Performing Diaspora Archives - Page 8 of 10

16 Sep, 2009

Rembetiko by Kunst-Stoff

2009-09-16T14:06:08-07:00By Yannis|Categories: CounterPULSE, Performing Diaspora, Yannis Adoniou|Tags: KUNST-STOFF, Performing Diaspora, Rembetiko, yannis adoniou|

Rembetiko is a type of music and lifestyle that was developed by the Greek refugees that lived for countless generations in Turkey and then were forced to move back to the motherland of Greece because of the threat of genocide. Yannis Adoniou Catherine Clambaneva and Leonidas Kassapides are exploring the style and importance of Rembetika by dissecting their own disciplines of dance, song and shadow theater and creating a new language so that the audience can feel in their heart

16 Sep, 2009

Returning to the “Door of No Return”.

2009-09-16T13:25:12-07:00By Colette|Categories: Colette Eloi, CounterPULSE, Performing Diaspora|Tags: Colette Eloi, Haiti, Performing Diaspora|

I wonder if my ancestors imaged that their children would ever come back home to Africa. After experiencing being captured beat, chained together and walked miles and miles from their homes, ancestral lands, family, language, culture, religion, food, flora and fauna to sit and wait in a dungeon. To be taken to a place on boats named “Jesus” and such. The slave dungeon in Elmina, Ghana is called a castle ironically enough and a church sits on top of it.

15 Sep, 2009

Untangling Webs

2009-09-15T02:30:35-07:00By Adia|Categories: Adia Tamar Whitaker, CounterPULSE, Performing Diaspora|Tags: adia whitaker, CounterPULSE, perform|

ind (circle) - the ghana blogs 2008 - (i feel you Colette!) Where clear crabs slide sideways across broken seashells and glass, there is a magnificent tossing and turning. At night they sing saltwater mountains of rage and revolt, a stampede of white stallions trample screaming angels and choke a caterwauling into the sea. Like fire shooting out of high voltage outlets into frazzled plugs, every grain of sand, salt and sea was charged and exploding. My feet sank as I sang

14 Sep, 2009

Place, Setting and The Beginning

2009-09-14T01:31:09-07:00By Opal|Categories: CounterPULSE, Opal Palmer Adisa, Performing Diaspora|Tags: Opal Palmer Adisa, Performing Diaspora|

Myal, like many African based religion is tied intricately to place, location -- the setting and its surrounding fauna/flora play an important role. Myal was initially believed to simple mean "spirit." The first known recorded observation of a Myal ceremony was in 1774 by Edward Long, who documented the performance of a Myal dance intended to persuade slaves that they would be invulnerable to the bullets of the white man. It was said they were told by the Myal leader

7 Sep, 2009

Thank you…

2009-09-07T20:58:49-07:00By CONTRA-TIEMPO|Categories: Ana Maria Alvarez, CounterPULSE, Performing Diaspora|Tags: Ana Maria Alvarez, CONTRA-TIEMPO, Performing Diaspora|

Danica and Dulce -thank you both so much for your sharing! Having been in Cuba for the first works in progress showing - and looking towards the 20th as the first time I will be meeting many of the other artists in this amazing convergence of cultures, approaches, artistic voices - I am feeling nervous, overjoyed, fearful, delighted and absolutely frantic all at once... As the date grows nearer and as the rehearsal process is underway - the 'everyday' seems

31 Aug, 2009

Devendra Sharma for Performing Diaspora: “Mission Suhani”- Reflections from India!

2009-08-31T23:34:58-07:00By Devendra|Categories: CounterPULSE, Devendra Sharma, Performing Diaspora|Tags: Devendra Sharma, dowry, forced marriages, immigration, Indian folk music, Indian folk opera, Indian women's rights, Nautanki, Performance for Communication, Performing Diaspora, politics of immigration, Pundit Ram Dayal Sharma|

Hi friends! I spent last three months living in India, co-writing the new Nautanki performance script for the “Performing Diaspora” with my father-- the renowned Nautanki artist, Pundit Ram Dayal Sharma, I loved my time in India. It was so much fun, and a learning experience, working with my father on this script that focuses on the issue of Indian men living in the U.S., who go back to India to get married to young Indian women and receive huge

