Festival Ballet Providence

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 8, 2004

Festival Ballet Providence, 401.353.1129

Hit series Up CLOSE, On HOPE returns, September 25th, 26th,
and October 2nd! Dance so near you can touch it!

Providence, RI - Festival Ballet Providence’s sold-out new series, Up CLOSE, On HOPE, returns for the 2004/2005 season, showcasing exciting contemporary repertory works in an intimate studio setting. These performances offer the chance to see thrilling, original dance, to meet the dancers, and to mingle with the evening’s choreographers. Critics and audiences alike were in complete agreement: Up CLOSE on HOPE is a great way for audiences to see dance, as indicated by the following reviews from the inaugural season:

“Proximity is priceless for ballet”
Bryan Rourke, The Providence Journal

“The variety and the selections for Up CLOSE, on HOPE make for a great evening of dance… This smaller space for Festival Ballet (and their guests) is a welcome addition for the dance scene in Rhode Island.”
Johnette Rodgriguez, The Providence Phoenix

“Rhode Island’s top dance company, the innovative Festival Ballet Providence, is getting dance fans about as close as you could expect to the dancers in an exciting new series, Up CLOSE On HOPE…With Up CLOSE on HOPE, Festival Ballet has again proven it has the skills, variety and innovative drive to continue its upward march toward the higher reaches of New England arts organizations.”
Bill Gale, WRNI

The series consists of three dynamic programs offered in September/October, November, and March at the company’s East Side studios at 825 Hope Street. Each program will be performed three times, on Saturday at 7:30 pm and Sunday at 6:00 pm and again the following Saturday. Performances take place in Festival Ballet Providence’s Grand Studio black box theater, for a limited audience of 90 members.

This year, audience members will have the opportunity to sample the Hope Street ambiance, with intermissions sponsored by Hope Street Restaurants, including Pizzico, Chez Pascal and Not Just Snacks, accompanied by wines provided courtesy of Laurine Ryan Perry and the Martignetti Companies of Rhode Island.

The success of Up CLOSE, on HOPE is largely due to the intimacy of the theater and the repertory chosen by Festival Ballet Providence Artistic Director Mihailo Djuric. It is diverse with high artistic quality, and expands the audience’s taste for different dance styles. This season the repertoire combines the ballets that have shaped and re-energized the Company during the past six years with the vitality of new, original works by some of New England’s most talented choreographers. The 2004/2005 Up CLOSE on HOPE season will be a diverse program with works of varying lengths, styles and approaches.

Mr. Djuric has always admired Ms. Cavanaugh’s work and considers her to be one of Rhode Island’s leading choreographers. She has been a collaborator on programs at Festival Ballet Providence for several seasons, in a partnership that has had great success and audience appeal. Hence, he has chosen her works to be seen in programs throughout the 2004-2005 Up CLOSE, on HOPE series.

Program 1 of the series will take place September 25th, 26th and October 2nd and will include works by Colleen Cavanaugh and Mihailo Djuric. Ms. Cavanaugh will restage Scarlet Tangents, to Robert Schumann’s Piano Quartet Opus 47, which was a highlight of last year’s Up CLOSE season and received by audiences with great applause. Ms.Cavanaugh will also present the premiere of her new work, Suspended in Quiet, portions of which were first shown at the Barrington Library in January 2004 as a work-in-progress for the Globalheart Project. It was created in collaboration with Providence composer Elaine Bearer and sculptor Christiane Corbat whose original plaster casts have been the inspiration for the composer and choreographer. Mr. Djuric will round out the program with two of his original ensemble works; Loose Ends to music by Thomaso Albinoni, and Upon Dark, with music by Paul Moravec, inspired by the northern lights.

Tickets for individual productions are available for $30 as general admission seating. Subscriptions for the three-performance series are priced at $85 per person. Those buying Up CLOSE On HOPE Series subscriptions receive preferred seating for each performance. Reserved tickets and series subscriptions are available by contacting Festival Ballet Providence, 401.353.1129 or by sending email inquiries to info@festivalballet.com.

In addition to the works of Djuric and Cavanaugh, future programs will include works by rising young choreographers as well as works by Viktor Plotnikov and Gianni Di Marco. Program 2 for the Up CLOSE, On HOPE series will take place November 13, 14 and 20. Program 3 of the series will take place March 12, 13 and 19.

The 2004-2005 Up CLOSE on HOPE series is made possible in part by a generous sponsorship from GLAD WORKS.

The Festival Ballet Providence and the Festival Ballet Providence Center for Dance Education are together a not-for-profit arts organization whose EIN is 05-0377245 and whose Rhode Island Corporate ID number is ND-27-137.

Intermission sponsors include:

September 25
Not Just Snacks, mini samosas and more!

September 26
Chez Pascal, seasonally inspired menu to be announced

October 2
Pizzico, appetizer assortment

Wines for the intermissions will be provided courtesy of Martignetti Companies of Rhode Island and Laurine Ryan Perry, and will include the following vineyards in the course of the season: Robert Mondavi, Trinchero Family of Wines, Rosemount, Penfolds, Linemans, and Cavit.