PERFORMANCE: November 2 & 3 (TH/FR) 8 PM
*Thursday opens with Elizabeth Falconer (Seattle)

Denise Fujiwara performs Sumida River, choreographed by Natsu Nakajima, an early disciple of both Kazuo Ohno and Tatsumi Hijikata. A spellbinding interpretation of a renowned 15th century Japanese Noh play, Sumida River is the haunting tale of a woman in search of her stolen child. Fujiwara's delicately shaded performance of this Butoh work explores a mother's journey in a work that captures the pure dance and spiritual essence of Mai, the sacred, internal dance of Noh. A critic for Montreal's Le Devoir calls it "a butoh dance of remarkable purity." Denise, one of the most diverse talents to evolve on the Canadian dance scene (choreographer, dancer, actor), received a B.F.A. in Dance at York University and became a founder of Toronto Independent Dance Enterprise. Fujiwara Dance Inventions was founded in 1991. Walls, a CBC television documentary about the life and work of Ms. Fujiwara, won the 1995 Gemini Award for Best Performing Arts Program.

ELIZABETH FALCONER Seattle koto master and storyteller Elizabeth Falconer performs Portrait of Shunkin, based on a 1933 disturbing and thought-provoking story of love and loyalty by Junichiro Tanizaki. She will accompany herself on the 13-string Japanese koto.

PERFORMANCE: November 2 (TH) 10 PM

Itto Morita and Mika Takeuchi of Goo Say Ten perform Toki Hime (Princess Toki). Toki is a Japanese bird on the verge of extinction. They describe their work as "duo Butoh evocators drifting across subconscious terrain, dreaming a Toki's scarlet dream as a princess of the good old Japan; a tenacious dream of the lost kingdom's legendary metamorphosis and madness." AONO JIKKEN ENSEMBLE Aono Jikken Ensemble is the multi-disciplinary ensemble of William Satake Blauvelt, Susie Kozawa, Yoko Murao, Mike Shannon, and Esther Sugai. Using a structured improvisational approach, their work includes new scores for classic Japanese silent films; original dance pieces; site-specific live soundscapes; and multi-media performance works. The group has appeared at the du Maurier International Jazz Festival (Vancouver B.C.); Northwest New Works; Northwest Asian American Theatre's A-Fest; and on KCMU's Sonarchy Radio.

Under the artistic direction of Joan Laage, Dappin' Butoh performs Milking The Way to a sound score by Ela Lamblin. Magical and darkly humorous, the work plays with our hopes, expectations, and fears as we encounter distinct landscapes and lifeforms. Joan studied under Kazuo Ohno and performed in Gnome (with SU-EN) under Yoko Ashikawa's direction in Japan. Founded in 1991, Dappin' and Joan have appeared in Seattle Fringe Festivals since 1992, Earshot Jazz, New City/New Dance, Allegro! Dance Series, San Francisco Butoh Festival, Asian Contemporary Dance Festival (NYC), and Butoh Breeze (Stockholm).

PERFORMANCE: November 5 (SA) 8 PM; November 6 (SU) 7 PM
*Sunday opens with Seattle Kokon Taiko (Seattle)

Directed by Yukio Waguri, Kohzensha will perform Bone of Earth 2, a work steeped in the essence of Butoh and Nihon Buyoh (traditional Japanese dance). A duet with Waguri and Asuka Shimada, the work's theme is to find out "what is specially Japanese and what is internationally common in Butoh." A critic in Lithuania remarked that the audience recognized the history of humankind and the elements of the Earth in Waguri's performance. Waguri became a disciple of Tatsumi Hijikata, Butoh's founder, in 1972. From 1987-89 he performed with Natsu Nakajima, an early disciple of both Hijikata and Kazuo Ohno, and in 1990, he organized Kohzensha. Waguri has performed and taught in Korea, Indonesia, Lithuania, and Australia, and in his native Japan.

SEATTLE KOKON TAIKO Founded in 1980, Seattle Kokon Taiko is a performing arts organization based in the Japanese American community devoted to the performance, promotion and study of taiko (Japanese drums). Taiko is a dynamic synthesis of rhythm, movement and spirit originating in Japan and evolving as a folk art over the last several hundred years. Seattle Kokon Taiko strives to combine the ancient with the modern with their repertoire of traditional and contemporary compositions and collaborative works with other artists.

