HERE Announces Additional Online Programming, Including a Zoom Opera, Livestreams, and More

In response to the current pandemic, the OBIE-winning HERE has announced additional free online programming designed to uplift audiences during these challenging times. These programs include #stillHERE, a weekly Livestream featuring a HERE artist who invites viewers to share in the creation of new work; and HERE@HOME, a weekly watch party that streams full-length productions previously presented at HERE; and #COVIDEO, a sequential, community-built work of video art that is led by HERE artists and staff, and that the public is invited to participate in.

#stillHERE Livestreams take place on Fridays at 1pm and will include New York City-based theater artist Aaron Landsman on April 10 and choreographer Alexandra Beller on April 17. On April 24, HERE will debut All Decisions Will Be Made By Consensus: A Zoom Opera by librettist Rob Handel, composer Kamala Sankaram, and director Kristin Marting.

HERE cracks open their vault of archived videos with HERE@HOME. Airing Wednesdays at 7pm on Facebook, HERE@HOME feature recordings of full-length productions previously presented at HERE and will include Arias with a Twist, the New York Times critic's pick collaboration between Joey Arias and Basil Twist; Wooden from choreographer Laura Peterson; Nick Lehane's puppet play Chimpanzee; The Reception from Donovan & Calderón; and The Scarlet Ibis by composer Stefan Weisman and librettist David Cote. Following the online premiere, these full-length videos will be available for viewing on Facebook until HERE reopens for live public performances.

Additionally, #COVIDEO, a sequential community-built work of video art, continues. Ten artists each contribute ten seconds of video art released individually over 10 days. On the 10th day, their contributions are crafted together into one video and released on social media. Beginning on April 13th, HERE will launch the third theme, Kindness Contagion featuring Mallory Catlett, Yiru Chen, Misha Chowdhury, Gamin, Soomi Kim, Laura Peterson, and Sachiyo Takahashi with the full video release on Monday April 27 on social media. The first edition focused on Social Distancing and included Christina Campanella, Hai-Ting Chinn & Matt Schickele, Suli Holum, Eleanor Kipping, Nick Lehane, Minor Theater, Mariana Newhard, Richard Stauffacher, Amanda Szeglowski, and Basil Twist. The theme of the second video was Flatten the Curve featured contributions from Lisa D'Amour, Maiko Kikuchi, Alex Lee, LEIMAY, Julia Levine, Spencer Lott, Ruth Margraff, Mary Prescott, Melissa Tien, and Nicole Wolcott. It will be released on April 12. Community participation for future editions of #COVIDEO is encouraged and interested individuals can email covideo@here.org to secure a slot.

Additional programming details follow. Please visit HERE.org for more information.

Arias With a Twist

Featuring Joey Arias & Basil Twist

April 15 at 7pm

Two national treasures unleash their epic imaginations to conjure a modern and intimate fantasy. Twist's signature magic envelopes Arias' legendary voice, transporting us to unpredictable worlds, channeling ecstatic desires, lavish nightmares and bizarre premonitions in a bejeweled cabinet of curiosities that could only be found in one of downtown's last enclaves for bohemian New York style. Arias with a Twist ran for six months at HERE for the 10th Anniversary of HERE's Dream Music Puppetry Program after a triumphant six-year run in Las Vegas with Cirque du Soleil's Zumanity.

Wooden

Choreographed by Laura Peterson

Performed by Laura Peterson, Kate Martel, Edward Rice, Janna Diamond

April 22 at 7pm
Wooden is a dance about time and nature's geometry. This evening-length quartet occupies different environments installed in one performance space. Follow the dance through a lush, growing lawn and a dry, desiccated landscape of hanging trees. Wooden is filled with mathematical precision, velocity and liquid improvisation.

All Decisions Will Be Made By Consensus: A Zoom Opera

Libretto by Rob Handel, composed by Kamala Sankaram, directed by Kristin Marting
Cast includes Paul An, Hai-Ting Chinn, Zachary James, Joan LaBarbara, Adrian Rosas, and Kamala Sankaram

April 24 at 1pm

The people are behind us, but is now the time to strike? A Zoom meeting of activists with radically conflicting styles, or a zoom meeting of radicals with actively conflicting styles. Don't disclose your location. Remember our community agreements. One diva one mic. But wait, is it even possible to sing a brand new 15-minute opera over Zoom? THERE IS ONLY ONE WAY TO FIND OUT.

Chimpanzee

Created by Nick Lehane

April 29 at 7pm

Chimpanzee was inspired by the stranger-than-fiction stories of chimpanzees raised in as children in human homes. These cross-fostering experiments tested the effects of raising chimpanzees as human children, specifically language acquisition. When the chimpanzees matured, or when funding dried up, some cross-fostered chimps went on to live as test subjects in a very different area of scientific research: pathogen studies performed in biomedical facilities.

The Reception

Created by Sean Donovan and Sebastián Calderón Bentin in collaboration with Jane Comfort, Leslie Cuyjet, Hannah Heller, and Ishmael Houston-Jones

May 6 at 7pm

In Donovan & Calderón's latest work, The Reception, the audience is a voyeur at a lively social gathering. Popular music, fizzy drinks, and friendly chatter hit the marks of a playful party, but something's not quite right. Bit by bit, The Reception depicts an uncanny cracking at the seams, as The Revelers contend with an increasingly unanchored world. Created and performed with a guest list of New York dance-world luminaries that spans the decades, The Reception delves into the dark underbelly of how we socialize and entertain.

The Scarlet Ibis

Composed by Stefan Weisman, Libretto by David Cote, Directed by Mallory Catlett
Featuring Eric Avery, Eric S. Brenner, Hai-Ting Chinn, Abigail Fischer, Nicole Mitchell, Keith Phares, Josh Rice and Meghan Williams

May 13 at 7pm

Inspired by the short story by James Hurst, The Scarlet Ibis is an opera about brotherhood, illness, and the power of the imagination to soar above physical limitations. This world premiere by composer Stefan Weisman (Darkling) and librettist David Cote fuses singers, puppetry, and multimedia stagecraft to tell the story of a remarkable disabled boy whose older brother pushes him to be "normal." Set in rural North Carolina a century ago, The Scarlet Ibis contrasts notions of physical wholeness with mystical otherness. Episodic and expressionistic, the narrative draws on elements of Southern Gothic, boy's adventure, and domestic tragedy. OBIE Award-winning director Mallory Catlett stages the premiere, and Steven Osgood conducts the American Modern Ensemble. For audiences 10 and up.

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