NOBA Will Open Season with Mark Morris Dance Group Performance, Oct. 22

The New Orleans Ballet Association (NOBA) is pleased to announce that its 2011-2012 season of dance will open with the world-renowned Mark Morris Dance Group at the Mahalia Jackson Theater on Saturday, October 22, 2011 at 8:00 PM.

The phenomenally gifted American dance icon, Mark Morris, is celebrating 30 years of creating intensely musical, endlessly inventive and joyously exuberant dances. Morris is a prolific and profound dancemaker, creating over 130 works for his company as well as for the San Francisco Ballet, Pacific Northwest Ballet, Dutch National Ballet and The Royal Ballet. He has worked extensively in opera, directing and choreographing productions for the Metropolitan Opera; New York City Opera; and The Royal Opera, Covent Garden.

World-renowned for a commitment to dance as a live music experience, the Mark Morris Dance Group always tours with classical musicians making every event a terrific concert and magnificent dance performance.

The long-awaited New Orleans return is no different, and this superb company brings a lush program of brand new dances and classical works set to live music, including, ALL FOURS set to Bartók, and his newest triumph, FESTIVAL DANCE, with music by Hummel. The evening's finale, GARND DUO, to music by Lou Harrison, is "one of the masterpieces of the 20th century" (The Guardian, UK).

Marking its first performance in New Orleans since 2002, "the Mark Morris Dance Group is the perfect kickoff to NOBA's 2011-2012 season," said Jenny Hamilton, executive director of NOBA. "The repertoire is classic Mark Morris and has been crafted specifically for New Orleans providing a perfect reintroduction to the company and the genius work of this prolific American artist."

ALL FOURS is set to Béla Bartók's String Quartet No. 4. In ALL FOURS the dancers are separated into two distinct groups, in which the outer group of eight dancers serves to frame the movements and often intimate encounters of the remaining four dancers.

Set to Johnann Nepomuk Hummel's Piano Trio No. 5 in E Major, Op. 83, FESTIVAL DANCE stands apart from the majority of Mark Morris' cannon of work because of its emphasis on partner work. 

The evening's finale GRAND DUO, set to Lou Harrison's Grand Duo for Violin & Piano, opens with 14 dancers posed as if they were models in a Greek relief painting. As the score progresses, the dancers movements create more tension, moving in tighter and tighter unison.

Single tickets for Mark Morris Dance Group are currently on sale for $20 - $80. Single tickets may be purchased by calling NOBA at 504-522-0996 or Ticketmaster at 1-800-745-3000; individual ticket sales are also available online at www.nobadance.com or www.ticketmaster.com. Discounts are also available for groups, seniors and students with a valid ID. To purchase season tickets or for more information on the upcoming season, call NOBA at 504-522-0996, Ext. 201 or visit www.nobadance.com.

The Mark Morris Dance Group (MMDG) was formed in 1980 and gave its first concert that year in New York City. The company's touring schedule steadily expanded to include cities both in the U.S. and in Europe, and in 1986 it made its first national television program for the PBS series Dance in America. In 1988, MMDG was invited to become the national dance company of Belgium, and spent three years in residence at the Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie in Brussels. The company returned to the United States in 1991 as one of the world's leading dance companies, performing across the U.S. and at major international festivals.

Based in Brooklyn, NY, the company has maintained and strengthened its ties to several cities around the world, most notably its West Coast home, Cal Performances in Berkeley, CA, and its Midwest home, the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign. MMDG also appears regularly in New York, NY; Boston, MA; Fairfax, VA; and Seattle, WA.

MMDG made its debut at the Mostly Mozart Festival in 2002 and at the Tanglewood Music Festival in 2003 and has since been invited to both festivals annually. From the company's many London seasons, it has also garnered two Laurence Olivier Awards.

MMDG is noted for its commitment to live music, a feature of every performance on its international touring schedule since 1996. MMDG collaborates with leading orchestras, opera companies, and musicians including cellist Yo-Yo Ma including the Emmy Award-winning film Falling Down Stairs (1997); percussionist and composer Zakir Hussain, Mr. Ma and jazz pianist Ethan Iverson in Kolam (2002); The Bad Plus in Violet Cavern (2004); pianists Emanuel Ax, Garrick Ohlsson and Yoko Nozaki for Mozart Dances (2006); and with the English National Opera in Four Saints in Three Acts (2000) and King Arthur (2006), among others. MMDG's film and television projects also include Dido and Aeneas, The Hard Nut, two documentaries for the U.K.'s South Bank Show, and PBS' Live From Lincoln Center.

In September of 2001, the Mark Morris Dance Center opened in Brooklyn, NY, to provide a home for the company, rehearsal space for the dance community, outreach programs for local children, and a school offering dance classes to students of all ages.

Born on August 29, 1956, in Seattle, Washington, Mark Morris studied with Verla Flowers and Perry Brunson. In the early years of his career, he performed with the Koleda Balkan Dance Ensemble, and later the dance companies of Lar Lubovitch, Hannah Kahn, Laura Dean, and Eliot Feld. 

Morris formed the Mark Morris Dance Group in 1980, and has since created more than 130 works for the company. From 1988-1991, he was Director of Dance at the Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie in Brussels, the national opera house of Belgium. Among the works created during his time there were three evening-length dances: L'ALLEGRO, IL PENSEROSO ED IL MODERATO; DIDO AND AENEAS; and THE HARD NUT. In 1990, he founded the White Oak Dance Project with Mikhail Baryshnikov.

Morris is also a ballet choreographer and has created seven works for the San Francisco Ballet since 1994 and received commissions from many others. His work is also in the repertory of the Pacific Northwest Ballet, Boston Ballet, Dutch National Ballet, New Zealand Ballet, Houston Ballet, English National Ballet, and The Royal Ballet.

Morris is noted for his musicality and has been described as "undeviating in his devotion to music." He has worked extensively in opera, directing and choreographing productions for The Metropolitan Opera, New York City Opera, Gotham Chamber Opera, English National Opera, and The Royal Opera, Covent Garden.

In 1991, Morris was named a Fellow of the MacArthur Foundation. He has received eleven honorary doctorates to date. In 2006, Morris received the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs Mayor's Award for Arts & Culture and a WQXR Gramophone Special Recognition Award "for being an American ambassador for classical music at home and abroad." He is the subject of a biography, Mark Morris, by Joan Acocella (Farrar, Straus & Giroux) and Marlowe & Company published a volume of photographs and critical essays entitled "Mark Morris' L'Allegro, il Penseroso ed il Moderato: A Celebration."

Morris is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Philosophical Society. In 2007, he received the Samuel H. Scripps/American Dance Festival lifetime achievement award. In 2010, he received the prestigious Leonard Bernstein Lifetime Achievement Award for the Elevation of Music in Society.

The MMDG Music Ensemble, formed in 1996, performs with the Dance Group throughout the season at home and on tour and has become integral to the company's creative life. The core group of accomplished musicians is supplemented by a large roster of regular guests, including cellist Yo-Yo Ma and pianist Emanuel Ax. While in Brooklyn, members of the ensemble continue to participate in the Mark Morris Dance, Music and Literacy Project in the New York City public school system.

 

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