STG Presents DAE's SONIC TALES at The Moore Theatre Oct. 30, 31

Seattle Theatre Group (STG) presents the premiere of Sonic Tales, a Degenerate Art Ensemble (DAE) piece, at The Moore Theatre on Friday, October 30, 2009 and Saturday, October 31, 2009 at 8:00 p.m. Degenerate Art Ensemble, an eccentric local performance art group, returns to The Moore Theatre after a sell-out engagement, Cuckoo Crow, in 2006.

Sonic Tales, DAE's most ambitious work to date, is a concert and movement theater spectacle - video projection and breathtaking costumes enhance this totally one of a kind experience.

This work sets DAE's surrealist dance theater style and hallucinatory visuals against fierce music that ranges from driving rocking rhythm to rich soaring melodies to far out atmospheric soundscapes - telling interwoven short stories in the form of bizarre invented fairy tales. Sonic Tales is both music concert and dance spectacle - video projection and breathtaking costumes enhance this totally one of a kind experience.

Aesthetically extreme, influenced by punk, protest, cartoons, ghost stories and nightmares, DAE takes the viewer into otherworldly landscapes - full of compelling characters and music that doesn't just accompany the action, but defines the mental state and reveals secrets to the audience that the characters on stage will never know.

Sonic Tales resembles a modern fairy tale - exploring the inner workings of a mind and the varied characters that inhabit it. An appetite girl, a ninja-battling weeble wobble princess, and a slug princess people this surreal dreamscape.

Sonic Tales hosts a powerful team of generative artists including:

Musicians Joshua Kohl and Jeffrey Huston who will be creating an expansive sound-scape using guitars, drum robots, pots and pans, flutes, voices, digital manipulation and many other implements.

Dancers include Haruko Nishimura (DAE's artistic director and founding member), Trinidad Martinez (Pat Graney Company) and Marissa Niederhauser (Maureen Whiting).

Jennifer Zeyl (scenic designer) has designed for Seattle's foremost companies both main stream and on The Edge including Intiman, Seattle Rep, Washington Ensemble Theater, ACT among others.

Leo Mayberry (video) is a Seattle based visionary who will through video projection, aid in creating characters with multiple faces, a living house, vast gardens and many other visual treats.

Rainer Groenhagen (lighting design) is a Berlin based light designer who has worked with DAE for seven years, and is a highly sought after designer throughout Europe, where he specializes in transforming unusual spaces into theaters, and transforming theaters into unusual spaces.
Chris Tschirgi (costume) is overseeing a superb costume team that is creating innovative costumes ranging from "the human weeble wobble" to the "human topsy turvy doll".

In addition to the performance, artists from Degenerate Art Ensemble will participate in the following community and educational events:

Master Class (suggested donation $15; pre-registration recommended)
Butoh: The Fully Committed Presence
October 18, 2009 / 2:00pm - 3:30pm
Velocity Dance Center
Through the embodiment of imagery & exploration of sensory experience, students will awaken tools already existing within, pushing to The Edge & cultivating moment to moment awareness, both of internal experience & the outward projection of that experience on the stage. Instructor, Haruko Nishimura, is Artistic Director of Degenerate Art Ensemble and has produced a consistent stream of original & adventurous works combining physical theater & butoh dance with live experimental music. RSVP to Liz Young at (206)467-5510 or email lizy@stgpresents.org. RSVP is strongly encouraged.

Lecture / Demonstration (free; open to the public and Cornish College of the Arts students)
October 21, 2009 / 12:30pm - 1:30pm
Poncho Hall, Cornish Collage (710 Roy Street)
Artists from Degenerate Art Ensemble, including former Cornish students Haruko Nishimura and Joshua Kohl, show video excerpts of their upcoming work and take questions from students and the public.

Tickets: Degenerate Art Ensemble Sonic Tales performance tickets are $20.00 and are available online at www.stgpresents.org, by phone at (877)STG-4TIX or (877)784-4849, in person at The Paramount Theatre box office, Monday through Friday 10:00am-6:00pm and The Paramount and Moore Theatre venue kiosks, 24-hours a day, 7-days a week. Call (206)315-8054 for group sales. The Moore Theatre is located at 1932 Second Ave in downtown Seattle.

STG is the 501 (c)(3) non-profit arts organization that operates the historic Paramount and Moore Theatres in Seattle, Washington. Our mission is to make diverse performing arts and education an integral part of our region's cultural identity while keeping these two landmark venues alive and vibrant. STG presents a range of performances from Broadway, off-Broadway, dance and jazz to comedy, concerts of all genres, speakers and family shows - at both historic theatres in Seattle and venues throughout the Puget Sound and Portland, Oregon.

For more information, please visit http://www.stgpresents.org/

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