Electric Pear Announces SYNESTHESIA 2010 4/21-5/1

In October 2009, a composer/lyricist team was asked to select a fortune cookie. They created a musical theatre piece based on the fortune. Two weeks later, they presented their work to another artist. This artist then had two weeks to create a piece based on the work shown to him (never having seen the fortune), and then presented his art to the next artist in the series. She then created a piece...and then another artist, and then another artist... eventually, eleven in all.

From April 21st - May 1st 2010, the assembled works of all eleven artists will be presented live, in-sequence, at the? Wild Project in New York City's East Village (269 East 3rd Street). Conceived and Produced by Ashlin Halfnight, Melanie Sylvan & Electric Pear Productions

"Electric Pear Productions has taken the grade-school game of Telephone to a new level."?- Time Out New York

Witness the next stage in the convergence of media. Now in its fourth season, Synesthesia is a live, annual event, which unites a select and diverse range of arts and artists for eight performances only. Synesthesia is an Electric Pear exclusive, conceived by Ashlin Halfnight and Melanie Sylvan, and staged for the first time in 2007. This year's show will offer up an evening of original music, theatre, art, film, dance...and surprises!

This year's line-up includes:
Ari Hest (Singer/Songwriter Extraordinaire)
Jon Morris' The Windmill Factory (Fuerzabruta's Running Man) Featuring William Nayan and Natalie Thomas
Brent Arnold (Electric Looping Cellist)
Mariana Elder & Andrew Elsesser (Musical Theatre's Next Hot Team)
Thomas Doyle (Micro Sculpture Artist)
Meghan Frederick (Superphysical Dancer/Choreographer)
-With dancer Elisa Davis
Brian J. Bustos (Broadway Costume Designer)
Stone Cold Fox (UCB's House Sketch Comedy Team)
Tariq Cherkaoui (Animator and Motion Graphic Artist)
The Mayhem Poets (Spoken Word/Slam Poet Dream Team)
Joel Bravo (Indie Rock Interstitial Music)
and Adam Ramsey (Mixologist)!!

Performances will be: Wednesday 4/21, Thursday 4/22, Friday 4/23, Saturday 4/24, Monday 4/26, Wednesday 4/28, Thursday 4/29, all at 8pm
Final Show: Saturday 5/1 at 7pm!
at The Wild Project, 269 East 3rd Street.

All Tickets $20.00 and may be purchased at www.electricpear.org or by calling 212/352-3101.

$15 Student Rush Tickets - 15 Minutes Prior To Show?(must have student ID)

Box Office opens 30 minutes prior to performance

Artists:

Singer/Songwriter
Ari Hest
Many singer-songwriters toil for months on their Macs, trying to make a demo that sounds polished enough to score them a record deal with a major label. But Ari Hest has done the exact opposite, as he continues to defy the conventional route of a musician. Already signed to a major, he opted out of his label deal so that he could have more control over his art. He then embarked on his ambitious ‘52' project, during which he spent all of last year immersed in an unprecedented effort - to write, record, produce and release one new song per week, for 52 weeks in a row. Now, he will self-release his new studio CD, ‘Twelve Mondays,' on March 10th. The album features reworked versions of 12 fan-selected songs, culled from the past year's extraordinary output.

Performance

Jon Morris' The Windmill Factory
Featuring William Nayan and Natalie Thomas
Jon currently starts in Fuerzabruta, the hit show from the creators of De La Guarda. Jon has performed on stage with Cirque du Soleil, Guthrie Theatre, Diavolo Dance Theatre, the Evidence Room and with Ken Roht's Orphean Circus, Fabulous Monsters Ramayana2k4 (5 Drama Desk nominations), and company member of Tony Award winning Theatre de la Jeune Lune in Minneapolis. Jon produces, performs, directs original work around the world. He was a 2008 Robert Wilson's Watermill Residency winner and was a 2007 Finalist for the Center Theatre Group's Sherwood Award. He was awarded the prestigious Thomas J. Watson Fellowship to study Movement Theatre with Phillipe Gaulier in London, Pantheatre in Paris, Gurukulam in India, and Balinese Dance in Bali. B.A. from the University of the South and Michael Howard Studios, New York.

Costume Design

Brian J. Bustos

Brian J Bustos is a costume designer based in NYC. Some recent design projects: International Chocolate Fashion Show, Kinetix at Busch Gardens Williamsburg, Mirage Canteen at Busch Gardens Tampa. Broadway Design Associate/Assistant: Shrek: The Musical (Tony Award), A Little Night Music, The Little Mermaid, Nine: The Musical (2003 Revival). International Projects: Nine: The Musical (Japan), High Frequency Wavelengths International Tour (Poland, Russia, Belarus), Ben Hur Live (Turkey, Germany).

