MIRLITONS to Make NYC Debut at L'Alliance New York
Chaignaud and Hainaux create an uncategorizable encounter blending dance, beatbox, and physical performance.
L'Alliance New York has announced the New York City premiere of Mirlitons by François Chaignaud and Aymeric Hainaux with performances on November 4-6, 2026 at 7:30PM at Le Skyroom, L'Alliance New York, 22 East 60th Street, 8th Floor, New York, NY, 10022. Tickets start at $15 and can be purchased here.
What does mirliton mean? Depending on the context, a mirliton could be a kid's flute, a bad poem, an old French coin, a military hat, or a pastry. In this performance, it's an encounter between two voices and bodies: choreographer François Chaignaud and beatboxer Aymeric Hainaux. The audience is presented with a total saturation of frequencies and muscles in this energetic performance, as the artists engage in a percussive duel. Through their voices, feet, arms, props and costumes, Chaignaud and Hainaux create a duet that is as uncategorizable as the word mirliton.
François Chaignaud graduated in 2003 from Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris ; he has worked with many choreographers (Alain Buffard, Boris Charmatz, Emmanuelle Huynh, Gilles Jobin). Since 2004, he has been a multidisciplinary artist - dancer, choreographer, singer, actor, historian and cabaret artist. His work was influenced very early on by the articulation between song and dance (Думи мої DUMY MOYI, 2013), and it is also fueled by deep historical research - for Chaignaud's own pieces as well as for the many collaborative creations with artists such as Jérôme Marin, Marie-Caroline Hominal, or Théo Mercier.
From 2005 to 2016, he created several pieces with Cecilia Bengolea, like Sylphides (2009),
(M)IMOSA (with Trajal Harrell and Marlene Monteiro Freitas, 2011) and Dub Love (2013).
In 2021, he founded mandorle productions, confirming his trajectory shaped by many collaborations. With Nina Laisné, he created Romances inciertos, un autre Orlando (2017) and with Marie-Pierre Brébant, he created Symphonia Harmoniæ Cælestium Revelationum (2019). In 2020, he co-created GOLD SHOWER with butoh icon Akaji Maro, as well as Un Bolero with Dominique Brun. His work also comprises group pieces: in 2018, he created Soufflette for the Norwegian Ballet Carte Blanche and in 2022 t u m u l u s, then In absentia in 2024 avec Geoffroy Jourdain (Les Cris de Paris). In 2023, he created Cortèges with composer Sasha J. Blondeau and Mirlitons with beatboxer Aymeric Hainaux. In 2024 Chaignaud created Petites Joueuses - a piece commissioned by the Musée du Louvre and the Festival d'Automne à Paris. In 2025, he created Último helecho with Nina Laisné and Nadia Larcher. He was the focus feature of the Festival d'Automne à Paris in 2025. In 2026, Chaignaud was appointed director of the Centre Chorégraphique National de Caen en Normandie.
With his background in the visual arts, (he first turned to cartoon stip at the Beaux-arts d'Angoulême, then to painting) Aymeric Hainaux is invested in a very personal approach to the human beatbox. He creates machine sounds so precise as the famous Roland TR909, and his incomparable technique makes him one of the prominent artists of this art. Hainaux 'plays what happens,' and his performances are a music of the present instant, attentive to silence and movement. Without a loop pedal, but the use of a microphone, some bells, a harmonica, and sometimes a cassettes player, all exclusively played in real time. He has collaborated with Christine Quoiraud, Tanya Tagaq, Kenzo Kusuda, Oguri, Erik M, and Anne Lise Le Gac. In 2005, he began a solo tour by hitchhiking. This adventure lasted eight years during which he traveled 40,000 kilometers each year-from Meknes to Copenhagen and from Tallin to Rome-and staged 700 performances on three continents. With banjo player Stéphane Barascud, in 2013, he created the music brut duo Cantenac Dagar, which proposed un rituel pour l'invention d'une sensibilité radicale (Sonic Protest festival, 2017). The group has released a dozen records, and this duo remains Hainaux's main musical project. The diversity of his projects also brings him to perform in the backrooms of restaurants and art venues. These include, in France, Mixart Myrys, the CND (Centre National de la Danse), Les Siestes Électroniques, the Palais de Tokyo, and the Sonic Protest festival. His label Isola Records, which he has been running since 2011, makes books, cassettes, CDs and records of artists and groups working at the borders of concerts and performances. He also has a practice of poetic writing and publishing. In 2023, he contributed to the soundtrack for Clément Cogitore's film Goutte D'or.
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