29 Aug, 2009

Cry into the song

2009-08-29T19:36:19-07:00By Adia|Categories: Adia Tamar Whitaker, CounterPULSE, Performing Diaspora|Tags: activism, african american women, Afro-Haitian, ampey, art, arts, avant-garde, children's games, community, counter pulse, CounterPULSE, Dance, diaspora, education, emerging artists, emerging arts, folkloric, gender issues, ghana, grassroots, mission, non profit, Performance, performing arts, Performing Diaspora, san francisco, sf, soma, theater|

The Ewe say " ... you must cry into the song." A man in the taxi said "... you are beautiful when you cry." ... But these things are not easy. To cry into the song when you are still so sad ... To let your beauty shine thru when you feel as though there is nothing to hold you up. Today "Ampey!" took it's first breath. It's a girl and a boy. A mommy and a daddy ... very

28 Aug, 2009

Koreni, making peace with the past to move forward as life gets in the way of ART

2009-08-28T15:09:33-07:00By Danica|Categories: CounterPULSE, Danica Sena Gakovich, Events, Performing Diaspora|Tags: Danica Sena Gakovich|

The very spontaneous nature of art rarely gives way to "schedules", ie. scribbling notes on a bathroom floor at 4am so as not to wake up the household, 2-hour rehearsals that turn into 10 hours, starting with violins and ending up with tambourines, constant breaking of commitments due to double-booking or financial constraints...and yet as performers, choreographers, collaborators we must adhere to some semblance of organization so as not to disappear into our microcosmic "bubbles". A famous Spanish dancer who

26 Aug, 2009

developing the script… the bare bones

2009-08-26T10:01:34-07:00By CONTRA-TIEMPO|Categories: Ana Maria Alvarez, CounterPULSE, Performing Diaspora|Tags: "Tangled Routes", CONTRA-TIEMPO, food, journey, Performing Diaspora, Salsa|

So I haven't been good with updating the blog regularly - I am the same way about my own personal blog - but when I do it is thorough! We have been traveling all summer and I have been very in my head about this work - working on skill building and movement material but not setting anything - that will begin next week - what I have been working on this summer is more the structure and 'script' of

25 Aug, 2009

Bihag, my choreographic take on the Hip hop Tinikling – part 2

2009-08-25T21:33:52-07:00By Dulce Capadocia|Categories: CounterPULSE, Dulce Capadocia, Performing Diaspora|Tags: Dulce Capadocia|

Archival Photo of Silayan Dance Company featuring dancers Sandy Mendez and Mandy Burgos from article on "Filipino Life", Los Angeles Times 1986 (Costume idea for Tikling Bird Goddess in "BIHAG" - look at male dancer in the back) I write in my pajamas in this late bright sunny afternoon wondering why I haven’t changed since the morning. I hesitate; feeling deeply exhausted from last month’s activities, I am slow to recuperating. I keep having to convince myself that being

20 Aug, 2009

Approaching the Feminine – Prumsodun Ok for Performing Diaspora

2009-08-20T04:41:20-07:00By Prumsodun|Categories: CounterPULSE, Performing Diaspora, Prumsodun Ok|Tags: Cambodian Classical Dance, Gender, Khmer Arts Ensemble, Multidisciplinary Art, Prumsodun Ok, Samba, Sim Thaina, Sompeah Kru|

"He, who is described as male, is as much the female and the penetrating eye does not fail to see it." - Rigveda It is 4.06 AM. My eyes tell me that I need to sleep but lying in bed is proving useless as thoughts race through my head. I was in Cambodia for ten days, just two days ago and have brought so much back with me. New knowledge, new costumes, new energy, and the pop song that currently

19 Aug, 2009

Towards Chicano Dance

2009-08-19T13:33:23-07:00By Gema|Categories: CounterPULSE, Gema Sandoval, Images, Performing Diaspora|Tags: Gema Sandoval|

When you choreograph folk dance and work to transfer movement from its natural habitat to the stage the considerations are: : Is the representation accurate? Am I being true to the spirit of the dance? Have I accurately reflected the integrity and idiosyncracy of the music, dance and people of that area? As important as these questions are, they are also the very elements that discourage creative evolutions from that dance. Additionally, I have always been keenly aware that ,

Performing Diaspora

MENU