CAROLYN CHEN
'HOW TO FALL APART'
co-presented by AMOC* and Monday Evening Concerts
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TWO PERFORMANCES:
Tuesday, June 4, 2024 | 8 PM [SOLD OUT] Wednesday, June 5, 2024 | 8 PM [SOLD OUT] |
PRESENTED AT:
L.A. Dance Project 2245 East Washington Boulevard | Los Angeles, CA 90021 |
PLEASE NOTE:
Doors Open at 7:30pm | Performance Begins at 8pm
Feel free to use the parking lot off of Washington. Otherwise, there should be plenty of street parking available.
Doors Open at 7:30pm | Performance Begins at 8pm
Feel free to use the parking lot off of Washington. Otherwise, there should be plenty of street parking available.
Monday Evening Concerts and AMOC* are thrilled to co-present composer Carolyn Chen's breathtaking theatrical work How to Fall Apart. Premiered at the Ojai Music Festival in 2022 and further developed at the Baryshnikov Arts Center in 2023, Chen's work is rooted in a close, multi-year collaboration with these "blindingly impressive" (NY Times) artists. Presented in the intimate performance space of L.A. Dance Project, this sonically and visually provocative piece is a rare experience you won't want to miss.
AMOC* performs Carolyn Chen's 'How to Fall Apart.' Photograph: Josh S. Rose
TICKETS:
PLEASE NOTE: THIS EVENT IS SOLD OUT.
PLEASE CONTACT US HERE IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO BE
ADDED TO OUR WAIT LIST IN THE EVENT THAT TICKETS FREE UP.
$100 - PATRON (FIRST FEW ROWS)
$50 - GENERAL ADMISSION
$25 - STUDENT / FIXED INCOME
Space is very limited at L.A. Dance Project. We encourage you to purchase your tickets early.
Student Seating will be at the front of the audience on cushions on the ground (with back support).
Because of the limited number of seats at L.A. Dance Project, we are limiting the amount of Student Seating for the time being.
Pending availability, we will expand the number of Student/Fixed Income levels (at $25 per seat) as the performance approaches.
If you are a Student or are on a Fixed Income and you cannot buy a ticket, please feel free to email us here so that we can put you on a waiting list.
If you have any special seating needs or other questions, please let us know. We will be happy to help!
PROGRAM:
CAROLYN CHEN - Private Ocean (2021) [13']
CAROLYN CHEN - How to Fall Apart (2022) [60']
An AMOC* Production
PERFORMERS:
JULIA EICHTEN, dancer
KEIR GOGWILT, violinist
COLEMAN ITZKOFF, cellist
IOANNIS LOGOTHETIS*, dancer
MATILDA SAKAMOTO*, dancer
ANNA DROZDOWSKI*, Producer
JULIA EICHTEN, Movement Direction
MARY ELLEN STEBBINS*, Lighting Design
VICTORIA BEK*, Costume Design
CHRISTOPHER GILMORE*, Production Technical Supervisor
Developed at Baryshnikov Arts Center and The Lumberyard
Special thanks to Or Schraiber and Jay Campbell for contributing to early workshops of the piece,
as well as to Justin Decatur, Suzanne Thorpe, George Gwilt, and Dea Lou Schraiber.
*denotes special guest artist with AMOC*
CAROLYN CHEN - Private Ocean (2021) [13']
CAROLYN CHEN - How to Fall Apart (2022) [60']
An AMOC* Production
PERFORMERS:
JULIA EICHTEN, dancer
KEIR GOGWILT, violinist
COLEMAN ITZKOFF, cellist
IOANNIS LOGOTHETIS*, dancer
MATILDA SAKAMOTO*, dancer
ANNA DROZDOWSKI*, Producer
JULIA EICHTEN, Movement Direction
MARY ELLEN STEBBINS*, Lighting Design
VICTORIA BEK*, Costume Design
CHRISTOPHER GILMORE*, Production Technical Supervisor
Developed at Baryshnikov Arts Center and The Lumberyard
Special thanks to Or Schraiber and Jay Campbell for contributing to early workshops of the piece,
as well as to Justin Decatur, Suzanne Thorpe, George Gwilt, and Dea Lou Schraiber.
