Grand Finale

Grand Finale description

Hofesh Shechter is no ordinary choreographer. Israeli born, London-based, Shechter exploded into the contemporary dance world when, as a relative unknown, his 2007 work In Your Rooms was hailed as one of the most important new works of the millennium.

Since then, he’s built an arrestingly powerful body of work, almost singlehandedly creating a new genre: part dance, part gig, part theatre. Critics try to encapsulate his work with words like ‘exultant’, ‘visceral’, and ‘ecstatic’, and certainly his trademark gestural language – derived from folkdance, military exercise, club-dancing and even the gym – is addictively hypnotic.

Harder to convey is its deep emotional impact and ability to wordlessly capture the contemporary zeitgeist, responding with searing intelligence to the world around us: demagoguery, the death of truth, groupthink, and ecological disaster. Yet threaded throughout is Shechter’s signature black humour with which he analyses and exorcises today’s demons. Spectacularly ambitious, his latest work Grand Finale pits his company of extraordinary dancers and an onstage live band against a gathering wave of percussive sound and ever-encroaching darkness. Fierce and anguished on one level, its moments of irony, of suspended rapture and raging defiance infuse it with a thrilling, unstoppable energy.

a wild waltz for the end of time … [Grand Finale] ranks among Shechter’s most sophisticated creations

The Guardian, UK

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Choreographic fireworks... Set, music, pounding percussion and dancers bodies soaring high, the apocalypse of Grand Finale shakes the compass of tribal dance. A must see.

Le Monde

Event additional information

Participants

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Choreography & Music by Hofesh Shechter

Set & Costumes design Tom Scutt

Lighting design Tom Visser

Music Collaborators Nell Catchpole and Yaron Engler

Associate Artistic Director Bruno Guillore

Design Assistant Rosie Elnile

Produced by Hofesh Shechter Company and commissioned by Georgia Rosengarten.
Our Commissioning Partners are Sadler's Wells, Théâtre de la Ville-Paris / La Villette-Paris and Brighton Dome and Festival. Co-commissioned by Colours International Dance Festival Stuttgart, Les Théâtres de la Ville de Luxembourg, Romaeuropa Festival, Theatre Royal Plymouth and Marche Teatro / Inteatro Festival together with Danse Danse Montréal, HELLERAU – European Center for the Arts Dresden in cooperation with Dresdner Musikfestspiele, Dansens Hus Oslo, Athens and Epidaurus Festival, HOME Manchester and Scène Nationale d’Albi.

Grand Finale is generously supported by the International Music and Arts Foundation.

Hofesh Shechter Company is supported using public funding through Arts Council England. Hofesh Shechter Company benefits from the support of BNP Paribas Foundation for the development of its projects.
Hofesh Shechter is an Associate Artist of Sadler’s Wells and Hofesh Shechter Company is Resident Company at Brighton Dome.

Resources

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Read and download the daybill here (PDF 493KB)

Teachers resources for the show can be found here (PDF 157KB)

Additional resources:

Review Writing Tips (PDF 290KB)

Theatre Etiquette (PDF 115KB)

Links to Curriculums for Education Resources (PDF 215KB)

Partners

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