Lincoln Center Out of Doors Celebrates 40th Season, Runs 7/28-8/15

Lincoln Center Out of Doors (LCOOD) will present three weeks of FREE music and dance on the plazas of Lincoln Center from July 28 to August 15 in the 40th annual edition of the popular outdoor summer festival. The festival will feature a diverse range of music, dance and street performance events by dozens of international, U.S. and local artists, highlighted by New York, U.S. and World premieres and debuts, and special commissions. Out of Doors calls up its street culture roots opening on Wednesday, July 28 with No Snakes in This Grass, a landmark piece from the Civil Rights Movement that is a moving and hilarious re-telling of the story of Adam and Eve by James Magnuson, directed by Mical Whitaker, and produced by Shirley J. Radcliffe of the Richard Allen Center for Culture and Art (RACCA), at the Barclays Capital Grove at 6:30 p.m. All three are alumni of the first edition of the Everyman-Community Theater Festival that evolved into Lincoln Center Out of Doors.

The opening night concert, at the Damrosch Park Bandshell at 7:30 p.m., is ETHEL Fair: The Songwriters, which features post-classical string quartet ETHEL collaborating on world premiere compositions and arrangements with four distinctive songwriters: pop tunesmith Adam Schlesinger (Fountains of Wayne), who is joined by Mike Viola (Candy Butchers); Dayna Kurtz, a Brooklyn-based folk-blues singer; Argentinean Juana Molina, who blends folk and electronics; and Tom Verlaine, of iconic New York band Television, with bassist Patrick Derivaz.

Embracing the street culture origins of Out of Doors, series producer, Bill Bragin, Lincoln Center's director of public programming, once again has made parades, processions and site-specific performances key features of the festival, centered around the return of Bang on a Can's Asphalt Orchestra, which debuted at LCOOD last year. For five nights, August 4-8, the Asphalt Orchestra moves throughout the Lincoln Center campus performing World premiere compositions by Yoko Ono and David Byrne with Annie Clark of St. Vincent as well as new original arrangements, to movement choreographed by Susan Marshall and Mark DeChiazza.

Lincoln Center Out of Doors 2010 is sponsored by Bloomberg and PepsiCo, Inc.
Other "moving" performances include: Brooklyn-based Haitian rara carnival band DJA-Rara (July 29); Audio Tutu, a one-woman, site-specific mobile music performance beginning at Broadway Plaza (July 30); a traditional Chinese Lion Dance presented by the Chinese American Arts Council (August 12) and a Belaganjur (marching gamelan) featuring Gamelan Galak Tika, beginning with an audience participation workshop/demonstration of Kecak (traditional Balinese "Monkey Chant") at Broadway Plaza (August 13).

The second year of collaboration with Dancing in the Streets's Hip Hop Generation Next initiative brings the World premiere of CENTRIFUGAL FORCE: Hip Hop Generations @ Lincoln Center to Out of Doors on its closing day, August 15. The site-specific work by Emilio "Buddha Stretch" Austin Jr., Adesola Osakalumi, and Gus Solomons jr juxtaposes the raw energy of street dance with the architectural grandeur of Lincoln Center. More than fifty dancers-the first and second generation of hip hop dance pioneers, prominent and emerging local and international dancers, and New York City teenage dancers-lead audiences from Josie Robertson Plaza to Broadway Plaza in front of Alice Tully Hall where the public will be invited to join in a freestyle dance cipher.
Other debuts and premieres in the 40th annual edition of Out of Doors include:

? The World premiere of Motor choreographed by Brian Brooks, danced by Brian Brooks Moving Company on the closing night of Out of Doors (August 15). In the site-specific, hour-long work, hundreds of sky blue cables expand to create a tunnel-like space over both audience and performers, spanning the distance from the back of the Damrosch Park Bandshell stage to reach beyond the performance space. The dancers move across and through the expanse, creating shifting chain reactions as they meet and separate.

