St. Paul Ballet – Best of The Nutcracker 2022
St. Paul Ballet has created a special edition for our return to the stage last year, the Best of The Nutcracker! Join us for sprinkles of seasonal magic and joy that will bring cheer to the whole family. Best of The Nutcracker will feature crowd favorites by Lirena Branitski including the Kingdom of the Snow from Act 1, as well as Spanish, Russian, and Waltz of Flowers from the Kingdom of Sweets along with excerpts from the Party Scene, guest appearances by CAAM Chinese Dance Theater and talented musicians from St. Paul Ballet who perform regularly in Minnesota. This intimate jewel of a concert is lovingly designed for the audience as we all return to the theater. The performance is under 90 minutes including intermission and is a perfect way to introduce the whole family to the power and beauty of dance. This year tickets are Pay As You Can. So, make time for joy this season and don’t miss this singular event!
The Classic Nutcracker
Ballet Minnesota’s 34th annual The Classic Nutcracker, returns to the O’Shaughnessy! Come celebrate this annual family holiday tradition! For novices to the ballet, this holiday story begins on Christmas Eve. We join a young girl, Clara, her mischievous brother, Fritz, and their family hosting a Christmas party. A latecomer to the party is Clara’s mysterious Godfather Drosselmeyer. He presents her with a marvelous gift, a Nutcracker doll. As Clara goes to sleep that night, we are transported into her dream of the Rat King fighting the Nutcracker and his army of toy soldiers. The Nutcracker Prince escorts Clara through an enchanted snow-covered forest and on to his Kingdom of the Sweets where Clara accepts the throne from the Sugar Plum Fairy. Enjoy the return of this classic holiday favorite!
The Classic Nutcracker
Ballet Minnesota’s 34th annual The Classic Nutcracker, returns to the O’Shaughnessy! Come celebrate this annual family holiday tradition! For novices to the ballet, this holiday story begins on Christmas Eve. We join a young girl, Clara, her mischievous brother, Fritz, and their family hosting a Christmas party. A latecomer to the party is Clara’s mysterious Godfather Drosselmeyer. He presents her with a marvelous gift, a Nutcracker doll. As Clara goes to sleep that night, we are transported into her dream of the Rat King fighting the Nutcracker and his army of toy soldiers. The Nutcracker Prince escorts Clara through an enchanted snow-covered forest and on to his Kingdom of the Sweets where Clara accepts the throne from the Sugar Plum Fairy. Enjoy the return of this classic holiday favorite!
The Classic Nutcracker
Ballet Minnesota’s 34th annual The Classic Nutcracker, returns to the O’Shaughnessy! Come celebrate this annual family holiday tradition! For novices to the ballet, this holiday story begins on Christmas Eve. We join a young girl, Clara, her mischievous brother, Fritz, and their family hosting a Christmas party. A latecomer to the party is Clara’s mysterious Godfather Drosselmeyer. He presents her with a marvelous gift, a Nutcracker doll. As Clara goes to sleep that night, we are transported into her dream of the Rat King fighting the Nutcracker and his army of toy soldiers. The Nutcracker Prince escorts Clara through an enchanted snow-covered forest and on to his Kingdom of the Sweets where Clara accepts the throne from the Sugar Plum Fairy. Enjoy the return of this classic holiday favorite!
Invite the Moon to Dance
Launching CAAM Chinese Dance Theater’s 30 th Anniversary season, Artistic DirectorJinyu Zhou brings together her original choreography, CAAM CDT dancers and livemusic by Gao Hong, internationally award-winning Pipa virtuoso with the CarletonChinese Instrumental Ensemble in a world premiere performance. Also included aredance performances by Aloe Liu, CAAM CDT’s newest professional and Walker ArtCenter Choreographer’s Evening artist, in a live collaboration with Gao Hong. Specialguest dance performances by Katha Dance and St. Paul Ballet round out this specialcelebratory program. These performances should not be missed!
Contempo Physical Dance – Desert
Contempo Physical Dance returns to The O’Shaughnessy with their 3rd international choreography residency, featuring a world premiere by the 2022 McKnight International Choreographer, Mario Nascimento. Mr. Nascimento is from Manaus, in the Amazon region of Brazil. He is the Artistic Director of Corpo de Dança do Amazonas, a contemporary dance company in the region. In the future, everything could be transformed into a desert of the soul; an emptiness of the soul and emptiness of life. It could also be a place where there isn’t anything, where there aren’t any trees or life. But at the same time, the desert is a place of resistance because people who live in the desert are resistant people. The desert is a place where the species of life are resistant to the world, resistant to destruction, resistant to everything that is bad. This group of dancers are resistant to the state in which we live today – resistant to the destruction of the forest, the destruction of indigenous people, and prejudices. This work is about human nature in its search for survival and preservation. An insistence for survival, an insistence to keep on our feet, an insistence in being resistant to the questions in our everyday lives that box us in. These dancers are like an urban tribe, resisting the desertification of the soul. People who live in the desert are strong and heroic. They are resistant, because the desert strengthens them.
