SOLD-OUT SHOW RETURNS TO FRINGE FOR DANCE, MUSIC, LIVE MIXED MEDIA IN PLANETARIUM

BIODANCE, Sound ExChange, and W. Michelle Harris interact with 4-story dome at the

Rochester Museum & Science Center

ROCHESTER, NY – BIODANCE, Sound ExChange, and W. Michelle Harris return to RMSC’s Strasenburgh Planetarium with the sold-out phenomenon from Rochester’s 2013 Fringe, Anomaly. This multi-art, experimental show that tests the boundaries between audience and performer will take place on Thursday, September 15 at 7PM, and Saturday, Sept. 17 at 2pm and 7pm at the Rochester Museum and Science Center Strasenburgh Planetarium.  Eric Rezsnyak, then editor of City News, claimed that “It was so lovely to behold that I found myself dreading its inevitable conclusion.” Missy Pfohl Smith, Artistic Director of BIODANCE and Director of the Program of Dance and Movement at University of Rochester, says, “I could not be more thrilled to collaborate again with Sound ExChange and W. Michelle Harris bring this special show back to life for the first time in three years, and to give it a new life of its own. In a time of climate change and broad social unrest, this piece offers a respite from the storm, inviting a peaceful center to bring back and share with the world.”
Anomaly brings together the artistry BIODANCE, hailed by City Newspaper as “Visually stunning,” and Sound ExChange, a music collective described by the Rochester Business Journal as a group that “turns the classical music concert on its head.” Live cinematic mix by visual artist W. Michelle Harris (Rochester Institute of Technology) envelopes the musicians, dancers and audience in a completely immersive experience inside the 4-story dome of the Planetarium. The virtuosic musicians from the Eastman School of Music ensemble, Ossia New Music, led by Dustin Seo, will perform live music from today’s leading composers, providing a narrative thread for the 45-minute show. Original choreographic work by Missy Pfohl Smith/BIODANCE, including the premiere of a new dance to the recorded music of Eastman alumni and Sound ExChange percussionist Kurt Fedde, the dancers from BIODANCE join the musicians in a collaborative and multi-sensory arts experience transports the audience to a deeply reflective state about existence within our larger universe. “…a brilliant merging of modern dance, classical music and eye-popping visuals…’Anomaly’ is a true sensorial experience.” (City News)

The show embraces the irregular nature of such an extensive collaboration and promises to be, as the traditional definition ‘anomaly’ suggests, “a deviation or departure from the normal or common order, form, or rule.” The show features Pulitzer Prize winner Caroline Shaw’s Limestone and Felt for cello and viola, with a surprising interior view of the landscape of self and of the planetarium. Arvo Part’s classic duo Spiegel im Spiegel (mirror in a mirror) concludes the show with a special feature from the planetarium’s most impressive display instruments, and one of Rochester’s best-kept secrets.
The Strasenburgh Planetarium, a 4-story dome at the Rochester Museum & Science Center, is one of greater Rochester’s most unique assets and has a 40-year-plus culture of unusual creativity among planetariums.

Anomaly: BIODANCE, Sound ExChange, and W. Michelle Harris takes place on September 15 at 7:00 PM, and September 17 at 2:00 PM and 7:00 PM at the Rochester Museum & Science Center Strasenburgh Planetarium, 657 East Avenue, Rochester, NY, 14607. Admission is $15. Tickets can be purchased at rochesterfringe.com.

(http://www.rochesterfringe.com/tickets-and-shows/anomaly)

Follow and learn more about BIODANCE, Sound ExChange, W. Michelle Harris, RMSC and Ossia New Music:

www.biodance.org; www.soundexchangeproject.com; http://people.rit.edu/wmhics/; ; www.rmsc.org; www.ossianewmusic.org
For hi-res photographs or more information, contact Missy Pfohl Smith at [email protected] or (585) 201-1002 or Emily Wozniak at [email protected] or (314) 973-6479

 

 

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BIODANCE heads to University of Southern Mississippi Feb. 9-12, 2016, to teach and perform two duets, “Absent Presence” from 2004, and “Amidst Crossed Wires in Parallel Paths” from 2015. Courtney World and Missy Pfohl Smith will perform these and other works together for this tour, as well as teaching four master classes. (Photos of Courtney and Missy in “Absent Presence” by Ralph A. Thompson)

 

 

“BUILDING A DANCE COMMUNITY!” Join us Saturday April 2nd for a day of dance. BIODANCE is featured in the Choreographer’s Showcase at 7:30pm at Cayuga Community College 197 Franklin St, Auburn, New York 13021.
About Event: We are so thrilled and excited to present the “Artist’s Dance Experience”. An experience for serious dancers…and choreographers to showcase their works. This event will draw a wide range of students and choreographers for across New York State. The day includes: Master Classes given by presenting dance studios and a dance concert performance in the evening. For more information please contact us 315-730-6056. Tickets are available for 7:30pm show $12 General Admission $10 Seniors & Students. Master Classes are open to public $40 (Observation pass available $20 )

BIODANCE performed at the American College Dance Association’s Northeast Conference on Thursday, March 11 at 7pm at The College at Brockport.

