Posts tagged as:

DANCE

Method and Madness

Cheap Lecture + The Cow Piece; Counting to One Hundred + One Flute Note, Jonathan Burrows and Matteo Fargion, Usine C

by Cerys Wilson
14.05.2013

Jonathan Burrows and Matteo Fargion were in Montreal this past weekend for a blink-and-you’ll miss-it run of Cheap Lecture and The Cow Piece, followed by Counting to One Hundred and One Flute Note. Packaged by Usine C as Quatre Créations in two nights, the individual works seemed shakily whole – a feeling reinforced at the close of each by Burrows and Fargion’s look of bemused surprise that they had, once more, pulled it off.

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FESTIVAL CITY

Global Stage Soars

Festival Transamérique, May 22 – June 8

by Marianne Ackerman
13.05.2013

For a Quebec Anglo de souche or by adoption, there can’t be a better tonic to the maudit winter of our discontent than a spell at the Festival Transamérique, opening in Montreal next Wednesday. An 18-day many-lingual feast of cutting-edge dance and theatre from the world out there, this is the Quebec we know and love. The rest is just politics.

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DANCE

Bang On

ÉCLATS – Vitrine Festival CanAsian, MAI, May 5, 3 pm

by Rebecca Galloway
04.05.2013

I have to confess, the last time I went to a dance show with the word “butoh” in the press kit, I spent the second half of the evening mentally composing my grocery shopping list. The white makeup, the interminable slow-motion choreography… Frankly I’d rather eat a bag of hair than sit through two hours of that.

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DANCE

Captivating and Captured

Autorretrato, Maria Pagés Compania, Danse Danse, to April 6

by Cerys Wilson
05.04.2013

For a brief three-day run, Maria Pagés and company perform Autorretrato, a self-portrait of its star Flamenco dancer. On Thursday night, the theatre of the Salle Wilfrid-Pelletier was packed, with many in the crowd shouting out words of encouragement and praise as dancers executed steps with dynamic finesse. These excited audience members helped bridge the gap between the imposing stage and the seats below, bringing an unscripted intimacy to the work that furthered its personal theme.

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DANCE

So Long, Farewell

Goodbye, Mélanie Demers/Mayday, Usine C, to March 22

by Cerys Wilson
21.03.2013

“It’s over!” Jacques Poulin-Denis yells at the small press group scattered about Usine C’s large auditorium Tuesday night. “Au Revoir! Auf Wiedersehen! Good Bye!” Nobody moves. “What? What, you wanna dance? Get the fuck out of here!” Silence.

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DANCE

Large Emotions, Small Executions

José Navas, Miniatures, Agora de la danse, to March 1

by Cerys Wilson
28.02.2013

In a work of eight successive solos, José Navas explores the effects of time, memory, and dance upon his body: through each, the vulnerability of the soloist is revealed and heightened. As the title suggests, we the audience move through a series of Navas vignettes: detailed studies from which we can but guess their subjects and significance. Beauty rests in the shared intimacy of the space, and in the concentration of the dancer’s efforts.

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DANCE

Sleepy Pastoral

Trois Paysages, Karine Ledoyen/ Danse K par K, Agora de la danse

by Cerys Wilson
15.02.2013

Trois Paysages, as choreographer Karine Ledoyen notes, is not meant to pack a punch. Instead it should flow naturally, like a river; its dancers blown about like leaves in the wind. Poetics were absent Wednesday night at Agora, however, and the work felt disjointed and stagnant.

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DANCE

Dancing with Myself

Le Bancs d’Essai Internationaux dance festival at Tangente May 10-12

by Kallee Lins
14.05.2012

Le Bancs d’Essai Internationaux brings together dancers and choreographers from around the world to put the newest generation of dance on display. The biannual tour ended its Montreal run Saturday night before heading to Europe. Though the performers came from diverse regions throughout Italy, Canada, France, The Netherlands, and Wales, a common thread ran through the night. Multimedia, once a novel addition to put dance-based pieces in the often provocative territory of interdisciplinary performance, has become the status quo. The question of adding a video backdrop now seems as necessary a consideration as the number of dancers onstage.

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DANCE

A Call to Arms

Choreographer Paul-André Fortier’s remount of Bras de Plomb wins on some fronts, loses on others

by Jamie O'Meara
27.10.2011

As is oft observed, dance audiences in Montreal are among the most generous in the performing arts, especially when it comes to rewarding the presentation of established work by celebrated creators. It’s a standing ovation you can pretty much take to the bank. So the polite applause that greeted the conclusion of the remount of [...]

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FESTIVAL CITY

Get Your Fringe On

A select preview of the 2011 St-Ambroise Fringe Festival

by James Gartler
01.06.2011

It’s that time of year again. A time when strip spelling bees, drag races, improv comedy and 11-second dance parties become daily occurrences in the Plateau-Mile End. It’s Fringe season, and if you don’t know what that means, relax: Rover’s here to tell you.

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FESTIVAL CITY

Cutting-Edge Collaborations

OFFTA Festival d'arts vivants

by Kallee Lins
26.05.2011

With all of the FTA festivities happening in the next few weeks, is it possible to pack more cutting-edge performances onto the island of Montréal this summer? You betcha. Look no further than the 5th edition of the OFFTA festival.

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The Glam Side of Ostracism

Glee, Fox TV

by Jay Mark Caplan
09.12.2009

The epic struggle between jocks and geeks has been raging in TV land for years. The premise might be battle-weary, but it’s not dead yet. This season’s standout hit is another high school comedy, the new Fox series, Glee. It’s funny, but there’s also a potent Broadway kicker: the geeks of Glee sing and dance.

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DANCE

High-Flying But Thread Lacking

SUTRA, THÉÂTRE DE MAISONNEUVE

by Tao Fei
06.11.2009

What does happen when East meets West, really? Culture-crossing Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui, one of Europe’s most highly-courted young choreographers, gives his most ambitious two cents to date with Sutra, a 70-minute work that brings to the stage 17 high-flying warrior monks from China’s famed Shaolin Temple. Montreal’s Danse Danse gave its North American premiere at [...]

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FESTIVAL CITY

Skanking To Give Thanks

Montréal Ska Festival, Club Soda

by D.W. Lee
09.10.2009

This Thanksgiving, get ready to skank it up at the annual Montréal Ska Festival, now in its … first year? Is that right? Bizarre but true … Montréal, “the Ska Capital of Canada,” has never had its own ska fest. Now, The Montréal Ska Society has taken the initiative, building the festival from the ground [...]

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EVENTS

Lessons From The Lama

Dalai Lama, Bell Centre

by Sarah Fletcher
05.10.2009

Before an audience of 14,000 at the Bell Centre on Saturday, His Holiness the XIV Dalai Lama gave a talk entitled “Educating the Heart: The Power of Compassion”. Hungry for wisdom and inspiration, the crowds sat hushed and waiting, perhaps, for something sensational. What they got was a down-to-earth talk from a man of simple [...]

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