Industry: Cennarium to Present First-Ever Streamed Performing Arts Festival Offering Free Access to Opera, Dance, Theater, Musicals & More

Audiences are increasingly consuming their favorite entertainment on computers, laptops, tablets and smartphones. Everything from music, movies, television, sports and books are now widely available to download or stream for easy and affordable viewing from just about anywhere, anytime. Music has been distributed digitally for almost two decades. Movies and television are all now largely distributed digitally through companies such as Netflix, Amazon, Apple and Hulu. The performing arts, however, have yet to become as readily available to audiences through these new digital channels. Cennarium, a new streaming service for the performing arts, aims to change that and put the final piece of the digital entertainment puzzle in place.

Cennarium offers subscribers a wide selection of world-class performances in a variety of genres including drama, dance, comedy, musical, opera and other theatrical productions from countries including the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Italy, Brazil, Spain, Germany and Russia. All productions are streamed in high-definition giving audiences the best possible viewing experience. A subscription to Cennarium costs $9.97 per month or $95.64 per year ($7.97/month) and includes unlimited access to an international assortment of performing arts productions.

"We are trying to grow the global performing arts audience by making Great Performances more accessible and affordable to a larger portion of the population," said Themis Gomes, CEO of Cennarium. "The overwhelming majority of the population does not have access to the performing arts and 95 percent of large productions are restricted to major cities; Cennarium enables subscribers to view performances no matter where they live."

To promote making the performing arts more accessible through streaming, Cennarium will make some of the most spectacular performances from around the world available to audiences around the world for free during "Promenade," the first-ever streamed performing arts festival. Promenade will run for 10 days beginning Sept. 15, with two performances each evening from 8-10 p.m. (EDT and PDT). Promenade is completely free with performances available for viewing from anywhere on any device. Viewers can sign-up for the online festival at www.Cennarium.com/Promenade.

Cennarium also enables performing arts companies to embrace new technologies and forms of distribution to share their work with exponentially larger audiences while still maintaining the integrity of their performances.

"Martha Graham discovered the power of capturing dance on film over 50 years ago; while she was deeply committed to the kinesthetic experience of live theater, she also was a visionary and knew that new technologies provided many other ways to make profound connections with audiences," said Janet Eilber, artistic director of the Martha Graham Dance Company. "The Martha Graham Company continues Martha's avidity for the power of technology and new forms of distribution. Streaming lets us connect with audiences around the world who may never have the opportunity to see our dancers live. It's a vital expansion that supports all that we do."

Performances chosen for Promenade have been carefully curated from some of the finest performing arts productions from around the world. Each night will feature two performances to be streamed simultaneously in a specific genre, including dance, theater, opera, magic, circus, comedy and musical. There will be chatrooms for viewers to connect with each other, a program guide for the evening with information about the performances and performers and a guest host for the evening to welcome viewers and introduce the performances. Among the performances to be streamed in high-definition during the festival are the epic undertaking of Alexander Ekman's "A Swan Lake," the multi-awarded German musical "Dangerous Liaisons," San Francisco Opera's thrilling production "Moby Dick," Grupo Galpao's carnivalesque "Romeo & Juliet" and several others.

Promenade will benefit Broadway Cares/Equity Fights Aids, with a donation being made for every performance streamed during the festival up to $5,000.