WHERE: Mark Morris Dance Center, 3 Lafayette Avenue, Brooklyn, NY

WHEN: Saturday, July 11 (callbacks Sunday, July 12)
WHAT: Auditions for The Hard Nut and full-time company positions

The Mark Morris Dance Group will hold auditions on July 11 for both male and female dancers of all ages for The Hard Nut (performances at BAM, December 21-20, 2015), as well as full-time company positions. Space is limited and priority registration will be given to this year’s MMDG Summer Intensive students. Call backs will be held on July 12.

Pre-registration is required at mmdg.org/auditions

 

ABOUT THE MARK MORRIS DANCE GROUP

Founded in New York in 1980, the internationally-renowned Mark Morris Dance Group (MMDG) has been called “the preeminent modern dance organization of our time” (Yo-Yo Ma), receiving “highest praise for their technical aplomb, their musicality, and their sheer human authenticity.” (Bloomberg News). MMDG spent three years in residence at Brussels’ Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie as Belgium’s national dance company, returning to the United States in 1991.

The Dance Group is distinguished as the only modern dance company with a commitment to live music at every performance, founding the MMDG Music Ensemble in 1996. MMDG also regularly collaborates with eminent musicians across genres, including cellist Yo-Yo Ma, mezzo-soprano Stephanie Blythe, jazz trio The Bad Plus, the London Symphony Orchestra, baroque orchestras Tafelmusik and Philharmonia Baroque, as well as opera companies such as The Metropolitan Opera and the English National Opera.  

Community engagement is also a vital component of the Dance Group. Through the organization’s Access/MMDG programming, it integrates opportunities for dance, music, talks, and education at its Brooklyn home, the Mark Morris Dance Center, as well as on tour around the world.

“The Mark Morris Dance Group has long been ahead of all other dance companies in the flow and detail of its dancers’ response to music. And their qualities of focus, stillness, and ease are ones that most actors would envy. “  — Financial Times

 

ABOUT THE HARD NUT

The Hard Nut is a retro-modern take on the holiday favorite The Nutcracker. Morris' rendition, which won Ovation TV's Battle of the Nutcrackers contest for three years running, transplants the story from the decorous 1890s to the swinging 1970s, a freewheeling era realized with panache and wit. Inspired by the E.T.A. Hoffmann story, Tchaikovsky's complete, original score, and the comic book art of Charles Burns,  Morris captures the beauty and tenderness of this classic while infusing it with supreme musicality and raucous humor.

 

“Morris' choreography is formally dazzling, uproariously funny.”

— San Francisco Chronicle