Repertory :: 7 Rooms to the Soul

Repertory

7 Rooms to the Soul
Video Clips

Premiere: Austin Lyric Opera, Ducloux Hall / February 2000 / Six Dancers. Four Opera Singers. / 35 minutes / Original Score by Graham Reynolds, The Golden Arm Trio / Choreography by Andrea Ariel / Video by Linedashmedia and Alison White/ Lighting Design by Zach Murphy / Costume Design by Amy Burrell / Space Design by Ann Marie Gordon/ Live Music, Quartet: piano, percussion, violin, viola, clarinets, trombone. Photography by Cindy Light.

Dance Performed by: Andrea Ariel, Ellen Bartel, Jim Chappeleaux, Angel Mendez, Whitney O'Baugh, Cecilia Proeger, Nancy Moran. Music performed by: The Golden Arm Trio-Graham Reynolds, Jason Elinoff, Erin Hill, Mike Hoffer, Lisa Nicol. Voice Performed by: Alok Kumar, Jayoung Yoon, Patrick Miller, and Kris Olson.

Called "a landmark,"; the company's 2000-2001 season premiere, 7 Rooms to the Soul, melds compelling dance with the live music of a six-piece orchestra, an operatic choir, and stunning video imagery set to an original composition that layers classically elegant and haunting melodies, exquisite pizzicato, and a cacophony of percussion with playful bursts of vocal experimentation. The composer, vanguard pianist/percussionist Graham Reynolds, won a Critics Table Award for Music Direction. Ariel describes 7 Rooms as a work that "sheds light on the realm of the imaginary. In each 'room' of the soul, a chorus of angels highlights the wanderings of the soul's thoughts." Ariel and her dancers invoke a range of feeling -- from the razor-edged frenzy of madness to carefree, lighthearted tumbling; shifting yet again from a meditative, poignant stillness to unfettered absurd silliness.

"So far, Ariel Dance Theatre's 7 Rooms to the Soul is the most exhaustive artistic creation of this Austin season. The 90-minute concert contains everything from opera to architecture, all arranged to encourage meditation in the imaginary rooms in our minds."

"Few artists combine as many disciplines and as many inspirations as Ariel--and to such canny effect. 7 Rooms to the Soul is a landmark."

Michael Barnes, Austin-American Statesman

The Ariel troupe manifests personae of poignant stillness, of razor-edged frenzy, of flowing grace, of downright absurdity in expressing the dimensions of humanness."

Wayne Alan Brenner, Austin Chronicle