Mixologist

Adam Ramsey

Adam Ramsey began his career at Flatiron Lounge, the cocktail institution where his traditional outlook on drinking was significantly altered. He developed a deep reverence for the aesthetic of the cocktail, placing value not only on fresh ingredients, and quality products, but also on visual presentation, and the ability to challenge the customer's perception of spirits and cocktails, in general. He is currently working at mezcal haven, Mayahuel, where he is actively helping customers forget about the one bad experience they had with tequila in high school.

Musical Theatre

Mariana Elder - Bookwriter & Lyricist:
Andrew Elsesser - Composer
Mariana Elder is a free-lance writer for theater and television. Her musical The Burnt Part Boys (bookwriter) will have its Off-Broadway premiere at Playwrights Horizons in spring 2010. Theater awards include the Ensemble Studio Theatre's Rusty Magee Music Theater Fellowship, Daryl Roth First Look Award, NYU's Tisch School of the Arts Dean's Fellowship for Musical Theatre Writing, and the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center Scholarship. Her plays have been published in the Estrogenius Playsource. She has also proudly taught through Lincoln Center Theater's Open Stages program since 2001, and is a graduate of NYU Tisch, Grinnell College, and the National Theater Institute.
Andrew Elsesser holds degrees from Emerson College in Boston, and from New York University's Tisch School of the Arts, where he was the recipient of the Jan Peerce Fellowship and of a Tisch Scholarship. A former member of the experimental theater company Temporary Distortion, Andrew composed songs and incidental music for four pieces in collaboration with director Kenneth Collins. His music has been heard at the Ontological-Hysteric Theatre, the Chocolate Factory, HERE Arts Center, Makor, and the Cutting Room. He is the recipient of the ASCAP Foundation Max Dreyfus Award, and, with collaborator Mariana Elder, the Daryl Roth First Look Award and the Ensemble Studio Theatre's Rusty Magee Music Fellowship.

Sculpture

Thomas Doyle
Thomas' s work mines the debris of memory through the creation of intricate worlds sculpted in 1:43 scale and smaller. Often sealed under glass, the works depict the remnants of things past-whether major, transformational experiences, or the quieter moments that resonate loudly throughout a life. In much the way the mind recalls events through the fog of time, the works distort reality through a warped and dreamlike lens.

Dancer/Choreographer

Meghan Frederick
Meghan Frederick graduated from Hampshire College in 2007 with a self-designed degree in Dance and Cultural Studies. Since moving to New York that same year she has danced with Nicole Wolcott and Artichoke Dance Company, among others, and continues to dance with the Brian Brooks Moving Company, Tze Chun Dance Company, and the MacArthur Dance Project. She has presented her own choreography at Dixon Place and The Tank.

Sketch Comedy

Stone Cold Fox

Stone Cold Fox was founded in 2008 as a house sketch 'Maude' team at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre, where they produce a brand new 30 minute sketch show each month. Irreverent and smart humor in the UCB tradition. Writers: Crystal Delahanty, Jocelyn Guest, Guy Patton, Joe Spellman, Greg Tuculescu, David C. White. Performers: D'Arcy Erokan, Johnathan Fernandez , Ashley Hale, John Murray, Joe Spellman, Greg Tuculescu. Directed by Neil W. Casey.

Motion Graphics/Animation

Tariq Cherkaoui
Tarik Cherkaoui is a Moroccan-born independent animator living in New York City. His short films have won awards at the Chicago Int'l Film Festival as well as been featured in Human Rights Watch. He is interested in animation as a form of art and animates with traditional media such as paint on glass, markers and charcoal.

Cellist

Brent Arnold
Brent Arnold attacks the cello with fiery intensity and delicate subtlety, with an unconventional approach that often sounds like anything but a cello. In the service of a song he might fingerpick the cello like a guitar, pound it like a piano, or build a maze of electronic-sounding tones. His avant-garde yet populist approach calls to mind cello pioneers like Arthur Russell and Tom Cora, as well as classical/pop tinkerers like Andrew Bird and Final Fantasy and the intense instrumental music of Explosions in the Sky.

Spoken Word Artists

The Mayhem Poets
"Let's go see a poetry show." That is a sentence rarely proclaimed and usually responded to with cringes and excuses. The Mayhem Poets are on a mission to change that. Having been dubbed "an amazing ride" by the New York Times, this mind boggling performance has been described as "The Simpsons meets Malcolm X at a Notorious B.I.G. concert". These theatre trained, comedically gifted, lyrical virtuosos seamlessly blend raw elements of hip hop, theatre, improv and stand up comedy to tell gut wrenching truths that leave audiences forever changed.

Music
Joel Bravo

Joel is the lead singer of the Albertans and the duo Bravo Silva with Henry Silva (Gummer).

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