*denotes special guest artist with AMOC*
DESCRIPTION:
"While “How to Fall Apart” looks unflinchingly at climate change, inherent in the theme is something close to hope." - ALL ARTS
The first collaboration between AMOC* and Carolyn Chen, How to Fall Apart describes cosmic, natural, and human processes of disintegration, aging, and falling apart. This evening-length work for three dancers, one violinist, and one cellist integrates text, gesture, and music, building upon Chen’s long-standing compositional work “in which sensuality and abstraction find common ground” (LA Times). How to Fall Apart unfolds as various assemblages of sound, movement, and storytelling cohere, dissolve, and reform, telling personal and scientific stories about the climate crisis, cosmological history, the erosion of soil in Northern Chad, the aging body, The Billion Oyster Project in New York, and the operations of microbes.
ARTIST BIOS:
CAROLYN CHEN:
Carolyn Chen has made music for supermarket, demolition district, and the dark. Her work reconfigures the everyday to retune habits of our ears through sound, text, light, and movement. Her studies of the guqin, a Chinese zither traditionally played for private meditation in nature, have informed her thinking on listening in social spaces. Recent projects include an audio essay on a scream and commissions for Klangforum Wien and the LA Phil New Music Group.
Described by The New York Times as “the evening’s most consistently alluring … a quiet but lush meditation,” Chen’s work has been supported by the American Academy in Berlin, the Fulbright Program, ASCAP Foundation’s Fred Ho Award, Paul and Daisy Soros Fellowships for New Americans, Stanford University Sudler Prize, and commissions from Green Umbrella, MATA Festival, and impuls Festival. The work has been presented at festivals and exhibitions in 25 countries, at venues including Carnegie Hall, the Kitchen, Disney Hall (Los Angeles), Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, the Guggenheim Bilbao, and the Institute for Provocation (Beijing). She has been fortunate to work with ensembles including SurPlus, Southland, San Francisco Contemporary Music Players, Aperture, andPlay, loadbang, koan, Dog Star Orchestra, The Reader’s Chorus, Pamplemousse, Chamber Cartel, orkest de ereprijs, S.E.M., red fish blue fish, Wild Rumpus, and The Syndicate for New Arts.
Writing and recordings are available in MusikTexte, Experimental Music Yearbook, The New Centennial Review, Leonardo Music Journal, Perishable, the wulf, and Quakebasket. Chen earned a Ph.D. in music from UC San Diego, and a M.A. in Modern Thought and Literature and B.A. in music from Stanford University, with an honors thesis on free improvisation and radical politics. She lives in Los Angeles.
Described by The New York Times as “the evening’s most consistently alluring … a quiet but lush meditation,” Chen’s work has been supported by the American Academy in Berlin, the Fulbright Program, ASCAP Foundation’s Fred Ho Award, Paul and Daisy Soros Fellowships for New Americans, Stanford University Sudler Prize, and commissions from Green Umbrella, MATA Festival, and impuls Festival. The work has been presented at festivals and exhibitions in 25 countries, at venues including Carnegie Hall, the Kitchen, Disney Hall (Los Angeles), Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, the Guggenheim Bilbao, and the Institute for Provocation (Beijing). She has been fortunate to work with ensembles including SurPlus, Southland, San Francisco Contemporary Music Players, Aperture, andPlay, loadbang, koan, Dog Star Orchestra, The Reader’s Chorus, Pamplemousse, Chamber Cartel, orkest de ereprijs, S.E.M., red fish blue fish, Wild Rumpus, and The Syndicate for New Arts.
Writing and recordings are available in MusikTexte, Experimental Music Yearbook, The New Centennial Review, Leonardo Music Journal, Perishable, the wulf, and Quakebasket. Chen earned a Ph.D. in music from UC San Diego, and a M.A. in Modern Thought and Literature and B.A. in music from Stanford University, with an honors thesis on free improvisation and radical politics. She lives in Los Angeles.
