Dance Ensemble BOOMERANG and Deerhoof Drummer Greg Saunier to Bring REPERCUSSION to Dixon Place

By: Feb. 22, 2016
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Dixon Place's new commission of BOOMERANG Dance and Performance Project's REPERCUSSION in collaboration with Greg Saunier, drummer and founding member of the internationally acclaimed band Deerhoof, who wrote the music and will be performing it live. REPERCUSSION begins performances on Friday, March 11th at 7:30 PM.

Based on new writing by MacArthur "Genius" Award recipient Lewis Hyde, REPERCUSSION will play a limited run of six performances only - March 11th, 12th, 18th, 19th, 25th, and 26th, at 7:30 PM, at Dixon Place (161A Chrystie Street). Tickets are $19 in advance, $22 at the door, and $15 for seniors and students. Tickets can be purchased by visiting www.dixonplace.org or by calling 866-811-4111.

BOOMERANG, the daring dance and performance project hailed as the "punk Mozart's of dance," premieres their first full-length work, REPERCUSSION. The production was developed at a number or residencies (including Dixon Place and a month-long summer stay at the Watermill Center, led by the legendary avant-garde theatre maker Robert Wilson). This new dance explores relationships between movement and sound. The production was praised by Wilson as "Brilliant and exceptionally strong work which made me listen."

Watch the trailer below!


REPERCUSSION is a multidisciplinary collaborative project, born out of choreographer Kora Radella's longstanding interest in relationship between physicality of dance movement and sound of live music, previously explored in her projects with the performance collective Double-Edge Dance. In REPERCUSSION, BOOMERANG combines her concept of "awkward grace" - an intentionally off-balance, idiosyncratic movement developed by her own body with the kinesthetic artistry of dancers Matty Davis and Adrian Galvin. Greg Saunier's physically charged and expressive drumming sets the tone for the piece, while the psychical instruments - snare drum, cymbal, and bass drum - constitute the set and visual frame for the performance.

One of the important themes in REPERCUSSION is its fearlessly physical exploration of 'active forgetting,' a concept borrowed from new and as of yet unpublished writings by essayist, cultural critic and 1991 MacArthur Fellow Lewis Hyde. The writer worked closely with Radella on assembling the collection of quotes that subsequently made their way into a song incorporated into the work. The costumes for the piece were designed and produced by the avant-garde fashion collective threeASFOUR (www.threeasfour.com), recipients of the Cooper-Hewitt/Smithsonian Museum's 2015 National Design Award known for their work with such artists as Björk, Yoko Ono, and Matthew Barney.

BOOMERANG Dance and Performance Project was created in 2012 by co­directors Matty Davis and Kora Radella with founding member Adrian Galvin. Recognizing the body as an evolving warehouse for physical and psychological life events, BOOMERANG conveys the eclectic histories that everyday people face and those working around them. BOOMERANG has performed throughout New York City, as well as in Barcelona, Berlin, Chicago, Cleveland, Grand Rapids and Pittsburgh. BOOMERANG was shortlisted as 1 of 20 juried finalists for the Grand Jury Prize at ArtPrize7.

Greg Saunier is best known as the drummer of acclaimed rock band Deerhoof. Since he co­founded the group in 1994, he has produced or co­produced their 13 albums and has been their most consistent songwriter. As a drummer, he has performed drums onstage or on recordings with Laurie Anderson, Anthony Braxton, David Byrne, Yoko Ono, Konono No. 1 and The Flaming Lips. He is active in the free music scene in New York and has released improvisation records with Sean Lennon, Zach Hill, Joanna Newsom and Brian Chippendale. He is a sought-­after producer and remixer for other artists including Maroon 5, Xiu Xiu, Marc and Mantra Percussion Ensemble. He has composed notated works for yMusic, Brooklyn Rider String Quartet, Ensemble Dal Niente, Ecstatic Percussion, Daan Vandewalle, Spektral Quartet and Empire Drive­In Casio Orchestra. This year will see the release of his Deerhoof Chamber Variations by Stargaze Ensemble, the performance of a new work for Kronos Quartet, String Quartet with choreography by Pam Tanowitz at the Vail International Dance Festival and Lincoln Center.

