Preview: Voces – Singapore Flamenco Festival 2019

This November, it’s time to put a little Spanish into your step as the Singapore Flamenco Festival returns for its 6th edition, with 10 days of power packed performances, inspiring workshops and engaging open forums by artists by local and international. This year’s edition, themed Voces (voices), aims to provide a powerful voice for pressing social issues, exemplified by anchor performance The House, an original flamenco production that explores … Continue reading Preview: Voces – Singapore Flamenco Festival 2019

Preview: Kalaa Utsavam 2019 by Esplanade – Theatres on the Bay

Back for its 18th edition, the Esplanade’s Kalaa Utsavam – Indian Festival of the Arts returns this Deepavali season to present another 10 exciting days of the very best artists from across the Indian diaspora, presenting both traditional and contemporary works – and sometimes, a mix of both to keep us both rooted as we move into the future. Much of Kalaa Utsavam’s line-up this year … Continue reading Preview: Kalaa Utsavam 2019 by Esplanade – Theatres on the Bay

Preview: Puffing Bodies by Maya Dance Theatre and Iptanz

  Following their series PANCHA last year about domestic violence and abuse, Maya Dance Theatre returns this December with a brand new collaboration with German company Iptanz. Centering around the idea of body shaming, Puffing Bodies is a dance-theatre production conceptualised by Ilona Pászthy (Artistic Director of Iptanz) and Kavitha Krishnan (Artistic Director of Maya Dance Theatre). When the two met at Tanzmesse, an international network for contemporary artists in Dusseldorf, … Continue reading Preview: Puffing Bodies by Maya Dance Theatre and Iptanz

Preview: Celebrations for Prof’ Ho by NUS Centre For the Arts (Music)

This weekend, Singaporean musicians are coming together to celebrate the 80th birthday of musical leader and key advocate for the development of local school bands, Associate Prof Ho Hwee Long. Comprising performers drawn from alumni and current band members of the National Institute of Education, National Junior College and National University of Singapore, all of whom were developed under the baton of Prof Ho, will perform … Continue reading Preview: Celebrations for Prof’ Ho by NUS Centre For the Arts (Music)

Review: The Golden Record 3.0 by Edith Podesta and NUS Centre For the Arts

The arts and sciences collide in this successful lecture-performance about quantum physics.  While multiple Bicentennial plays this year have focused on questioning the past, the NUS Centre For The Arts has chosen to go in quite the opposite direction, looking into the future with The Golden Record 3.0 Marking the third and final part of a trilogy of plays inspired by the 1977 Voyager launch, which … Continue reading Review: The Golden Record 3.0 by Edith Podesta and NUS Centre For the Arts

Hong Kong 2019: The Big Meal by Hong Kong Repertory Theatre (Preview)

HONG KONG – In a restaurant, touching moments play out scene after scene. Whether it is lovers enjoying a candlelight dinner, or family members joining together at the table, every meal is a meaningful occasion filled with wide-ranging emotions, accompanied by laughter and tears both bitter and sweet. Over the course of The Big Meal, eight actors play a total of 26 characters having 54 … Continue reading Hong Kong 2019: The Big Meal by Hong Kong Repertory Theatre (Preview)

da:ns festival 2019: Pas de Deux by Raimund Hoghe (Review)

Finding tenderness and connection in the face of seemingly irreconcilable differences.  Raimund Hoghe is a shorter than average 70-year old German man with a discernible hunchback, pale and serious. Takashi Ueno is a much younger Japanese man of average height, slim and lithe. One wonders how the two might even begin to find a point of connection with each other with these distinct physical builds and … Continue reading da:ns festival 2019: Pas de Deux by Raimund Hoghe (Review)

da:ns festival 2019: FULL OUT! (Review)

Living proof that street dance is just as much of an art form as every other production gracing the Esplanade Theatre. It’s hard to believe it’s been over a decade since the Esplanade’s da:ns festival has featured street dance performers on the mainstage. Almost as if to make up for this absence, FULL OUT! features some of the world’s very best dance crews gathering for a single, … Continue reading da:ns festival 2019: FULL OUT! (Review)

Review: Lim Boon Keng – The Musical by Musical Theatre Limited

A musical digest reclaiming the life of a Singaporean icon ahead of his time.  Honest question: how many of you can say you know who Lim Boon Keng was? Sure, you may know him because of Boon Keng MRT station, but who was he really, and why is he such an important figure in Singapore’s history? The answer to that question comes neatly packaged in Musical … Continue reading Review: Lim Boon Keng – The Musical by Musical Theatre Limited

da:ns festival 2019: Princess by Eisa Jocson (Review)

Someday my prince will come. But not if you’re Pinoy.  Growing up on a steady diet of Walt Disney’s animated films, the current generation of young adults were almost certainly bombarded with a relentless insistence of happy endings and visions of the ideal woman as a svelte, prim and proper princess. The sad reality is, the Disney empire’s brand of happiness would apply only to … Continue reading da:ns festival 2019: Princess by Eisa Jocson (Review)