? The world premiere of composer Christine Southworth's Super Collider, (August 13) performed by the acclaimed Kronos Quartet and 14 musicians of Gamelan Galak Tika using the Gamelan Electrica, a new electronic "virtual gamelan" designed and developed by Alex Rigopulos (founder/CEO of Harmonix Music, inventor of video games Guitar Hero and Rock Band). Southworth was inspired by the Large Hadron Collider at CERN-the largest machine ever built-designed to recreate the beginning of the universe. Super Collider takes two sound worlds and traditions, the string quartet and the ancient gamelan, and juxtaposes them through the unlimited sonic universe of electronics, evoking string theory's concept of "universal harmony." Kronos will also perform works by Steve Reich and Café Tacuba. Kenyan Luo musicians Kenge Kenge, making their New York debut, open the evening, exploring the traditional acoustic roots of exhilarating benga dance music.

?The New York debut of the International Body Music Festival (August 12) which explores the sonic possibilities of the human body as instrument offers a roster of amazing artists from North and South America: Brazil's 12-member "circle orchestra" Barbatuques in its New York debut, Bay Area-based a capella/tap/beatboxers, the SLAMMIN All-Body Band, Inuit throat singers Celina Kalluk and Lucie Idlout from Nunavut, Canada, and hambone artist Derique McGee, steeped in traditional African-American roots.

? Larry Harlow's 1977 orchestral opus La Raza Latina, a Salsa Suite, starring Rubén Blades, with guest vocalist Adonis Puentes, featuring a large orchestra and chorus conducted by Harlow, will have its long-overdue New York premiere on a bill with the Bobby Sanabria Big Band (August 14).
Other Highlights of the Out of Doors season:

?The fertile cultural grounds of three locales that are much in the news because of the natural and man-made hardships they've endured-Haiti, New Orleans, and Detroit-are in the spotlight in three separate programs.

On July 29, artists representing a variety of Haitian styles and traditions, including Queen of Haitian song Emeline Michel, Creole troubadour Beethova Obas, Ragganga songwriter/guitarist BélO, all-female, Boston-based ensemble Zili Misik, and celebrated Haitian dancer/musician Peniel Guerrier collaborating with the Mikerline Dance Company take the stage in Damrosch Park for Ansanm (In Love We Stand), a celebration of Haiti's musical riches.

Then frequent collaborating partner, The Caribbean Culture Center African Diaspora Institute co-presents a tribute to New Orleans in commemoration of the 5th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina (August 8): S.O.S. (Saving Our Soul) - From the Big Apple to the Big Easy featuring the Soul Rebels Brass Band, Wild Magnolias, Bo Dollis' famed Mardi Gras Indian Tribe, and gospel-inflected jazz trombonist Glen David Andrews.

The Motor City gets its due on the first day and night of the "Roots of American Music" mini-festival (July 31). Out of Doors partners with the Louisiana-based Ponderosa Stomp festival to celebrate Detroit, home to great blues, garage rock, punk and, of course, soul. The afternoon concert of Ponderosa Stomp presents The Detroit Breakdown features a rare appearance by garage rockers The Gories, and includes bluesman Eddie Kirkland, and the Motor City Soul Revue featuring Dennis Coffey (of Motown house band The Funk Brothers), Melvin Davis, Spyder Turner, and The Velvelettes all backed by The Party Stompers. The evening program in Damrosch Park brings out powerhouse groups: Mitch Ryder & The Detroit Wheels (soul infused garage rock; "Devil in a Blue Dress"); garage rock pioneers ? & the Mysterians ( "96 Tears") and Death (the recently rediscovered Black proto-punk band from the early 70s).

? The second day of "Roots of American Music" (August 1) celebrates hipsters, eccentrics, and originals with music and spoken word performances that defy categories and push boundaries. Dig: Their Royal Hipness features afternoon performances on Hearst Plaza by old-timey neo-vaudevillians Asylum Street Spankers, Mexican pro-wrestling mask-wearing surf guitar band Los Straitjackets; new-burlesque trio The World Famous Pontani Sisters; and Niger's "modern" traditional band Etran Finatawa; "Hip" and "Cool" get turned up a notch that evening in Damrosch Park, with a program that features music by the flamboyant David Johansen of New York Dolls and Buster Poindexter fame; homages to social satirist and provocateur Lenny Bruce and "baddest beatnik" Lord Buckley; Filmmaker/author Melvin van Peebles performing Shel Silverstein's proto-rap Hamlet: The Street Chant; and some surprises.

