locust

locust just performed the first 15 minutes of “crushed” as part of the National Performance Network’s Annual Meeting in Seattle this past Friday December 12. Due to not enough tech time, and in efforts to keep things simple, we burned our video onto a DVD.  Should be simple, but technology never is.  The DVD player worked during our tech, dress rehearsal, and 5 minutes before we went on stage.  However, when it was time to do it for real, the damn player decides to magically break.  Blame it on the full moon and the fact that planets were in retrograde.  These things happen.  We kicked total ass anyway.  The dance and music was tight and people were excited!  It got us all even more excited for our premiere in February at the Moore Theater in Seattle, February 27th 2009!  Maybe we will post a little preview for all ya’ll.  Keep checking back!

For those of you in Seattle, you haven’t seen much of us around town since the premiere of “mockumentary” at On the Boards in the fall of 2006. Since then, we took a little break right afterward since we have been making something every year since 2000. You gotta breath every now and then you know. In 2007 Amy O conducted teaching and choreographic residencies at Idaho State University and Texas Woman’s University. In August 2007, Amy O was a choreographer in residence at Bates Dance Festival in Lewiston,MN. At Bates, Amy O and Ellie Sandstrom performed a short excerpt from “mockumentary” in the Different Voices Concert. In September of 2007, we reworked all of “mockumentary” while in residence at the University of Montana in Missoula. Every day for a week, Amy O and Zeke conducted master classes and worked with a group of dance and media students to facilitate the creation of their own dance/music/video performance. Every night, locust worked on installing “mockumentary” in a green screen filming room that used to be a gym. With no light grid and sound equipment, we built the technical components of the piece from high powered hunting flash lights and light bulbs in power strips and work lights used for painting outdoors. We performed the show on Friday with the students performing the work we helped them to create as our opening act. Since Elton John was in town that night, we had to start the show at 4 pm so people could go see him after us. We packed the room with some people standing for the whole hour and a half. They were right there with us. It was a wonderful experience to take “mockumentary” and go from the high end, technical dream version in Seattle, to no tech in Montana. The result was more intimate and humbling to know that we can always make something from nothing and sometimes, it’s better that way. Two weeks later, we took this version of “mockumentary” to San Diego, CA through SUSHI Performing Arts. We got some well deserved beach time there.
In December of 2007, Amy O went to Tokyo Japan and screened 2 locust films in Next Moment at Uplink Factory. Next Moment was organized and curated by Corrie Befort. In January 2008, Amy O performed with Reggie Watts in the Under the Radar Festival at the Public Theater in New York. Amy O and Zeke attended their second Creative Capital retreat on the east coast this summer. They presented a short presentation on “mockumentary” to a room of 300 presenters and artists. In August 0f 2008, Amy O was in residence at the Headlands Center for the Arts in Sausolito, CA for 3 weeks working in the studio alone, preparing for the work she and locust have coming up in 2009. Zeke has been working with his new band Moon Lander.
So what is next?
locust has been invited to showcase at the National Performance Network Annual Meeting in Seattle this month. We will be performing the first 15 minutes of our new piece “crushed”. “crushed” will premiere February 27, 2009 at the Moore Theater in Seattle. ONE NIGHT ONLY! We are so super excited about the new work we are doing. It is a new direction for us and we are so excited to share it with you! SAVE THE DATE!