AMOC*:
AMOC* (American Modern Opera Company), founded in 2017 by Matthew Aucoin and Zack Winokur, builds and shares a body of collaborative work. As a group of dancers, singers, musicians, writers, directors, composers, choreographers, and producers united by a core set of values, AMOC* artists pool their resources to create new pathways that connect creators and audiences in surprising and visceral ways.
The 2023/24 season proposes a dialogue between neglected histories and uncertain futures, from colonial legacies to today’s climate crisis. With two significant world premieres, a US-tour launch, a new work in Paris, and our continued commitment to developing multidisciplinary works, this season showcases groundbreaking American artistry on an international scale. In December 2023, we celebrated Latin American poets and the voices of women with John Adams’ El Niño: Nativity Reconsidered, a chamber-music arrangement written specifically for AMOC*. El Niño toured to Opera Omaha, Stanford University, and Yale University before returning to the Cathedral of St. John the Divine for a second year. Spring 2024 also marks the world premiere of two AMOC* commissions: Music for New Bodies, composed by AMOC* Co-Founder Matthew Aucoin, is a staged song cycle based on recent poems by Jorie Graham. This new work, co-created with director Peter Sellars, explores humankind's impact on the planet and the presence of immense cycles beyond our control. The work premieres as a co-commission with DaCamara of Houston and Rice University on April 20th at Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music. In June, The Comet / Poppea, a co-production with Anthony Roth Costanzo, Cath Brittan, and The Industry debuts at The Geffen Contemporary at MOCA in Los Angeles. Conceived and directed by Yuval Sharon and composed by George Lewis, with a libretto by Douglas Kearney, The Comet / Poppea juxtaposes W.E.B. DuBois’ short story The Comet with Monteverdi’s The Coronation of Poppea—framing both a rebuke of opera and a celebration of the form’s radical potential.
Simultaneously, AMOC* continues developing new works, including a multidisciplinary triptych by artistic duo Gerard & Kelly combining music, dance, and film that focuses on Julius Eastman’s life and legacy. The first part of this triptych, Gay Guerrilla, premiered in July at the Centre Pompidou (Paris) in partnership with the Opéra national de Paris, & Compagnie, AMOC*, and Festival d’Aix-en-Provence, with the support of enoa and the Creative Europe program of the European Union.
The 2023/24 season proposes a dialogue between neglected histories and uncertain futures, from colonial legacies to today’s climate crisis. With two significant world premieres, a US-tour launch, a new work in Paris, and our continued commitment to developing multidisciplinary works, this season showcases groundbreaking American artistry on an international scale. In December 2023, we celebrated Latin American poets and the voices of women with John Adams’ El Niño: Nativity Reconsidered, a chamber-music arrangement written specifically for AMOC*. El Niño toured to Opera Omaha, Stanford University, and Yale University before returning to the Cathedral of St. John the Divine for a second year. Spring 2024 also marks the world premiere of two AMOC* commissions: Music for New Bodies, composed by AMOC* Co-Founder Matthew Aucoin, is a staged song cycle based on recent poems by Jorie Graham. This new work, co-created with director Peter Sellars, explores humankind's impact on the planet and the presence of immense cycles beyond our control. The work premieres as a co-commission with DaCamara of Houston and Rice University on April 20th at Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music. In June, The Comet / Poppea, a co-production with Anthony Roth Costanzo, Cath Brittan, and The Industry debuts at The Geffen Contemporary at MOCA in Los Angeles. Conceived and directed by Yuval Sharon and composed by George Lewis, with a libretto by Douglas Kearney, The Comet / Poppea juxtaposes W.E.B. DuBois’ short story The Comet with Monteverdi’s The Coronation of Poppea—framing both a rebuke of opera and a celebration of the form’s radical potential.
Simultaneously, AMOC* continues developing new works, including a multidisciplinary triptych by artistic duo Gerard & Kelly combining music, dance, and film that focuses on Julius Eastman’s life and legacy. The first part of this triptych, Gay Guerrilla, premiered in July at the Centre Pompidou (Paris) in partnership with the Opéra national de Paris, & Compagnie, AMOC*, and Festival d’Aix-en-Provence, with the support of enoa and the Creative Europe program of the European Union.