PERFORMANCES: November 4 (SA) 10 PM, November 5 (SU) 9 PM

In Haku Haiku, the stories of Asian workers migrating to Hawaii are woven together like Haku lei with the thread of the interminable human spirit. Directed by Willy Manalang, Grotto will perform a work combining film, live and recorded music, sounds effects, and a marriage of Butoh, modern, and hula dance. A native of the Philippines, Willy graduated from Brigham Young University in Hawaii. In Hawaii, he danced with The Children of the Light Butoh Dancers, and he has been a featured performer in Dappin' Butoh and Degenerate Art Ensemble.

Ink Boat

PERFORMANCES: November 8 & 9 (WE/TH) 8 PM

Surreal and darkly comic, Ink Boat is a Performing Arts collective founded and directed by Shinichi Momo Koga. Ink Boat performs Cockroach, a testament to the tenacity of the unloved and marginal. Like the Cockroaches, many human groups have become despised and ignored by those in positions of power and wealth. The human will to survive can manifest beauty, terror, and mystery. Among the performers in Cockroach are musicians from Tin Hat Trio, Charming Hostess, Sleepytime Gorilla Museum, and Seattle's own Degenerate Art Ensemble. Momo is a member of TEN PEN Chii in Germany, co-choreographs for Seattle's Degenerate Art Ensemble, and has danced in Harupin-Ha based in Berkeley.

P.A.N.
P.A.N.'s latest project - vermillion.violet - is an exploration of the process of "bruising". Incorporating live music, video, and dance, the complexities of the inner/outer body and of metamorphosis will be examined. The states of psychological, emotional, socio-enviromental bruising are also sources for this collectively produced work.
P.A.N. is a multimedia performance collaborative working to blur the lines of varied disciplines to create contemporary, integrated works.

PERFORMANCES November 10 & 11 (FR/SA) 8 PM

In SU-EN's solo Atomic, the choreography, soundtrack, spatial and light designs, and costumes all interpret the theme of the atom and beyond; the smallest particles to be known and the force that is dwelling in this nothingness. Susanna Akerlund (SU-EN) resided in Japan for 8 years where she was a member of Gnome from 1988-1993, with instruction and choreography by renowned Butoh dancer Yoko Ashikawa, and also worked with Tomoe Shizune & Hakutobo. Based in Sweden, SU-EN tours performances, lectures, and workshops internationally.

   Degenerate Art Ensemble   
   photo by Junko Yamamoto

PERFORMANCE: November 10 & 11 (FR/SA) 10 PM

KAGAMI Butoh's work is influenced by Kazuo Ohno, Doranne Crable's first Butoh teacher; by classical Japanese dance artist Isaburo Hanayagi, and the legendary Flamenco maestro El Farruco, with whom she studied in Spain. A in progress, Z ONE Z EROS explores the tensions that break the silence and stillness that we can't tolerate, and is inspired by Samuel Beckett's plays (Act Without Words and Waiting For Godot), Michelangelo's David, street performers in Florence, and Bun-Ching Lam's evocative composition, "Water" (1999). Doranne who founded KAGAMI in 1993 after dancing with Dappin' for three years, was a featured artist at the 1997 Edinburgh Fringe Festival, and is involved with World Artists For Tibet.

DEGENERATE ART ENSEMBLE
Degenerate Art Ensemble (formerly The Young Composers Collective) revisits their 1997 work Rinko with a new interpretation. Rinko is a dynamic exploration of a terrifying future-through dangerous sounds and hallucinatory imagery-an eerie tale set in a polluted landscape of mutation clashing with Rinko (performed by Haruko Nishimura), the spirit of extinct children. Composed by Ensemble conductor Joshua Kohl, the music explores sounds "between the notes"-set against thundering drums. Degenerate Art Ensemble is a big-band-garage-orchestra / movement-theater company / multi discipline art army. A Stranger reviewer wrote, "… their art is a violently beautiful, passionate world where things don't have a 'nice day', but are either dying or coming to life, screaming or absolutely silent."

Featuring: Featuring: Molly Barrons (San Francisco), Antonio Delbenes (Phoenix), Leigh Evans (Oakland), Brian Shapiro (Austin), Mary Cutrera & Helen Thorsen (Seattle), and Alan Sutherland (Seattle).

November 4(SA) 7PM  ishan Vernallis (Seattle)

November 12(SU)  6:30 PM Bob DeNatale (San Francisco)