10 Hairy Legs Debuts 5th Consecutive New York Season at BAM

10 Hairy Legs, the all-male repertory Dance Company, debuts at BAM for its fifth consecutive New York Season for four performances June 8-11. Continuing to showcase the company's extensive repertory and aggressive commissioning of World Premiere Commissions, our New York Season features 2 World Premieres to bring the number of exclusive works to 14 and 4 musical scores since its founding in 2012. The program is completed by the Brooklyn premiere of 2016 Commissions by Doug Varone and Megan Williams. Tickets are $25 for Adults and $20 for Students and Groups of 10 or more through the BAM Box Office on line or by calling 718.636.4100.

Al Blackstone's "Brian," is a vibrant and playful quintet set to "Say I Wanna Know" by Nick Waterhouse that showcases the dancers' storytelling abilities, playfulness and the spirit that they bring into the space. Blackstone noted: "Working with 10 Hairy Legs is an opportunity to blur the line between dance and theater, comedy and drama, classic and cutting edge. The men in the company differ from dancers in most other companies in that they themselves transcend labels. They are classically trained yet commercially viable, exquisitely sophisticated and somehow also scrappy and humorous."

Raja Feather Kelly's "Andy Warhol's Blue Movie," will have a newly commissioned score by Bryan Strimpel that will be played live at all performances. Kelly noted: "I am obsessed with the life and work of Andy Warhol and the development of popular culture over the last thirty years. I am inspired by Warhol's philosophy and aesthetic as a model for my own use of repetition, iconography, and cinematic sensibilities. I am invested in amplifying mundane and/or pedestrian movement so that it becomes scientific and virtuosic. I use performance making and exhibition as a way to promote empathy. My practice identifies and magnifies opportunities where popular culture and human desire intersect ... all of my training and background-Speech and Debate, Musical Theatre, social dance styles of the 90's, my academic study of Modern Dance and English-have prepared me for the uniquely Warholian way that I re-humanize our over-mediated experience of reality. Working with 10HL is a dream. It takes a special kind of dancer to work in a Repertory Company. It's not for everyone. Having to adhere to so many choreographers' visions is no easy feat. Each of the dancers do it differently and so well. I dedicate my piece to them, because they have worked so hard in realizing my vision. Each dancer and performer has shown a personal interest in my work and the work we are creating together. They have integrity, they have investment and it is a treat to see them live through movement." This work is underwritten in part by a Major Grant from The O'Donnell Green Music and Dance Foundation.

Varone's work "mark," is a quartet set to the music of Holly Herndon. Varone noted, "It was great to work through this and find a place that looked like the sound but also had its own structural identity." Artistic Director Randy James commented, "It's riveting, deeply complex yet so simple and clear - rhythmically rich." Deborah Jowitt noted in her review in Arts Journal: "Varone's mark mates strongly designed movements with cool precision."

Megan Williams' quartet "Quadrivium" is set to "New York Counterpoint," a lush Steve Reich score, "Quadrivium" digs into the intrinsic space held by memories of boyhood play and social behavior, male preening rituals, and the desire to create a folk dance for the 21st century. "... tricky individual paths come together in elaborate counterpoint." --- Deborah Jowitt, Arts Journal. On Saturday, June 10, 10 Hairy Legs honors Baraka Sele with its Arts Advocacy Award. Baraka Sele has served as an Advisory Board Member to 10 Hairy Legs since our founding in 2012. Her holistic approach to community building in the arts has had a direct impact on the company's exponential growth in audience and scope of programs and services extending our reach beyond traditional dance audiences. Her insistence upon the highest of standards of excellence day in and day out keeps us true to the authenticity of our mission.

Tickets for the Benefit Performance and Dessert Reception on June 10 are $150/Gold in support of New Commissions and $75/Silver in support of Education Program Scholarships and include one ticket to the performance and the post-performance reception. Tickets to the Benefit sold exclusively through 10 Hairy Legs at 10hl.org until June 5 when they may be purchased at the BAM Box Office. Proceeds support and. The Bosco Instant Photo Booth sponsors the Benefit, and a Photo Booth will be at the post-performance reception for guests to enjoy.

