ENGLISH VERSION

Yggdrasil Dance Ensemble presents:

THE BUTTERFLY

Choreographer: Birgitte Bauer-Nilsen
Composer & Musical Director: Niels Lan Doky
Co-composer: Xavier Desandre-Navarre

The participant musicians:

Niels Lan Doky (piano) (Denmark/France)
Emil Spanyi (keyboards, loops, samples) (Hungary/France)
Xavier Desandre-Navarre (percussion) (France)
Prahbu Edouard (percussion) (India)
Jesper Bodilsen (bass) (Denmark)
Maulidi Mohammed (percussion) (Tanzania)
Quoc Trung (keyboards, loops, samples) (Vietnam)

The participant dancers:

Mr. Nguyen Hong Phoung (Vietnam)
Ms. Nguyen Thi Quoy Nga (Vietnam)
Mr. Aloyce Mohammedi Makondo (Tanzania)
Ms. Maureen Mvoni (Tanzania)
Mr. Lars Bjørn (Denmark)
Ms. Johanne Hestbeck Dam (Denmark)
Mr. Bharath Rao (India)
Ms. Bijayini Satpathy (India)

YGGDRASIL DANCE ENSEMBLE:

In the Nordic mythology, there is a World Tree named ”Yggdrasil” which symbolizes the center of the earth. The roots of this Yggdrasil tree symbolize the people of the earth and each of its roots represents a different culture.

The different cultures join in the trunk of the tree and in the branches new cultures are created - and this is a metaphor for the artistic vision of the Yggdrasil Dance Ensemble.

Birgitte Bauer-Nilsen is the founder of the ensemble.

SYNOPSIS”THE BUTTERFLY”
– THE CHOREOGRAPHY:

Choreographer & founder of Yggdrasil Dance Ensemble:
Birgitte Bauer-Nilsen

Just as the ”Tango” is essentially Argentina’s traditional fertility or courtship dance, equivalent dances – about the meeting between man and woman – exist in other cultures, such as the 4 cultures from where the Yggdrasil dancers are from:
In Tanzania this traditional dance is called ”Sindimba,” in Denmark there is the ”Brudevalsen” or the ”Bryllupsmarchen” and India and Vietnam each have their own equivalent with just as much strength and character. The common tone is eroticism and sensuality - and the different dance traditions all reflect universal feelings.

The courtship dance in Tanzania,”Sindimba,” is an expressive dance with shaking of the hips and shoulders and direct eye contact. It is performed as a group dance – in sharp contrast to the Danish ”Brudevalsen” (i.e. Wedding Waltz) which is only danced by a couple and where the man leads the women in harmonized steps sliding across the floor. In Vietnam it is all about small movements and steps, with very elegant hand gestures, no eye contact, and no touching of each other. In India it is the slapping of the feet, isolated torso and head movements, short glimpses to the partner and up to the Gods, magnificent finger movements and hardly any touching of each other either.

The dancers’ artistic meeting point is Modern Dance – but they are all without exception highly skilled in Traditional Dance from their respective cultures.

The Butterfly dance performance paints a nuanced picture of love, in a cross-cultural fusion between Vietnam/Asia, Tanzania/Africa, India/Asia and Denmark/Europe.

The Butterfly represents a global meeting and an aesthetic dialogue between man and women in different cultures. The Butterfly will inspire a better understanding of different cultures and their aesthetic attitudes. Hopefully it will contribute towards making it easier for people to meet and live in a global society.

A butterfly is transformed from a caterpillar into a pupa and finally into a free-flying being. And this can serve as a metaphor for the spiritual transformation that goes on in humans, in the meaning between man and woman and in the meeting between different cultures of the world.

SYNOPSIS”THE BUTTERFLY”
– THE MUSIC:

Composer and Music Director Niels Lan Doky reflects the choreographer’s cross-cultural vision. Not only is he himself half-Danish and half-Vietnamese, he has also gathered an international cast of musicians all with extensive prior experience in multicultural fusions and hybrid music forms:

It is important to not the essential fact that all of the musicians are present on stage in close proximity of the dancers throughout the entire Butterfly performance. The reason for this is that the music is highly interactive with the dancers.

The music’s point of origin is Jazz but mixes and integrates many different other genres including World Music, Electronic, Classical and Pop.

A yogi from India once said (while analyzing philosophies in different cultures) that Jazz is the Western world’s way of practicing Zen - living in the moment. Jazz is based mainly on improvisation and on spontaneous interaction and it is an art form which has always reflected a unique and strong ability to absorb, integrate and merge outside elements and influences. Thus it is, musically speaking, a very natural starting platform for the Butterfly project.

