Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival Announces 2009 Season
February 9, 2009
Suchu Dance performing on the Pillow's Inside/Out stage in 2008. Photo by Ben Rudick.
Orbo Novo, a new work created for Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet by choreographer Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui and the U.S. debut of Fang-Yi Sheu’s LAFA & Artists are just a couple of highlights from the Jacob’s Pillow 2009 festival set to kick off on June 20. Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui is currently one of Europe’s most in demand choreographers and his work is rarely seen in the U.S. Orbo Novo will be his first work for an American company.
Founded in 1933 by modern dance pioneer Ted Shawn, Jacob's Pillow is the longest-running dance festival in the U.S. and presents a three-month program every summer on its sprawling 163-acre campus in the Berkshires of Western Massachusetts. The festival’s venerable and storied history is recorded in an extensive archive collection and the grounds were declared a National Historic Landmark in 2003. This year's festival will present fifty dance companies from around the world appearing on three stages - the Ted Shawn Theatre, the Doris Duke Theatre and the Inside/Out stage - through Aug. 30.
The season will also include a celebration to honor Merce Cunningham’s 90th birthday; a two-week engagement of Jason Samuels Smith’s troupe of tap soloists, A.C.G.I. (Anybody Can Get It); and an exclusive program by the Pacific Northwest Ballet performing the works of choreographer Ulysses Dove. Dove died in 1996 at the age of 49 from an AIDS-related illness and was widely mourned by many as the loss of a major choreographic talent.
The festival offers hundreds of events in conjunction with all of the performances, including interviews with the artists, exhibitions, tours of the grounds and master dance classes, many of which are free.
Ella Baff, the festival’s executive director, called the festival an “escape” because “there is no admission fee required to enter the grounds and take part in the more than 200 free performances, talks and events...In these tough economic times, the Pillow remains a place that everyone, regardless of financial status, can enjoy.”
The Pillow also houses a training center for dance, “The School,” that offers professional advancement programs throughout the festival in specific forms: ballet, cultural traditions (hip-hop), contemporary traditions, jazz/ musical theatre dance and choreography. National auditions will be held for these programs.
Click here for additional details and an audition schedule.