Patrons with Visual Disabilities may request a Large Print Program by contacting Executive Director Elizabeth Shaff Sobo at bsobo@10hl.org by June 2, 2017. BAM Fishman is barrier-free.

About 10 Hairy Legs

Randy James, founding Artistic Director of 10 Hairy Legs, has had a significant impact on the field of dance for more than three decades locally, regionally, nationally and internationally as a highly regarded dancer, choreographer, teacher, guest lecturer, panelist and staunch advocate of the arts. In 2010 the The Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation cited him as "The Patron Saint of New Jersey dance." As a choreographer, James has created more than 40 works on his own companies and on 16 other professional companies throughout the United States, garnering positive reviews from The New York Times and The Village Voice. The New Jersey State Council on the Arts/Department of State honored him three times with Choreography Fellowships in 1995, 2002 and 2014 in recognition of his artistic excellence and named him "Distinguished Teaching Artist." As an Associate Professor of Dance, James has been a member of the dance faculty at Mason Gross School of the Arts, Rutgers University, since 1998.

10 Hairy Legs is an all-male repertory Dance Company performing existing and newly commissioned works. Since our founding in 2012 we have commissioned 12 works from choreographers Doug Varone, Doug Elkins, Tiffany Mills, Manuel Vignoulle, Julie Bour, Megan Williams and founder Randy James. We have served more than 65,000 patrons, students, artists and educators throughout the NY/NJ region, in NYC at New York Live Arts, The 92nd Street Y, Brooklyn Dance Festival, Modern Dance at Bryant Park, Dixon Place, Gibney Dance, Joe's Pub, West End Theatre, Fire Island for the DRA Benefit Week End, Dance at Socrates, Koresh Come Together Festival; on tour to the Choregus Dance Festival in Tulsa, OK, Seattle, WA, The Cayman Islands, New England; and Rhode Island; broadcast nationally and internationally on NJTV's State of the Arts, The Meredith Vieira Show and Nick Cannon's Red Nose Dancathon, and in residence at the Kaatsbaan International Dance Center. In December 2016 we were the only American Dance Company appearing at the Cape Town (South Africa) International Dance Festival. The company provides a wide range of education programs for all ages focusing on the many facets of maleness as expressed through dance, serving more than 6,500 students and educators each year.

"...since its formation in 2012, its rapid growth has been astonishing...The diversity of this programming is a treat for audiences...this company has also become a welcome source of choreographic commissions." - Robert Johnson, 2014.

In 2015 10 Hairy Legs launched 10 HL Projects, which includes women for specific productions outside of the all male company. The first of these was a new full-length work based upon C. S. Lewis' The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, choreographed by James that had its World Premiere at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center in January 2016.

Our Artistic Collaborators are choreographers Julie Bour, Seàn Curran, David Dorfman, Dan Froot, Doug Elkins, Heidi Latsky, CLeo Mack, Tiffany Mills, David Parker, Stephen Petronio, Claire Porter, Niv Sheinfeld and Oren Laor, Doug Varone, Manuel Vignoulle, Christopher Williams and Megan Williams; musicians Tigger Benford, Sarah Biber, Jane Chung, Lachlan Glen, Kyle Olson, Robert Maggio, Michael Wall, Dorian Wallace and Peter Whitehead; and designers Abraham Cruz, Oana Botez, Cindy Capraro, Benjamin Heller, John Lasiter, Naomi Luppescu, Mary Kokie McNaugher, Dennis O'Leary-Gullo, Lauren Parrish, Amanda Ringger, Amanda Shafran, Ken Tabatchnik and Olivier Theyskens. In addition to their work with 10 Hairy Legs, our company members are currently featured artists with The Bang Group, Stephen Petronio Company and Zvi Dance, among others.

Leadership funding for the company has been provided by The Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation, New Music USA, The Frank & Lydia Bergen Foundation, The Blanche and Irving Laurie Foundation, The O'Donnell Green Music & Dance Foundation, The Harkness Foundation for Dance, Magyar Bank Foundation, Middlesex County Cultural and Heritage Commission, with assistance provided by the New Jersey State Council on the Arts/Dept. of State, the Rutgers Research Council, Johnson & Johnson and The Hyde & Watson Foundation.

This event is presented by 10 Hairy Legs. BAM house, ticketing, and membership policies may not apply.

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