Mark Murphy, executive director of REDCAT, said in a statement, "We try to introduce audiences here to artists who are playing an important role in the evolution of contemporary art culture. These people are inventing new forms, combining disciplines, provoking thought and experimenting with a variety of cultural traditions."
The season will begin with Phillippe Quesne's La Mélancholie des Dragons, a theatre performance about a band of metal heads who decide to create an amusement park with a heavy metal theme. They are joined by a helpful stranger and her dog. La Mélancholie des Dragons will be presented Sept. 23 – 25.
Following will be a performance by Irvine Arditti, founder and first violinist of the Arditti Quartet. The all-acoustic solo performance will feature the world premiere of "imagine/violin" and "imAge/violin" by Pulitzer Prize winner Roger Reynolds. The performance will also include performances of Salvatore Sciarrino's "Six Caprices", Pierre Boulez's "Anthèmes I", Toshio Hosokawa's "Spell", and others. Irvine Arditti will perform on Sept. 29.
Next in the season is Song From The Uproar, written by Missy Mazzoli and Royce Vavrek. Song From The Uproar will be co-presented by the Los Angeles Opera. It is a multimedia opera that combines live musical performance with original film. Song From The Uproar was inspired by the journals of Isabelle Eberhardt, who left her life in Switzerland for the North African desert at the age of 20. It will be presented Oct. 8 – 11.
The Wong Street Journal, written and performed by Kristina Wong, will be next in the season. Wong's comedic solo show is "part TED lecture, part amateur hip hop extravaganza, and part nonsense." In her performance, Wong will touch on issues such as click bait, global poverty, privilege, and economic theory, while using uneasy-to-read charts, live hashtag wars, and handcrafted slideshows. The Wong Street Journal will be presented Nov. 12 – 15.
Following will be Joey Arias' solo performance celebrating the centennial of singer Billie Holiday. Arias premiered the show earlier this year at Lincoln Center. Arias also portrayed Holiday in the early 1990s in his show Strange Fruit. Arias will perform on Nov. 19.
Closing out 2015 will be BLACK GIRL: Linguistic Play choreographed by Camille A. Brown and performed by her company. The work will reveal the complexity of finding identity as a self-defined black female in urban American culture. The show will combine storytelling and theatricality with a mix of African American dance vernacular. It will include social dancing, double dutch, tap, ring shout, steppin', Juba, and gesture. BLACK GIRL: Linguistic Play will presented Dec. 3 – 6.
In early 2016 REDCAT will present Meg Wolfe's New Faithful Disco, Harold Pinter's The Room as performed by the Wooster Group, and Christiane Jatahy's Julia, an adaptation of August Strindberg's play Miss Julie.
For more information, visit REDCAT.org.
