January 23, 2007 -

OTTAWA -- “Watching an evening of William Forsythe’s sleek, urban works is like taking a stimulant.” (The Village Voice, New York). The world’s foremost creator of contemporary ballet is known for radical imagination, choreographic invention, and a distinct theatrical vision. When The Forsythe Company appears in Southam Hall of the National Arts Centre on Saturday March 10 and Sunday March 11, 2007 at 20:00, the 18 dancers will perform a mixed programme consisting of Ricercar, Quintett, and the North American premiere of a new work (as yet untitled).

“There is nobody to compare to Forsythe. He will be remembered as ballet’s Mozart.”
Dance Europe

“Ricercar” (from Merriam-Webster): any of various keyboard musical forms of the 16th and 17th centuries in either quasi-improvisatory toccata style or strict polyphonic fugal style. “Ricercar” from the Italian word ricercare: to seek again, to seek out. “Ricercar” as defined by William Forsythe, 2003: a formal investigation -- intricate movement combinations unfolding in a clean curving sweep. In a musical room created by the rush and pause of David Morrow’s variations on J.S. Bach’s “Ricercar a 6”, a six-voice fugue, the dancers wind their way, breathing, shaking, swinging, in a pyrotechnic display of the choreographer's genius for endless movement invention.

The elegiac Quintett demonstrates a quieter and more contemplative side of Forsythe. In counterpoint to the heartbeat of ‘Jesus’ Blood Never Failed Me Yet’ by Gavin Bryars, this piece is a love letter to his dying wife. The curtain rises on a clear, open plane and the dancers set into motion a slow, eddying force; a seamless flow of duets, solos, and trios that grows in fluid, joyous complexity. The dancers appear and vanish through an opening in the ground, a bright, vital vision that contains an awareness of its own end. The dance is slower, more considered and the dancers are perfect in their athleticism, style, and dedication.

William Forsythe is recognized world-wide as the foremost choreographer of contemporary ballet. For twenty years as director of the Ballett Frankfurt, his choreography and his company’s performances consistently won overwhelming audience acclaim and the most prestigious awards the field has to offer. His work has significantly re-oriented the practice of ballet from its historical encapsulation in classical repertoire to a new viability as a dynamic art form of the 21st century.

After the closure of Ballett Frankfurt at the end of the 2003-2004 season, Forsythe established The Forsythe Company in January 2005.Together with a more intimate ensemble of 18 dancers, the choreographer has built on the intense collaboration developed in the rehearsal studio over the last 20 years and begun to explore a new dramaturgy of social and political engagement. His enduring and evolving interest in developing alternative encounters with the audience is leading the company to performances and installations in theatres, public spaces, museums and cultural houses worldwide.

The Forsythe Company performs Ricercar, Quintett, and a new work in Southam Hall of the National Arts Centre on Saturday March 10 and Sunday March 11, 2007 at 20:00. Tickets are $54, $51, $40 and $31 for adults and $28.25, $26.75, $21.25, and $16.75 for students (upon presentation of a valid student ID card). Tickets are available at the NAC Box Office (in person) and through Ticketmaster (with surcharges) at (613) 755-1111; Ticketmaster may also be accessed through the NAC’s website at www.nac-cna.ca. Same-day Live Rush tickets (subject to availability) for full-time students (aged 13-29) are $10 at the NAC Box Office between 14:00 and 18:00 on the day of performance only, upon presentation of a valid ‘Live Rush’ card. Groups of 10 or more save 15% to 20% off regular ticket prices to all NAC Music, Theatre and Dance performances; to reserve your seats, call 947-7000 ext. 384 or e-mail grp@nac-cna.ca

New! Dinner packages at Kinki, Social, and Meditheo are available with the purchase of tickets to any NAC Dance performance. Book your package by visiting Ticketmaster at one of the following links: http://www.ticketmaster.ca/promo/24375, http://www.ticketmaster.ca/promo/24364, or
http://www.ticketmaster.ca/promo/b5kfde

Photos for all dance events can be viewed and downloaded at: www.nac-cna.ca/media/

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Information:
Gerald Morris
Marketing and Media Relations,
NAC Dance Department
(613) 947-7000, ext. 249
gmorris@nac-cna.ca

WILLIAM FORSYTHE
As an American working internationally for the last thirty years, William Forsythe is recognized as one of the world’s foremost choreographers. His work is celebrated for reorienting the practice of ballet from its identification with classical repertoire into a dynamic 21st-century art form.

Raised and principally trained in New York, Forsythe arrived on the European dance scene in his early 20s as a dancer and eventually as Resident Choreographer of the Stuttgart Ballet. At the same time he also created new works for ballet companies in Munich, The Hague, London, Basel, Berlin, Frankfurt am Main, Paris, New York, and San Francisco. In 1984, he began a 20-year tenure as Director of the Frankfurt Ballet where he created many of the most celebrated dance theatre works of our time, such as The Loss of Small Detail (1991) in collaboration with composer Thom Willems and designer Issey Miyake. Other key works from the Frankfurt Ballet years include Gänge (1982), Artifact (1984), Impressing the Czar (1988), Limb’s Theorem (1990), A L I E / N A(C)TION (1992), Eidos:Telos (1995), Endless House (1999) and Kammer/Kammer (2000).

Forsythe’s choreography and his companies’ performances have won overwhelming audience acclaim and the most prestigious awards the field has to offer, such as the Bessie Award (1988, 1998, 2004), Laurence Olivier Award (1992, 1999), Commandeur, Ordre des Arts et des Lettres (1999), the German Distinguished Service Cross (1997) and the Wexner Prize (2002). He has been chosen as ‘Choreographer of The Year’ several times by international critics’ surveys.

After the closure of the Frankfurt Ballet in 2004, Forsythe established a new, more independent ensemble – The Forsythe Company. The company was founded with the support of the states of Saxony and Hesse, the cities of Dresden and Frankfurt am Main, and private sponsors. Forsythe’s most recent creations are developed and performed exclusively by the new company while his previous work is prominently featured in the repertoire of virtually every major ballet company in the world including The Kirov Ballet, New York City Ballet, San Francisco Ballet, The National Ballet of Canada, The Royal Ballet Covent Garden, and The Paris Opera Ballet, among many others. The Forsythe Company, based in Dresden and Frankfurt am Main, enjoys a yearly residency at the Schiffbauhalle of the Schauspielhaus Zürich and also maintains an extensive international touring schedule.

Forsythe’s choreographic thinking has engaged with and contributed to the most significant international artistic currents of our time: from performance and visual arts to architecture and interactive multimedia. He has created architecture / performance installations commissioned by Daniel Libeskind in Germany, Artangel in London, Creative Time in New York, and the City of Paris. His short film, Solo, was presented at the 1997 Whitney Biennial. In 2006, a major exhibition of his performance, film and installation work was presented at the Pinakothek der Moderne in Munich.

In 1994, Forsythe virtually reinvented the teaching of dance with his pioneering and award-winning computer application «Improvisation Technologies: A Tool for the Analytical Dance Eye» which is used by professional companies, dance conservatories, universities, postgraduate architecture programs and secondary schools. As an educator, Forsythe is regularly invited to lecture and give workshops at major universities and cultural institutions internationally. He served as the first Mentor in Dance in the inaugural cycle of the Rolex Mentor and Protégé Arts Initiative and currently codirects and teaches in the Dance Apprentice Network Across Europe (D.A.N.C.E.) program. Forsythe has been awarded an honorary fellowship from the Laban Centre for Movement and Dance in London and an honorary doctorate from the Juilliard School in New York.