JULIA EICHTEN:
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Julia Eichten is a graduate of the Juilliard School, where she received the Hector Zaraspe Award in recognition of her choreography in 2011. Eichten was a founding member of L.A. Dance Project and is a current member of AMOC* (American Modern Opera Company). Since working with L.A.D.P, Eichten continued working with Gerard & Kelly as a performer as well as an associate choreographer on such projects as ‘bridge-s,” in collaboration with Solange & the Getty Museum of Los Angeles. Last summer, Eichterling, an ongoing project with creative partner Bret Easterling had a premiere of their latest work, “Dance in The Park,” at the Ojai Music Festival. ‘What followed was a joyous, frockling pas de deux of love, extinction and human evolution — Charles Darwin meets Fantasia.’- SF Chronicle. At the start of 2023, Eichten was choreographer and the associate director of “Expostulations of Mary,” a new chamber opera for voices, strings, dance, and electronics with composer Eliza Bagg and director, George Miller. Eichten performed and was movement director in Carolyn Chen’s, “How to Fall Apart,” at Baryshnikov Art Center, NYC. Recently, at Frieze Art Festival, Eichten performed an excerpt of, “Julie with a Beet,” as a part of Open Studios at L.A. Dance Project, Los Angeles, CA.’This smart choreographic rhythm by Eichten is the kind of dance that you always want to stumble upon and be taken by surprise with.’ - LA Chronicle. Eichten performed in Bobbi Jean Smith's “Broken Theater” at Carolina Performing Arts, Chapel Hill, NC & Oz Arts, Nashville and most recently to a sold out run at La Mama, NYC. ‘Julia Eichten, in the role of stage manager, provides some much-needed comic relief.’ - NY Times.
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KEIR GOGWILT:
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Keir GoGwilt is a violinist, musicologist, and composer who was born in Edinburgh and grew up in New York City, where he currently lives. His work combines historical research and collaborative experimentation across a range of musical styles and genres. Known as a "formidable performer" (New York Times) with an "evocative sound" (London Jazz News) and "finger-busting virtuosity" (San Diego Union Tribune), he has soloed with groups including the Orchestra of St. Luke's, Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, Chinese National Symphony, Orquesta Filarmonica de Santiago, the Boston Modern Orchestra Project, the New England Philharmonia, and the La Jolla Symphony. His duo with bassist Kyle Motl features their original compositions and has been noted for its "rhapsodic gestures" (The New Yorker) and "keen musical intellects" (The Wire). His recompositions of renaissance and medieval music with violinist Johnny Chang have been released on Another Timbre; their music has been praised for its "patience, poise, and consummate balance" (Night After Night) and "mystical ecstasy" (Esoteros). His current project, Ortiz the Musician, re-imagines early music in 16th-century Mexico and Cuba through extensive research, collaborative composition and improvisation.
GoGwilt has worked closely with composers including Matthew Aucoin, Carolyn Chen, Tan Dun, and Celeste Oram. He has also worked extensively with bassist Mark Dresser, percussionist/conductor Steve Schick, and choreographer/dancer Bobbi Jene Smith. As a founding member of the American Modern Opera Company (AMOC), he has performed original, collaboratively-devised music, dance, and theater works at the 92nd st Y, Baryshnikov Arts Center, Luminato Festival, PS 122 COIL, Stanford Live, American Repertory Theater, Carolina Performing Arts, Momentary, and the Ojai Music Festival. GoGwilt earned his PhD in Music (Integrative Studies) from UC San Diego in 2022 and was awarded the Chancellor's Dissertation Medal for the Division of Arts & Humanities. As an undergraduate at Harvard he studied Literature, and was awarded the Louis Sudler Prize in the Arts. His research on histories and philosophies of performance, pedagogy, and embodiment has been published in Current Musicology, Naxos Musicology, and the Orpheus Institute Series. |
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COLEMAN ITZKOFF:
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Cellist and performer Coleman Itzkoff stands at the intersection of baroque/classical/new music, contemporary dance, and experimental theater. Whether premiering works by living composers and performing baroque music on historical instruments in the same concert, delivering enigmatic monologues in a piece of avant-garde dance theater (as well as dancing in said piece), composing, arranging, and recording music for the Amazon film ‘Le Bal des Folles’, or simply playing a piece of solo Bach for hospital patients in the time of COVID, Coleman continues to push the boundaries of what it means to be a musician of the 21st century, bringing his diverse range of interests and shape-shifting presence to every room and stage he occupies.