The music for the Butterfly is at the same rigidly structured and strongly improvised. It alternates between very detailed prewritten sequences and stretches of freely improvised musical reactions to the dancers’ movements on stage. As a result, the musicians perform the music with their eyes glued to the dancers most of the time – in order to create a powerful symbiosis between the dance and the music. As a result, portions of the choreography are also interactive in relation to the improvised sections of the music.

As is the case with the choreography (where there is a mixture between Modern Dance and Traditional Dance) the music also mixes the old and the new. Composer Niels Lan Doky considers this a lost value in modern society. He has himself always lived by credos that value the new as an extension of the old rather than a replacement of the old. He is especially found this value to be very present in the black American jazz community where one of his mentors once told him that it comes from an old African proverb that goes like this:”Those of us, who stand on the shoulders of our ancestors, stand tallest.”

The mixture of the old and the new and the rich and extensive blend of cultures is an omnipresent characteristic in the music in The Butterfly.

NIELS LAN DOKY – mini CV:

Pianist, composer, producer and director Niels Lan Doky (borrn 1963) was born and raised in Copenhagen to a Danish mother and a Vietnamese father. He is the first Danish jazz musician since bassist Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen to gain wide international renowned and critical acclaim.

He first emerged on the jazz scene in 1979 as the 15 year old protégé of American jazz legends Thad Jones and Ernie Wilkins. He moved to the USA in 1981 where he quickly came to prominence playing and recording with such jazz icons as Joe Henderson, Clark Terry, Charlie Haden, Ray Brown, David Sanborn, Woody Shaw, Jack DeJohnette, Al Jarreau, John Scofield, the Brecker Brothers and many others. His extensive recording career, which began in 1986, includes 25 albums as a leader and countless albums as a producer or sideman for other artists.

His recording work is represented on such prestigious jazz labels as Blue Note, Columbia, Verve and Milestone. He is one of the most influential jazz pianists in his native Denmark and is also among the most popular jazz artists in Japan where his albums have received multiple awards and reached top positions on the national bestseller charts. He has performed for many prominent world figures, including Pope Jean-Paul II and Queen Margrethe II of Denmark.

In June of 2003, Denmark’s minister of culture Brian Mikkelsen appointed Doky Member of the Music Committee under the Danish Arts Council. Niels moved to Paris, France in 1989 where he currently resides with his family. In 2005 he debuted as a feature film director with his acclaimed film "Between a Smile and a Tear".

For more information please visit: www.nielslandoky.co

BIRGITTE BAUER-NILSEN – mini CV:

Choreographer, Associate Professor in Dance (Born 1962 in Denmark). Birgitte Bauer-Nilsen has made dance performances and choreography work in both Europe and in Third World countries, including teaching as an Associate Professor in Dance and work as visiting lecturer.

Since 1995, Birgitte has been the Artistic leader of Yggdrasil Dance Ensemble, whose major projects include such intercultural dance performances as "The Butterfly". Composer Niels Lan Doky, starring dancers from Vietnam, Tanzania, and Denmark performed on the Opera in Hanoi and Ho Chi Ming city, Vietnam, and in Denmark. "Ice and fire" a fusion of modern dance and Indian contemporary dance. Choreographer: Birgitte Bauer-Nilsen. Composer: Trilok Gurtu. "Prophecy of the Volva" translated by Suzanne Brøgger, Choreographer: Birgitte Bauer-Nilsen and performed on FN´s World Conference on women in Beijing, China and Indonesia.

Birgitte Bauer-Nilsen has been teaching since 1999 as an Associate Professor in Dance at the Department of Music and Dance at the University of Stavanger in Norway subjects as: Dance Anthropology, and Choreography among other topics and has conducted exchange projects with Bagamoyo College of Arts in Tanzania, Africa and the Nalanda Dance Research Center, Mumbai University, India.
Birgitte Bauer-Nilsen was also employed as choreographer at the international event "Barter" Odin Theater in Denmark, where professional artists from Bali, India, Japan, Brazil and amateurs from Copenhagen (a total of 150 attendees) participated. This was part of Copenhagen Cultural Capital of Europe 1996. Birgitte has given workshops and made research in traditional and ritual dances from India, Indonesia, China, Vietnam and Tanzania.

Birgitte has participated in the most prestigious dance company in Denmark, Danish Dance Theatre. Birgitte has been a visiting lecture by various universities in Europe and the United States in Dance Anthropology.
Education and studies: PhD Fellowship in Dance Anthropology and Choreography. Master thesis "Dance as a cultural phenomenon in the European and Indian culture", Roskilde University, Denmark. Studied at The Department of Music and Dance, University of Massachusetts, USA. Studied at The Alvin Ailey, The American Dance Theater, New York, United States.


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