BIODANCE performed as plenary guest artists at University of Rochester’s “Creative Innovation: Building Synergy through the Arts, Sciences and Diversity” on November 13, 2015.  Sharing Smith’s choreography from the BIO/DANCE & Social Justice series, the company performed In/Difference at the Memorial Art Gallery at the Creative Innovation Performance and Reception.  Smith also served on a panel:  INVESTIGATE Breakout Session that examined methods for trans-disciplinary research and its connection to diversity with a panel of scholars led by AnnMarie White, EdD.

 

BIODANCE presents In/Difference on Jan. 5, 2016 at Rammerman Leadership Group in Rochester, NY.  As part of the BIO/DANCE & Social Justice Series, the company presents choreography by Missy Pfohl Smith as part of Frederick Jefferson’s Leadership course, accompanied by dialogue and discussion.

 

“Compartmented”

Multimedia site-specific art happenings

Co-curated by Missy Pfohl Smith and Evelyne Leblanc-Roberge

At ‘The Sunday School’

Rochester Lyric Opera

440 East Avenue, Rochester, NY 14607

December 4 & 5, 2015, 6–9pm, $5 at the door

For images and souvenirs from the show, visit Compartmented’s Website: http://thesundayschool.space

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/events/1221086807907978/

Seventeen artists will occupy ‘The Sunday School’ located in the back of the Lyric Opera Theatre for two evenings of site-specific installations and performances in December. The audience will be invited to wander through a unique curiosity cabinet and explore the architectural structure transformed by the artists’ interventions. Independent artists and faculty from University of Rochester, RIT, Alfred University, Alfred State College and Hobart and William Smith Colleges were invited by the organizers/curators to imagine and present work in response to this fascinating space.

Missy Pfohl Smith happened upon the space when considering venues for The Fringe, and immediately thought it would make for fascinating site-specific art and performance. Smith contacted colleague Evelyne Leblanc-Roberge, suspecting she too would be inspired by the space. Smith says, “I was thrilled when Sue Cotroneo and Lyric Opera were willing to let us play in this curious space. Lyric Opera’s plans to renovate the space into a cabaret hall were scheduled to begin in January – I felt an urgency to give these fascinating vestiges from the former Christian Scientist Church one last life through art, dance and media.” Luckily, Evelyne wholeheartedly agreed, and the two invited multi-disciplinary artists from the region to explore and create in and for the space. Leblanc-Roberge writes, “One could see Bentham’s Panopticon, strange biblical reading rooms, a compartmented symmetrical cabaret, fascinating surfaces and corners, rounded walls, hypnotic wallpaper, one could hear the sound of a lost memory, imagine a dress as big as a room, a play of differences and repetitions, the smell and texture of a worn red carpet, typographic wonders of ancient blue prints, a place of worship, or perhaps a surveillance device.” The curators and the dozen artists involved in the project are curious to know, “What will you find here?”

This project would not be possible without the Rochester Lyric Theater, thank you!

 

BIODANCE shared two works from the BIO/DANCE & Social Justice Series on Oct. 11, 2015 in Spurrier Dance Theatre at University of Rochester.  In/Difference choreographed by Missy Pfohl Smith and (drowning) choreographed by Lev Earle were performed by Jeanne Schickler Compisi, Kathy Diehl, Lev Earle, Maureen Gorman, Alaina Olivieri, Laura Regna, Julie Schlafer Rossette, Missy Pfohl Smith, Stuart Tsubota and Kaitley Wozer.

 

On Friday, Oct. 16, there will be a FREE dance performance at Rush Rhees Library, Q&I Area, First Floor (inside the front/main entrance off the quad) at 12:00noon of BIO/DANCE & Social Justice. This performance will feature work by BIODANCE, students from DAN378 Choreographic Voice: Dance & Social Justice, and special guest artists.  Work will include (drowning) by Lev Earle, Lined Up for Injustice by Donna Davenport, In the Palm of Our Hands by Kelly Johnson,  Rickshaw-See-Saw by Allen C. Topolski, and more.  Join us!

This performance is made possible with support from Kinections and with funds from the Decentralization Program, a regrant program of the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature and administered by Livingston Arts, a member supported organization.

Please consider supporting this project and helping us match our grant by making a tax-deductible contribution online at this website through our Contributions page!

 

On Friday, June 19, BIO/DANCE and Social Justice will be presented at Community Place of Greater Rochester (145 Parsells Ave., Rochester, NY) in a free, public performance at 12:30pm.  On this day, we commemorate Juneteenth, the ending of slavery in the United States.  But we also mourn on this day, the nine victims of the atrocious Charleston Church shooting – nine innocent African American citizens of our country.  While we struggle to understand how it is possible for this type of hate crime, and so many other losses where race, difference, religion and fear play a main role, to continue in 2015, we offer our work as a way to open a dialogue about these issues, as way to share the beauty of difference, and as a way to honor justice and equality and humanity.

BIODANCE and Social Justice Starts May 29 Press Release 1