Kora Radella is the choreographer and a co­artistic director of BOOMERANG. In addition to her work with BOOMERANG, she is the artistic director of Double­Edge Dance, whose work has been performed in cities including Aberdeen, Amsterdam, Barcelona, Basel, Berlin, Brussels, Cleveland, London and New York City. Noted for her use of 'awkward grace,' she researches being on the edge of control, pushing both physical & psychological balances. Radella received a 2014 Ohio Arts Council Individual Excellence Award. Her honors also include the Ineke Sluiter Prize for choreography in Amsterdam, a fellowship from the Belgian American Educational Foundation for choreographic research in Brussels and numerous grants. Radella's primary teaching interests include contemporary dance technique with dynamic release principles, improvisation, choreography and movement for actors.

Matty Davis is the principal performer and a co­artistic director within BOOMERANG. He is also an artist whose work pits the body against often-radical undertakings and journeys that explore the limits and empathic possibilities of embodiment, as well as the origin of materials and mark making. Davis has performed at the Watermill Center, Judson Church, the United Nations and in Performa 13 and Performa 15, which included working with Francesco Vezzoli and dancing with David Hallberg at St. Bart's Church at Performa's opening gala. Matty has studied at Kenyon College, the American Dance Festival, Anne Teresa de Keersmaeker's P.A.R.T.S. in Brussels, Belgium. He is currently pursuing his MFA at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. In 2015, he was selected as one of 80 artists internationally to work with Robert Wilson at the Watermill Center's International Summer Program.

Adrian Galvin is a co­founder and dancer with BOOMERANG. He is a yoga teacher at Katonah Yoga in New York City and musician with his bands, Poor Remy and Yellerkin. Yellerkin's recent EP was received with critical acclaim and their music can be found via the link to the right. Galvin graduated from Kenyon College (2012), where he designed his own major in liberation theology and German Social Theory.

Lewis Hyde is a MacArthur "Genius" grant recipient. His 1983 book, The Gift, is an inquiry into the situation of creative artists in a commercial society. Trickster Makes This World (1998) is a portrait of the kind of disruptive imagination needed to keep any culture flexible and alive. Hyde has also published a book of poems, This Error is the Sign of Love, and edited a number of volumes, including The Essays of Henry D. Thoreau, a book of responses to the poetry of Allen Ginsberg, and selected poems of the Nobel Prize winning Spaniard, Vicente Aleixandre. Hyde most recently published Common as Air: Revolution, Art, and Ownership, a book about 'cultural commons,' that vast un-owned store of ideas, inventions and art that we have inherited from the past and continue to create in the present.

The Dixon Place Lounge is open before and after the show. Proceeds directly support Dixon Place's artists and mission. Dixon Place is located at 161A Chrystie Street (between Rivington and Delancey), in Manhattan's Lower East Side (By subway: F to 2nd Ave, J/Z to Bowery, 6 to Spring St, M to Essex St).

An artistic incubator since 1986, Dixon Place is a Bessie and Obie Award-winning non-profit institution committed to supporting the creative process by presenting original works of theater, dance, music, puppetry, circus arts, literature & visual art at all stages of development. Presenting over 1000 creators a year, this local haven inspires and encourages diverse artists of all stripes and callings to take risks, generate new ideas and consummate new practices. Many artists, such as Blue Man Group, John Leguizamo, Lisa Kron, David Cale, David Drake, Deb Margolin and Reno, began their careers at DP. In addition to emerging artists, Dixon Place has been privileged to present established artists such as Mac Wellman, Holly Hughes, Justin Bond, Karen Finley, Kate Clinton and Martha Wainwright. After spawning a salon in her Paris apartment in 1985, founding Artistic Director Ellie Covan pioneered the institution in her NYC living room for 23 years. Covan was a recipient of a Bessie, a New York Dance and Performance Award and a Bax10 Award for her service to the community. Dixon Place received two Obie Awards, and an Edwin Booth Award for Excellence in Theater. Dixon Place has organically developed and expanded into a leading professional, state-of-the-art facility for artistic expression.

For more information, visit www.dixonplace.org or follow on Twitter: @dixonplace and Facebook: facebook.com/dixonplace.



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