Alonzo King Lines Ballet to Return to The Wallis With DEEP RIVER in June

Alonzo King LINES Ballet will return to the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts with Deep River by company co-founder, artistic director, and visionary choreographer Alonzo King, on Friday, June 9, and Saturday, June 10, 2023, 7:30 pm, in The Wallis' Bram Goldsmith Theater. The full-length work is set to a score by jazz pianist, composer, and MacArthur Fellow Jason Moran featuring Grammy Award-winning vocalist Lisa Fischer. This is King's second collaboration with Fischer and his ninth collaboration with Moran, which he created as a part of LINES Ballet's recent 40th anniversary season. Bending the lines between classical and contemporary ballet, King draws on the strengths of his extraordinary dancers altering the way we look at ballet today. Hailed for its evocative work and unique artistic vision, LINES Ballet adheres to the classical form-the linear, mathematical and geometrical principles deeply rooted in the East-West continuum. An artist talk back will immediately follow the performance on June 9.

Deep River is a call to keep hope and to look at each other as a family of souls. The moving work melds dance with Black spirituals and invites audiences to look at human beings as the pinnacle of creation. King says that on the highest level the work is a reminder that "love is the ocean that we rose from, swim in, and will one day return to - and that love can set us free."

King added, "As we look back on 40 years of work in the community, in ourselves, the programs, classes, and performances, both live and on film, we recognize that it is the same vision and belief that have carried us to this moment and will continue to carry this organization into the future. We have strived to make obvious that art is the inheritance of every individual, that art activates evolutionary growth, is an intellectual virtue, and the fostering principle for all that is made, done, or known."

Tickets, $39 to $125, are on sale now. The Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts is located at 9390 N. Santa Monica Blvd, Beverly Hills. To purchase tickets and for more information, please call 310-746-4000 or visit TheWallis.org/Alonzo. The company will also perform Deep River May 27, at Segerstrom Hall in Costa Mesa - scfta.org.

The health and safety of patrons, staff, and artists inside and outside the venue are a top priority for The Wallis. Masks are optional, and proof of full COVID vaccination is no longer required; however, guests are welcome to wear masks in our spaces.

The Wallis' health and safety protocols are also subject to change at the venue's sole discretion or in accordance with LA County and City of Beverly Hills regulations. Current Health & Safety Protocols and updates may also be accessed at TheWallis.org/Safety. Policies are subject to change.

About Alonzo King LINES Ballet:

Alonzo King LINES Ballet is a celebrated contemporary dance company that has been guided since 1982 by the unique artistic vision of Alonzo King. Alonzo King LINES Ballet has collaborated with noted composers, musicians and visual artists from around the world to create performances that alter the way we look at ballet today. Its unique artistic vision adheres to the classical form - the linear, mathematical and geometrical principles that are deeply rooted in the pre-existing East-West continuum.

Forty years of outstanding, multi-disciplinary collaborations for the stage place the LINES Ballet company at the forefront of artistic innovation in ballet. With each collaboration, LINES Ballet investigates deeply rooted affinities between Western and Eastern classical forms, elemental materials, the natural world, and the human spirit. At LINES Ballet, the artistic investigation is infinite and essential for it leads to what unites us as human beings: empathy, joy, and the ability to transcend. LINES Ballet's spring and fall home seasons and global tours share this vision of transformative, revelatory dance with 50,000+ audience members worldwide every year.

King said, "The term LINES alludes to all that is visible in the phenomenal world. There is nothing that is made or formed without a line. Lines are in our fingerprints, the shapes of our bodies, constellations, geometry. It implies genealogical connection, progeny and spoken word. It addresses direction, communication, and design. A line of thought. A boundary or eternity. A melodic line. From vibration or dot to dot it is the visible organization of what we see."

The Company has been featured at venues such as the Venice Biennale, Monaco Dance Forum, Maison de la Dance de Lyon, the Edinburgh International Festival, Montpellier Danse, the Wolfsburg Festival, the Holland Dance Festival, and most recently the Théâtre National de Chaillot in Paris.

Alonzo King has been called a visionary choreographer, who is altering the way we look at ballet. King calls his works "thought structures" created by the manipulation of energies that exist in matter through laws, which govern the shapes and movement directions of everything that exists. Named as a choreographer with "astonishing originality" by The New York Times, Alonzo King LINES Ballet has been guided by his unique artistic vision since 1982.

King has works in the repertories of the world's leading ballet and modern companies and has collaborated with distinguished visual artists, musicians, and composers across the globe. His work has been recognized for its impact on the cultural fabric of the company's home in San Francisco, as well as internationally by the dance world's most prestigious institutions.

King was honored with a Dance Magazine Award in 2020. He received Honorary Doctorates from The Juilliard School, Dominican University of California, and California Institute of the Arts in recognition of his significant contribution to the field of dance. Renowned for his skill as a teacher, King was also honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award by the Corps de Ballet International Teacher Conference in 2012. Joining historic icons in the field, King was named one of America's "Irreplaceable Dance Treasures" by the Dance Heritage Coalition. An internationally acclaimed guest ballet master, his training philosophy undergirds the educational programming at the Alonzo King LINES Dance Center of San Francisco, which includes the pre-professional Training Program, Summer Program, and the BFA Program at Dominican University of California.

