out the schedule on line: http://www.dancingontheedge.org/schedule.php


The festival also has two site works happening:

Fortier Danse
Solo 30x30
Paul-André Fortier/ Fortier Danse
July 9-18
at 5:15pm
Library Plaza

DUSK DANCE
http://www.dancingontheedge.org/dusk.php
July 15
July 16
July 17
July 18
at 7pm
Queen Elizabeth Park by the duck pond

Dancing on the Edge Festival HOTLINE 604-689-0926
http://www.dancingontheedge.org

Dancing on the Edge Performances at Scotiabank Dance Centre

Henry Daniel's t2 is simultaneously a telematic dance performance and an installation that links Scotiabank Dance Centre with the Interurban Gallery on the Downtown Eastside. The work brings together two very different communities via technological link while allowing the audience to participate in a dialogue about space, place and identity.

t2 performances: July 11 & 12 at 8pm at Scotiabank Dance Centre.

Installation: July 8 -26, Wed-Sat 12-5pm at the Interurban Gallery, 1 East Hastings St.

the plastic orchid factory's first evening length work, endORPHIN, aims to investigate the physiological by-products of consumer culture and the influence they have on the cognitive development of self. Choreographed by James Gnam and set to an original score by Phil Thomson, endORPHIN uses movement, sound and technical design to build an abstract, dislocated work that frames the beauty, strength and stoicism inherent in contemporary dysfunction.

endORPHIN performances: July 16 & 17 at 7pm at Scotiabank Dance Centre.

For the full Festival schedule, tickets and information call 604.689.0926 or visit

www.dancing ontheedge.org

The Dance Centre is pleased to announce that Sara Coffin is the recipient of the third Iris Garland Emerging Choreographer Award.

The Award was established in memory of Iris Garland, the pioneering educator who developed Simon Fraser University’s dance program. The biennial Award provides $5000 to assist an emerging artist between 19 and 35 years of age who demonstrates exceptional choreographic potential, to produce their work at Scotiabank Dance Centre in Vancouver. Coffin will use the award to support the production of a new ensemble work inspired by the concept of open source culture, set to premiere in September 2010 at Scotiabank Dance Centre. The previous recipients of the Award are Amber Funk Barton in 2005, and Chengxin Wei in 2007.

Born in Nova Scotia, Sara Coffin is a Vancouver-based dancer and choreographer. She completed her BFA in dance at Simon Fraser University's School for the Contemporary Arts and her Kinesiology degree (BScK) at Dalhousie University. Notable artists she has worked with include The Holy Body Tattoo in monumental, Daelik, Mascall Dance, Susan Elliott, Susan Lee and Lesandra Dodson, Deborah Dunn, and Peter Chin, with the TILT: sound + motion dance company. Her own choreography has been presented in Nova Scotia, Toronto and Vancouver; including the Dancing on The Edge Festival, ROMP! (Victoria), Dances for a Small Stage, 12 Minutes Max, Pulse (at Scotiabank Dance Centre), Video-In, Toronto's 808 series, and at TILT's Choreographic Workshop (Toronto). Coffin studied at the Impulstanz International Dance Festival in Vienna, supported by the Canada Council in 2005. She received the 2005 BC Emerging Dance Artist Award, awarded by the Holy Body Tattoo Dance Company; the BC Arts Council Senior Scholarship Award for choreography (2002), and The Pat Richards Choreographic Award (1999,1998); and is Dance Centre Artist-in-Residence during the 2009-2010 season. She is a co-founder of SINS Dance (Sometimes In Nova Scotia), a collective based in Nova Scotia that traverses Canada. She also currently teaches contemporary dance at the Shadbolt Centre for the Arts and is an assistant programmer for the dance program. www.saracoffin.com

Fortier Danse-Creation in Cabane

The Dance Centre's Global Dance Connections series comes to a close with Fortier Danse-Création from Montreal in the Vancouver premiere of Cabane. Canadian dance icon Paul-Andre Fortier’s new duet is created and performed with the extraordinary artist and musician Rober Racine in and around a small cabin. The elegant Fortier and mischievous Racine generate a series of surreal encounters in a provocative, amusing work which is part installation, part site specific work, and breaks the conventions of dance performance. http://www.fortier-danse.com/

Shifts and shapes itself in amazing ways…. delightful installation-art. The Montreal Gazette

Duration: 60 minutes

Thursday-Saturday June 11-13 at 8pm at Scotiabank Dance Centre, 677 Davie St, Vancouver. Post-show artist talkback June 12. Tickets $26/$18 from 604.684.2787 (charges apply) or online at http://www.ticketstonight.ca/. Groups of 8+ $15 per ticket, in advance only from 604.606.6420. Read our Ticketing FAQs for details.

The BIG Picture with Dianna David

Date: Thursday, June 18, 2009
Time: 7:30pm - 9:30pm
Location: Norman Rothstein Theatre (West 41st Ave / Oak St)
Street: 950 West 41st Avenue
City/Town: Vancouver, BC
Phone: 6047804363
Email: info@diannadavid.net

Come see what Dianna David is up to now!

She has a bag of tricks that keep you on the edge of your seat from hip hop dancing, clowning, miming, shadow play, multi-media and contact juggling. This multi-talented physical performer brings a show that you will never forget.

THE BIG PICTURE will encompass the pieces that have inspired her current touring production, TAKE A CLOSER LOOK, which will be featured in the second half of the show.

TAKE A CLOSER LOOK has been on a 75-show tour since April and has been getting rave reviews in 40 cities all across BC. This is the only public viewing of this production this year…so DON’T MISS IT!

This is also the OFFICIAL DEBUT of a recent addition to dubD Productions, Miss Charity Zapanta - co-creator, multi-media designer, and director. She has been a key player behind the scenes of many of Dianna's performances in the past year and has discovered her passion and talents in creating and directing live performance.

Don't miss it! Tickets are LIMITED so RESERVE BY PHONE or EMAIL

Advance $15/students, $18/adults
Door $18/students, $22/adults
Doors: 7pm, Show: 7:30p