Photo courtesy River Oaks Chamber Orchestra
Seismic the first of several innovative and varied programs ROCO has scheduled for 2023-2024. It first takes the stage at Miller Outdoor Theatre on Sept. 29, and again at The Church of Saint John the Divine on Sept. 30, the night of ROCO’s annual gala. The concerts are free and pay-what-you-can, respectively, and both will be livestreamed at no cost.
DiLorenzo’s composition, Techtonal, is inspired by the book The Telling Image by documentary filmmaker Lois Stark. The book takes the reader on a trip around the world and back and forth in time to explore how recurring patterns and shapes, both human-made and of the natural world, provide a visual key our understanding of the universe. The performance will feature projections of AI animation, created by Wong using text from Stark’s book, and timed to the music much like a soundtrack follows images of a film.
Also on the program is a full, 40-piece chamber orchestra realization of Lau’s The Nightingale, based on the Hans Christian Andersen’s tale, and originally scored for just violin, clarinet, piano, and narrator. Described by the composer as “hyper-Romantic, lush and lyrical, with a touch of the cinematic,” the Disney-esque nature of the music will appeal to children young and old alike. Complementing the original version is ROCO’s newly published children’s book, which includes QR codes that allow young readers to listen to Lau’s composition and narration. (They can also select the option of just hearing the music and reading the story themselves.) A braille version of the book is also available on request.
Known as “the most fun you can have with serious music,” Lawyer founded ROCO in 2005 after multiple experiences in other musical start-ups where she saw first-hand the need for a sustainable and thriving model that would focus on authentic connections between musicians and audiences. The scope of ROCO’s 19th season, very accurately titled Making Waves, is pretty incredible, and features more than 18 works by women composers and multiple world premiere commissions, as well as collaborations with such institutions as the Rothko Chapel and Houston Contemporary Dance Company. This weekend’s “seismic” concerts are just the crest of the wave.
Anthony DiLorenzo
Cynthia Wong (photo by George Kunze)
Kevin Lau
Mai Ann Chen (photo by Simon Pauly)
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Open Dance Project presents 'Flutter' at HBG
The fun, family-friendly and site-specific performance takes place in HBG’s Susan Garver Family Discovery Garden. While exploring the garden and its three butterfly installations created by Houston sculptor Meredith Tucker, each now a permanent part of the garden’s art collection, visitors can check out at their leisure three, half-hour immersive performances by members of Open Dance Project, choreographed by founding artistic director Annie Arnoult.
When it comes to dance and theater, Open Dance Project has never been interested in “the fourth wall.” Inspired by the tumult of the 1968 Chicago Democratic Convention, the company’s most recent immersive theater piece, 1968: The Whole World is Watching, had dancers screaming from makeshift scaffolding, running in-between audience members, and at one point, restaging boxer Sonny Liston’s 1964 match with a young upstart named Cassius Clay. Flutter is a bit calmer than that. In performance, the dancers, wearing very colorful, very butterfly-like costumes designed by Houston-based artist Natasha Bowdoin, will shape their movement around Tucker’s sculptures, which depict three different species of butterfly and a plant each pollinates. Beginning with the gestures and movement patterns of butterflies as source material, Arnoult brings a cast of “quirky characters and personalities” to life, each one embodying the spirit of both a sweaty human and a delicate butterfly.
Flutter also incorporates painted textiles and artistic props fabricated by Bowdoin, whose work is often augmented by live performance, and proposes a better future for humankind’s all-too-often adversarial relationship with the natural world.
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