About Lisa Fischer

"Lisa Fischer in concert is addictive. Every performance is so enriching, so exciting, so transcendent that you want more. With remarkable vocal range and vocabulary, Fischer can sing soul, jazz, rock, gospel, pop, folk and classical with equal facility and authority. She often mixes styles in the same song, sometimes in the same vocal line. Her approach tends to be intimate, artful and almost meditative, accompanied by her interpretive dancing, but she also can cut loose and funk with fierceness and rock with abandon." (Minneapolis Star Tribune)

After four decades of featured background singing with icons like Luther Vandross, The Rolling Stones, Chaka Khan, Tina Turner, and Nine Inch Nails, Lisa Fischer set out to take center stage with her own humble, heartfelt song. The 2013 Best Documentary Oscar winning film Twenty Feet from Stardom altered the course of Lisa's musical journey, telling her story, with clips of her legendary duets with Sting or with Mick Jagger on "Gimme Shelter," left audiences eager to see and hear more, so Lisa took the chance to set out on her own reinventing classic songs with her co-conspirators JC Maillard and Grand Baton. Their organic fusion of Caribbean psychedelic soul and jazzy progressive rock ignited Lisa's flexibility and freedom of expression, awakening her lifelong desire to make music that heals but still rocks the house.

While Lisa's range is legendary, her greatest gift is the ability to connect, to reach the hearts of her listeners. Raised in the Fort Greene neighborhood of Brooklyn, she emerged from New York's fervent studio scene in the early 1980s, sang for two decades with legendary vocalist Luther Vandross, and released "So Intense", earning her first Best R&B Performance Grammy with "How Can I Ease The Pain". She joined the Rolling Stones for their 1989 Steel Wheels tour, and continued to grace their stage for the next 26 years.

Lisa's passion for constant growth and experimentation with different styles invited recent collaborations with jazz pianist Taylor Eigsti, Sting, Bruce Springsteen, Michael McDonald, Eric Krasno, Talib Kweli, Billy Childs and YoYo Ma, the BBC Proms / Jules Buckley and the Metropole Orkest, Alonzo King LINES Ballet, Anna Deavere Smith's Notes from the Field for HBO, and especially her full evening program The Classic Lisa Fischer with Grand Baton and Seattle Symphony, Cincinnati Symphony and The National Philharmonic.

About Jason Moran

Jazz pianist, composer, and performance artist Jason Moran was born in Houston, TX, in 1975 and earned a degree from the Manhattan School of Music, where he studied with Jaki Byard. He was named a MacArthur Fellow in 2010 and is the Artistic Director for Jazz at The Kennedy Center. Moran currently teaches at the New England Conservatory.

Moran is deeply invested in reassessing and complicating the relationship between music and language, and his extensive efforts in composition, improvisation, and performance are all geared towards challenging the status quo while respecting the accomplishments of his predecessors. His activity stretches beyond the many recordings and performances with masters of the form including Charles Lloyd, Bill Frisell, and the late Sam Rivers, and his work with his trio The Bandwagon (with drummer Nasheet Waits and bassist Tarus Mateen) has resulted in a profound discography for Blue Note Records. The scope of Moran's partnerships and music-making with venerated and iconic visual artists is extensive. He has collaborated with such major figures as Adrian Piper, Joan Jonas, Glenn Ligon, Stan Douglas, Adam Pendleton, Lorna Simpson, and Kara Walker; commissioning institutions of Moran's work include the Walker Art Center, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Dia Art Foundation, the Whitney Museum of American Art, Harlem Stage, and Jazz at Lincoln Center.

The artist's solo exhibition, Jason Moran: Black Stars: Writing in the Dark is currently on view at Mass MoCA in North Adams through November 2024. Other recent institutional solos shows include Bathing the Room with Blues at The Museum of Contemporary Art Denver (2021-22), and Jason Moran, organized by the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN in 2018, which traveled to the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, MA, Wexner Center for the Arts, Columbus, OH, and Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY (a monographic publication accompanied the exhibition). Moran has participated in major group exhibitions such as the Whitney Biennial, Venice Biennale, and Soft Power at San Francisco Museum of Fine Art.

About Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts:

Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts is a dynamic cultural hub and community resource where local, national and International Artists share their artistry with ever-expanding audiences. The campus, located in the heart of Beverly Hills, CA, is committed to robust and distinctive presentations and education programs curated with both creativity and social impact in mind. Distinguished by its eclectic programming that mirrors the diverse landscape of Los Angeles and its location in the entertainment capital of the world, The Wallis has produced and presented more than 350 theater, dance, music, film, cabaret, conversation, and family entertainment programs since its doors opened in October 2013. Hailed as "au courant" (LaLa Magazine), The Wallis was lauded by Culture Vulture, which proclaims, "If you love expecting the unexpected in the performing arts, you have to love The Wallis." Its programming has been nominated for 79 Ovation Awards and nine L.A. Drama Critic's Circle Awards. The campus itself, a breathtaking 70,000-square-foot facility, celebrating the classic and the modern, has garnered six architectural awards. Designed by acclaimed architect Zoltan E. Pali (SPF:architects), the restored building features the original 1933 Beverly Hills Post Office (on the National Register of Historic Places), which serves as the theater's dramatic yet welcoming lobby, and includes the contemporary 500-seat, state-of-the-art Bram Goldsmith Theater; the 150-seat Lovelace Studio Theater; an inviting open-air plaza for family, community and other performances; and GRoW @ The Wallis: A Space for Arts Education, where learning opportunities for all ages and backgrounds abound. Together, these elements embrace the city's history and its future, creating a performing arts destination for L.A.-area visitors and residents alike. The Wallis is led by Michael Nemeroff Chairman of The Wallis' Board of Directors, and Robert van Leer, Executive Director and CEO.

For more information about The Wallis, please visit: TheWallis.org.

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