Solus and Synergy happening at OZ Arts Nashville this Friday (Dec 5) and Saturday (Dec 6). A double bill of original premieres merging dance, film, and music featuring local artists Becca Hoback and Shabaz Ujima and Thea Jones of shackled feet Dance! with the music of Rod McGaha celebrating the liberation of body and mind through Black Classical Music.
“Synergy came up because the work we do with Rod is so multidisciplinary,” co-artistic director of Shackle Feet Dance! Thea Jones said. We find ways in which our art talks to each other and so how to make this theme broader and how do we take these people, these dancers and these creatives that we know, and bring them into this collective and create this work. With Synergy specifically, we are exploring these relationships between the dancer and the musician, the dancer in multimedia, those with different abilities and those with whatever societal standard abilities, the elders and the youth. All these relationships will be present on stage. Rod McGaha has gifted us all of his music and he peeling out all these beautiful songs and they’re so diverse. We have the privilege of using his music for this piece. In addition we have the privilege of using his art in this piece.”
Solus by Becca Hoback is her collaboration with composer and cellist Kaitlyn Raitz. A dance, film, and music triptych exploring a search for the sacred and profound.
“Becca’s beautiful, lovely piece explores deeper and more concentrated topics will be paired or complemented with our piece,” she said. “Hers is exploring light as a scan of the body. Ours is exploring light when projected from the inside out. What we want you to leave with is to be happier than you came. What you will experience is a multi-generational, multicultural, differently able dance collective that is telling stories from all these points of view that wouldn’t normally gather in the same place at the same time. But this shared commonality has brought these humans into this space. We hope that you a see yourself reflected on stage, see yourself reflected in the space, connect with someone or something that you see, color, art, photography, movement, storytelling, all that will be present there.”
Additional event opportunities in the next week:
Thursday (Dec 4) Do615’s 13th birthday party at The Basement East. Back at the same venue on Friday (Dec 5) JD McPherson presents Socks: A Rock N Roll Christmas. On Saturday (Dec 6) Nashville Punk Rock Flea Market is at Eastside Bowl also JID performs at Marathon Music Works and Chockcherry is at Cannery Hall’s Row One Stage. Sunday night (Dec 7) Portugal the Man is at the Caverns and on Monday night (Dec 8) Erykah Badu performs at The Pinnacle. Also on Monday, Alanna Royale: A Royale Holiday is at City Winery. Wrap up this week’s listings on Tuesday (Dec 9) with Billie Marten performing at The Basement East.
