The Sacre Project

Pacific Symphony

UCI Dance Department

Creative:

Director & Media Designer: John Crawford

Choreographers: Jodie Gates, Chad Michael Hall, Lisa Naugle

Scenic Designer: Luke Cantarella

Sound Designers: Michael Hooker, Alan Terricciano

Lighting Designers: Lonnie Alcaraz, Stacie O’hara

Costume Designer: Katie Wison

Piano (Recorded): Lorna Griffitt, Nina Scolnik

Cast:

Kelly Alvarez

Melanie Anderson

Tanya Ariana Bendis

Kimberly Bridgewater

Cierra Crowley

Kelsey Gerber

Alec Guthrie

Melanie Hawkes

Kaitlyn Hicks

Chris Johnson

Kelly Kaufman

Saleemah Knight

Celeste Lanuza

Jennifer Lott

Samantha Matsumoto

Natalie Matsuura

Stefanie Maughan

Ali McKeon

Nia-Amina Minor

Sara Mizuno

Aubrienne O’Meara

Robert Olivares

Andrea Ordaz

Dominika Pietrzyk

Tracy Shen

Brittany Steacy

Daniel Tran

Peri Trono

Mason Trueblood

Karen Wing

Bret Yamanaka

Lani Yamanaka

Mlondi Zondi

Vincent Hardy

Jessie Ryan

Jeremy Zapanta

Regina Carli

Katie Jo Turk

A dance & media performance using strategies of performing arts and media installation to envision The Rite of Spring as a radically deconstructed performance event evoking ritual, polyphony and embodiment.

The Sacre Project featured work by three choreographers, seven designers and over forty dancers, and incorporated computer-generated visuals with a processed audio soundscape. A digital media installation at the beginning of the piece remixed sections of The Rite of Spring musical score, presented with small groups of dancers in sculptural structures arranged around the perimeter of a black-box theatre space. Audience members walked through this gallery-like setting, watching and listening on their own individual terms, choosing the degree to which they would engage with scenic and performative elements. As the piece progressed, dancers gradually transformed the space from a free-form exploratory experience to a single-focus performance environment, and the event concluded with the sacrificial dance staged on a central platform.

Igor Stravinsky’s iconic score for The Rite of Spring had its first performance in Paris in 1913 with choreography by Vaslav Nijinsky and scenic design by Nicholas Roerich. The Sacre Project*, presented in California in 2013, used new choreography processed and interpreted through digital video projections, accompanied by a electronic soundscape based on Stravinsky’s score. Originally produced at UC Irvine, the project subsequently was restaged in collaboration with Pacific Symphony at the Segerstrom Center for the Arts.

First performance: February 2013.