Hailed by Alex Ross in the New Yorker for his “flawless technique and keen musicality,” Coleman has performed in the great halls and festivals of America and abroad. As a soloist, he has had the privilege of being the featured soloist with many great orchestras, including recent appearances with the Houston, San Diego, and Cincinnati Symphonies. As a recitalist, he is allowed to express his eclectic taste and inventive programming, and is constantly experimenting with the form and format of a solo concert, playing with unique lighting, unconventional spaces, and often with an accompaniment of dance or text. Collaboration is the heart of Coleman’s art making. To that end, he is a dedicated member of several ensembles, including the early music ensembles Ruckus and Twelfth Night, and is a founding member of AMOC, the American Modern Opera Company. Coleman holds a Bachelors in Music from Rice University, a Masters in Music from USC, and an Artist Diploma from The Juilliard School. For more information, please visit colemanitzkoff.com |
IOANNIS 'YAYA' LOGOTHETIS:
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Ioannis ‘YaYa’ Logothetis (it/its) is a post-disciplinary artivist from Thessaloniki, Greece, experimenting at the intersection of improvisation, movement, performance art, sound, film, and installation. YaYa is a living artist, a creative problem solver, an improviser, a leader and a collaborator. It believes in change and in adjacent spaces that are rooted in collaborative leadership, and its work is intuitive and imaginative, a collage, a moving target, a blending of all things, places, and times. It received a BFA in Dance at Marymount Manhattan College, and a Qigong Certification at Coremotion, has performed across the US, Europe, and Asia, collaborating with Bobbi Jene Smith, Shamel Pitts, and Maxine Doyle, and been an artist in residence at Theater De Nieuwe Vorst, Arts On Site, and Triskelion Arts. Durational and Installation works include “ΜΟΝΑΔΑ” exploring the white body in extensive stillness, discomfort, vulnerability, non-linear non-binary time exposure, and “Immortal Game” on technology, relationships, expression before form, and collaborative improvisation, exploring the space between virtual reality and immersive performance.
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MATILDA SAKAMOTO:
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Matilda Sakamoto is from Los Angeles. Matilda has performed in dance and theater productions including, Sleep No More in New York City, Richard Nelson’s play, The Michaels, at the Public Theater and starred in Apple’s “Snap” Airpods campaign as well as spots for Gap, Meta, Oscar Meyer, Skillshare and more. Matilda has shown and created work at numerous venues in New York and Los Angeles, like Chen Dance Center, Dixon Place, Martha Graham, Judson Memorial Church, Triskelion Arts, Juilliard, Caroga Arts Music Festival and Highways Performance Space. She was chosen to be a dance resident at Art Omi and for the Ann and Weston Hicks Choreography Fellowship at Jacob’s Pillow. She received her BFA from the Juilliard School.
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ANNA DROZDOWSKI:
Working most often as a curator and producer, Anna Drozdowski builds supportive structures for extraordinary experiences in art, society and academia. Delivery systems at home and abroad include: festivals, conversations, retreats, installations, performances, catalogs, creative exchange and belles lettres.
To provide platforms for contemporary hybrid work in visual art and performance in Philadelphia, Anna co-founded Thirdbird, ThinkingDance, facilitated with ArtistsU and managed Headlong in the development of their Performance Institute. She directed the adaptive re-use of Neighborhood House and taught in Socially Engaged MFA program at Moore College of Art & Design. Recent collaborators include: Woodlands Cemetery, David Lang, Trade School, Common Field, Crossing Choir, Burrows & Fargion, Bowerbird, Bobbi Jene Smith, Roberto Lugo, Mural Arts, AMOC*, Ojai Music Festival, Attacca Quartet & WuMan, Silkroad Ensemble and Philip Glass/Tenzin Choegyal.