? La Casita marks its 10th anniversary at this year's Out of Doors (August 14; repeated in its entirety in the Bronx at Teatro Pregones on August 15), in a 16 artist, 5+ hour program emceed by La Bruja, celebrating oral traditions in both verse and music from a wide range of cultures including Afro-Caribbean, Latino, Filipino, Balkan and more.

MORE DANCE EVENTS: Nicholas Leichter Dance with Monstah Black in THE WHIZ: Over the Rainbow, a remix and mash-up of the movie Wizard of Oz and the hit musical specially expanded for the outdoor venue (July 30); the legendary Paul Taylor Dance Company's 80th Birthday Celebration, featuring performances of Airs (1971), Syzygy (1987), and Company B (1991) (August 5); and the recently reconstructed 1979 post-modern classic Dance, choreographed by Lucinda Childs, with music by Philip Glass and film by Sol Lewitt, this year's closing-night program, topping off a dance double-bill with Brian Brooks' Motor (August 15).

MORE MUSIC EVENTS: Legendary vocalist Nona Hendryx offers a career retrospective ranging from her girl-group days with The Bluebelles, to the groundbreaking funk rock of LaBelle to her futuristic solo career

(July 30); a double bill pairing the seminal krautrock of Hallogallo 2010: Michael Rother & Friends perform the music of NEU! and the visionary Brazilian "Sorcerer" of sound, composer/multi-instrumentalist Hermeto Pascoal (August 6); the carnivalesque gypsy-punk meets breakbeats of Balkan Beat Box sharing a bill with circus-punk marching band Mucca Pazza (August 7); Latin Grammy Award-winning, Afro-Peruvian singer Susana Baca, Honduran Garifuna artist Aurelio Martinez & Garifuna Soul, and Cuban nueva trova songwriter Carlos Varela & His Band (August 11); a night of hip hop and r&b inspired jazz with The Robert Glasper Experiment with special guests Q-Tip and Bilal on a bill with José James' Blackmagic (August 4); and Heritage Sunday (August 8 at 2 p.m.), co-presented with The Center for Traditional Music and Dance, with music from Bulgaria, Egypt, Lebanon, and Greece.

FAMILY EVENTS: Kids Day (August 7) features a return engagement for Willie Mae Rock Camp for Girls Summer Revue which debuted at Out of Doors last summer. The group features young women, aged 8 to 18, who have participated in summer camps which take place annually in Brooklyn. The concert will feature the return of hit groups le Saffire and The Awkward Turtles, as well as just-formed bands, playing brand new, original songs that range from political satire to irresistible pop numbers. The Puppeteers Cooperative will present a brand-new Puppet Pageant commissioned by Lincoln Center, created and performed with colorful costumes, masks, and musicians by the Cooperative artists in collaboration with the Lincoln Square Neighborhood Center and Red Hook Community Center.

ABOUT LINCOLN CENTER OUT OF DOORS
Inaugurated in 1971 under director of community programming Leonard DePaur, Out of Doors began as a small festival of street theater, in collaboration with Everyman Theater (co-founded by actress Geraldine Fitzgerald.) Former Lincoln Center President John Mazzola's vision was "to bring the community to Lincoln Center and bring Lincoln Center to the community." Gradually expanding to include music and dance performances, the re-christened Lincoln Center Out of Doors has grown into one of the largest free performance festivals in the U.S. Over its 40-year history, Out of Doors has commissioned some 90 works from composers and choreographers and presented hundreds of major dance companies, renowned world-music artists, and legendary jazz, folk, gospel, blues and rock musicians, many under the auspices of its popular "Roots of American Music" mini-festival, and poets and storytellers as part of the annual "La Casita." It has highlighted the rich cultural diversity of New York City with performances by established ensembles and up-and-coming groups and has partnered with dozens of community and cultural organizations including the Caribbean Cultural Center African Diaspora Institute, Lincoln Square Neighborhood Center, Brooklyn Arts Council, Bronx Council on the Arts, Center for Traditional Music and Dance, the Chinese American Arts Council, Americas Society, and Dancing in the Streets.

ALL EVENTS ARE FREE and take place on the Lincoln Center campus-Hearst Plaza/Barclays Capital Grove, Damrosch Park, Josie Robertson Plaza, and Broadway Plaza-located between Broadway and Amsterdam Avenues, West 65th Street to West 62nd Street.

Visit www.LCOutofDoors.org for complete schedule or call 212-875-5766 to request a brochure.

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