Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui & Toneelhuis July 27, 2007

The Moroccan dancer and choreographer Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui who works in Belgium made a furore with his last works (like e.g. “d’avant” that was shown at ImPulsTanz 2006) of medieval boy bands singing a capella and acrobatic virtuosity. He didn’t shy away from using his multi-cultural identity to build bridges between the middle ages and post modernity, Orient and Occident in order to discover trans-cultural archetypes.

This year he sets off with a large ensemble of over twenty performers and live musicians to work on a myth that writes itself during the process, and is being called thus.

Sidi Larbi works closely with Patricia Bovi, a specialist in ancient music who traces the ability to be an oracle back to traumatic experience. And so a purgatory is created, an ecumenical waiting room between the past and the present, East and West, where Catholic song calls up pre-Catholic figures and Damien Jalet, as a kind of Dracula, hunts for the shadow that influences reality retrospectively.

Official Website: http://www.impulstanz.com/festival07/performances/id10/en