Her work has been supported by Fulbright, NEA Dance Criticism, and DAAD Fellowships and grants from: Pew Center for Arts & Heritage, Knight Foundation, TMU, CDSP Chicago, PA Council on the Arts/Humanities and PHL Cultural Fund. NYU calls her a Master of Performance Studies. Anna is reviving a tiny homestead in the hinterlands of Vermont as a space to cultivate and cross-pollinate the wildness that comes from creative people. She believes in giving credit where it is due, astringent integrity, and loves starting things.
To provide platforms for contemporary hybrid work in visual art and performance in Philadelphia, Anna co-founded Thirdbird, ThinkingDance, facilitated with ArtistsU and managed Headlong in the development of their Performance Institute. She directed the adaptive re-use of Neighborhood House and taught in Socially Engaged MFA program at Moore College of Art & Design. Recent collaborators include: Woodlands Cemetery, David Lang, Trade School, Common Field, Crossing Choir, Burrows & Fargion, Bowerbird, Bobbi Jene Smith, Roberto Lugo, Mural Arts, AMOC*, Ojai Music Festival, Attacca Quartet & WuMan, Silkroad Ensemble and Philip Glass/Tenzin Choegyal.
Her work has been supported by Fulbright, NEA Dance Criticism, and DAAD Fellowships and grants from: Pew Center for Arts & Heritage, Knight Foundation, TMU, CDSP Chicago, PA Council on the Arts/Humanities and PHL Cultural Fund. NYU calls her a Master of Performance Studies. Anna is reviving a tiny homestead in the hinterlands of Vermont as a space to cultivate and cross-pollinate the wildness that comes from creative people. She believes in giving credit where it is due, astringent integrity, and loves starting things.
MARY ELLEN STEBBINS:
Mary Ellen Stebbins (Lighting Design) Based in New York City, collaborations include work with MCC Theater, Shakespeare Theater Company, Opera Philadelphia, Juilliard, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, as well as Theresa Rebeck, Talking Band, Clare Barron, A$AP Rocky, Adrienne Truscott, Monica Bill Barnes, and eighth blackbird. Mary Ellen is a 2020 Bessie Award Honoree for her work with Monica Bill Barnes’ Days Go By and a 2016 Henry Hewes nominee for her design for Clare Barron’s I’ll Never Love Again. She is a 2019 Opera America Tobin Director-Designer Prize recipient, a 2014 Live Design Young Designer to Watch, the 2011 USITT Barbizon Lighting Design Award winner, and a 2009 Hangar Theater Lab Company Design Fellow.
Mary Ellen holds an AB from Harvard University and an MFA from Boston University. She is a member of USA 829 and currently teaches at Carnegie Mellon School of Drama and SUNY Purchase.
Mary Ellen holds an AB from Harvard University and an MFA from Boston University. She is a member of USA 829 and currently teaches at Carnegie Mellon School of Drama and SUNY Purchase.
VICTORIA BEK:
Victoria Bek is a costume artist based in New York City. Her work maintains a multifaceted approach through design, construction, collaborative curation, custom textile dyeing and painting. Through the years, Victoria has worked both regionally and internationally in Dance, Theater, Opera, and Interdisciplinary Performance Art. Her most recent collaborations include the Park Avenue Armory, The Juilliard School, The Shed, L.A. Dance Project, American Modern Opera Company, Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, Gibney Company, New York Philharmonic, and more.
CHRISTOPHER GILMORE:
Christopher Gilmore designs for theatre, opera, live performance, and dance. Recent designs include “Seven Deadly Spins” (La Jolla Music Society), Luke Hickey’s A Little Old, A Little New (The Joyce @ Chelsea Factory, American Dance Festival, New Victory Dance Festival), With Care (92Y), Ensemble Connect Up Close: Through Movement (Carnegie Hall), CAGE (American Modern Opera Company), Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (New York Film Academy). Assistant/Associate: Trevor: A New Musical (Stage42), Assembly (Armory), Radio Golf (Two River), Log Cabin (Playwrights Horizons), also multiple productions at American Repertory Theatre and Huntington Theatre Company. Proud graduate of Emerson College.