WHERE AND WHEN:
December 21, 22 and 23
Fri and Sat at 8:00 pm, Sun at 3:00 pm
Theater for the New City, 155 First Avenue (At E. 10th Street )
Presented by Theater for the New City
$15; box office (212) 254-1109, online ticketing available at www.theaterforthenewcity.net
BOTH DANCE AND MUSIC CRITICS are invited to all performances.

NEW YORK, November 20 – "Tarantella--Spider Dance," directed by the internationally-renowned percussionist and singer Alessandra Belloni, celebrates the mystical power of the tarantella in a Mediterranean/Southern Italian Winter Solstice Celebration. Theater for the New City, 155 First Avenue, Manhattan, is presenting this Dance/World Music event for three nights only, December 21 to 23, in its large Joyce and Seward Johnson Theater. Belloni and the company of I Giullari Di Piazza (Players of the Square) invite holiday revelers to celebrate the darkest night of the year with them in an evening of ecstatic dances, musical exorcisms and a new Techno Tarantella trance dance.

While I Giullari Di Piazza is well known for extravaganzas with ritual drumming and traditional folk music, this is its first production using Techno Music. It is also its first collaboration with choreographer Antonio Fini of the Martha Graham Dance Company.

The Spider Dance, or "Tarantella," is a wild erotic dance ritual from Southern Italy used to cure the mythical bite of the tarantula. An earlier version of this production was presented at Lincoln Center's Alice Tully Hall in 1996 and played to a sold-out audience as "The Dance of the Ancient Spider." In articles on the year's best World Music CDs, the sound track of this production made the top ten lists of Jon Pareles of the NY Times and Dan Hackman of the Los Angeles Times.

This new production has folk dances choreographed by Alessandra Belloni and modern dances choreographed by Antonio Fini, who is originally from southern Italy. Its music infuses ancient melodies and instrumentation; Arabic, Middle Eastern, and Brazilian rhythms; and for the first time, techno beats and electronic music. Some arrangements are by guitarist John La Barbera and violinst Joe Deninzon. Some music has been composed by Alessandra Belloni.

In its modern sense, the piece is aims to involve audiences of all ages in a collective ritual dance of liberation from the spider web of entrapment in today's society. It aims for an ecstatic release known as the Pizzica, or Spider Dance, whose origins are cross-cultural. Its music derives from ancient Greece, southern Italy during the Crusades, the Renaissance and modern times, blending modern and ancient healing trance dances, powerful ritual drumming and chants in honor of the Black Madonna, erotic sensual love songs and women's work chants.

Most specifically, the performance harkens back to the historic Dance of the Tarantula, a healing trance dance for women from the Greek rites of the "Baccantes." Women involved in these rites, called Tarantate, danced the "Pizzica Tarantata" ("the bite of the spider tarantula," also called "the bite of love"). A bite of love drives them to dance in a wild frenzy in order to free themselves of repressed sexual desires. The dominant music was percussion, with large tambourines playing non-stop to a 12/8 beat, with loud accents. By spinning and stomping their feet, participants symbolically expelled the "poison" of the mythical bite of the tarantula from their bodies. A double row of jingles on the instruments accentuated the madness as dancers, traditionally clad in white with red scarves and ribbons, moved on their backs like spiders. All participants customarily experienced a trance-like state induced by the combination of music and dancing.

Instrumentation in this piece combines the traditional and the modern. Traditional percussion instrumentation will include tambourines, frae drums, dumbeck, riqq and castanets. Modern instrumentation will include drum set; electric violin techno beats and electronic music.

Arachne, played by dancer Sharon Li VArdo, challenges the Goddess Athena, played by percussionist/singer Alessandra Belloni into a weaving contest. Arachne wins and Athena, taken by jealousy, destroys her competitor's creation. A humiliated Arachne commits suicide and hangs herself from a tree. Athena then transforms her into a spider, played by Aerial dancer Fran Sperling, thus condemning her to weave her web forever. The show goes on to tell the story of a woman (played by Alessandra Belloni) wrongly accused of being a witch during a winter solstice gathering in the woods. She is not allowed to express her sexual desires and turns into a tarantata. Her only cure to be rid of the depression is to dance the Tarantella.

The performance concludes with a collective trance dance cleansing ceremony. The audience is invited to participate in this celebration of life and love with dancing and wine.

The musical ensemble includes Alessandra Belloni (lead vocals, southern Italian percussion and ritual dance), Joe Deninzon (musical director, electric and acoustic violin), percussionist Vinnie Sicala and Wael Gamel from Egypt, Sergio Bellotti (drumset, percussion) and Anand Gan (computer samples design and sound engineer). Singers are Alessandra Belloni (mezzo soprano), Ivan Thomas (baritone, from the original show "River Dance") and Alessandra Tartivita (soprano).

The dance company includes eight dynamic dancers and fire dancers of different cultural backgrounds. Appearing will be dancers from the Martha Graham Ensemble, guided by Antonio Fini (who also plays Dionysus); Italian folk dancers; a Middle Eastern Dancer, Andrea Noriega, whirling in a Sufi dance; and stilt dancer Mark Mindek. Set design is by Arden H. Mason.

Alessandra Belloni (www.alessandrabelloni.com) is a Remo artist with her own line of signature series tambourines. A virtuoso of the instrument, she uses it ro revive an ancient women’s tradition. Women priestesses honoring the Goddess of the Earth and the Moon in ancient Egypt , Greece and Rome mainly played tambourines and frame drums. Today, these instruments are still used in Southern Italy. Belloni has mastered these instruments, combining them with singing and dancing. She has been named "One of the best percussionists in the World" by DRUM Magazine and other publications. Belloni has collaborated with many celebrated drummers such as Rick Allen (Def Leppard), Gordon Gottlieb, (NY Philharmonic, Julliard, Steely Dan), Jamie Haddad, (Paul Winter, Paul Simon), Kenny Aranoff, Anthony Miranda, Brazilian percussionist Mauro Refosco (from David Byrne's band) and others.

John La Barbera (arrangements), originally from Southern Italy, is co-founder of I Giullari Di Piazza, has developed, taught and transcribed traditional Italian music in the US since 1979. He has composed music for several films and documentaries, such as "Sacco and Vanzetti," "Children of Fate" and the "Souls of Naples" with John Torturro.

Music from this concert will soon be released and include collaborations with some of the most talented drummers of our time. This production is funded in part by the New York State Council on the Arts.

PRESS CLIPPINGS:
"Invocations and work songs, exorcisms and lullabies shared the program of "Rhythm is the Cure' in the Chapel of the cathedral of St. John the Divine.... driven by tambourine patterns so fast that the drummers hands became blurs. Ms. Belloni sang in an exultant voice. The songs blazed with an age-old momentum." (Jon Pareles, New York Times)
"Alessandra Belloni... is a revelation ... The Music is utterly fascinating in addition to its revelatory presentation of Italian roots music, it is timely as well, given the current surge of interest in the healing powers of music." (Don Heckman, Los Angeles Times)

"An earthy presence like Anna Magnani and a passionate voice all of her own" (Newsday, Anamona Hartacolis)

"Armed with a detailed knowledge of Italian tradition, a mastery of percussive techniques, and her customary tambourine, Alessandra Belloni summons powerful healing forces... she is a Mediterranean Volcano; she can erupt artistically and emotionally at any moment with a passion that spills to a powerful effect..." (Iris Brooks, Rhythm Music & Percussion Source)

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DANCE AND MUSIC CRITICS ARE INVITED to all performances