Contempo Physical Dance – Desert
This performance is approximately 70 minuets. Contempo Physical Dance returns to The O’Shaughnessy with their 3rd international choreography residency, featuring a world premiere by the 2022 McKnight International Choreographer, Mario Nascimento. Mr. Nascimento is from Manaus, in the Amazon region of Brazil. He is the Artistic Director of Corpo de Dança do Amazonas, a contemporary dance company in the region. In the future, everything could be transformed into a desert of the soul; an emptiness of the soul and emptiness of life. It could also be a place where there isn’t anything, where there aren’t any trees or life. But at the same time, the desert is a place of resistance because people who live in the desert are resistant people. The desert is a place where the species of life are resistant to the world, resistant to destruction, resistant to everything that is bad. This group of dancers are resistant to the state in which we live today – resistant to the destruction of the forest, the destruction of indigenous people, and prejudices. This work is about human nature in its search for survival and preservation. An insistence for survival, an insistence to keep on our feet, an insistence in being resistant to the questions in our everyday lives that box us in. These dancers are like an urban tribe, resisting the desertification of the soul. People who live in the desert are strong and heroic. They are resistant, because the desert strengthens them.
James Sewell Ballet – Breathe
As we continue to innovate in the field of dance – the art form of touch and breath – JSB shares a program with breath and exchange at its center. Take it in and let it fill you up. Special guest XINA combines her dance and music savvy to co-create a piece blending art-pop and spiritual sensibilities – no formula, just boundless creativity. Michael Walters returns with brand new choreography after astonishing and energizing audiences with his JSB New Works Project ’22 premiere. Arimee Gambill, in her fifth season as company dancer, debuts a work that combines rapture with decay. What happens at the intersection of total rhapsody and utter nihilism? Rounding out the program is a restaging of Sewell’s Grey (2018), with mesmerizing moves swirling to selections from Ukrainian world-music quartet DakhaBrakha.
James Sewell Ballet – Breathe
As we continue to innovate in the field of dance – the art form of touch and breath – JSB shares a program with breath and exchange at its center. Take it in and let it fill you up. Special guest XINA combines her dance and music savvy to co-create a piece blending art-pop and spiritual sensibilities – no formula, just boundless creativity. Michael Walters returns with brand new choreography after astonishing and energizing audiences with his JSB New Works Project ’22 premiere. Arimee Gambill, in her fifth season as company dancer, debuts a work that combines rapture with decay. What happens at the intersection of total rhapsody and utter nihilism? Rounding out the program is a restaging of Sewell’s Grey (2018), with mesmerizing moves swirling to selections from Ukrainian world-music quartet DakhaBrakha.
Ananya Dance Theatre: Nün Gherāo: Surrounded by Salt
Running time: 74 minutes, without intermission • ASL interpretation on September 30 Nün Gherāo uses a 1978-79 massacre on the Marichjhapi Island in West Bengal, India, as its point of departure to explore betrayal, dispossession, and exile, and the desperate global resistance against great odds that fuels hope and survival. This work becomes activated through shared breath and rhythms, practices of mourning, overlapping time cycles, ritualized movement, dances of fire and personal connection that tag different sites of memory through meditations on dancing in salt water, where one’s tears meet the rising and warming oceans of our world.Choreographed by Ananya Chatterjea and performed by the artists of Ananya Dance Theatre, Nün Gherāo features the work of an exceptional team of collaborators, including sound artist Spirit McIntyre (performing live), stage director Marcus Young, lighting designer Kevin A. Jones, costume designer Annie Cady, scenery designer Chelsea Warren, props designer Kezia Florence, writer Mimi Mondal, and filmmaker Darren Johnson.PAY WHAT YOU CARE asks those who routinely pay $30 for Ananya Dance Theatre tickets to pay that amount; it is the fair market value of the ticket. If you need to pay less, you can choose to pay less, as little as $5 a ticket. Those who can pay more than the market price are welcome to do so, and your generosity will help cover the cost of someone else’s ticket.
