Doug Varone and Dancers To Perform in 2017 Victory Dance; Four Weeks of Free Dance for New York City Summer Schools Thursdays, July 13 & 20, 2017 at 7pm

Celebrating its 30th Anniversary this year, Doug Varone and Dancer presents Lux, a vibrant, life-affirming dance set to Philip Glass’s “The Light” performed by eight members of the Bessie Award-winning company. Commissioned by the Vapnek Family Fund, the dance has been a mainstay in the Company’s repertory since its premiere in 2006.

This July, The New Victory Theater will present its fourth season of VICTORY DANCE, the theater’s initiative to provide FREE dance performances to kids in New York City day camps, school and youth programs over the summer. For four weeks from July 10 – August 4, 2017, VICTORY DANCE will feature a cross-section of highly accomplished and internationally recognized New York-based dance companies who perform a range of movement styles including hip-hop, contemporary, Indian classical dance and traditional African dance. Like The New Victory Theater, each company hopes to inspire young people to embrace the art form.

VICTORY DANCE consists of two unique programs which, this year, will include the following dance companies or soloists: Bill Shannon, Buglisi Dance Theatre, Decadancetheatre, Doug Varone and Dancers, Heidi Latsky Dance, Ronald K. Brown/EVIDENCE, and Preeti Vasudevan’s Thresh with New York City Ballet’s Amar Ramasar.

Every performance will feature a 90-minute program including a Talk-Back led by a NEW VICTORY Teaching Artist. Also, between each dance, a Teaching Artist will share more about the company, choreographer or the dance, providing insight into each work. Through the post-show discussions, New York City kids will have the opportunity to engage with choreographers and dancers, and the creators will also learn more about how their work affects young people.

VICTORY DANCE is designed to serve New York City students enrolled in NYC Department of Education summer school enrichment programs, such as Summer Arts Institute, subsidized day camps and social service agencies. These students attend daytime performances free of charge and also receive free dance-related workshops led by professional Teaching Artists before and after their visit to the theater. Summer school instructors also receive free NEW VICTORY School Tool® Resource Guides, which encourage further exploration of the art form in the students’ day-to-day curriculum.

This summertime program, which reaches more than 3,500 NYC kids, mirrors the education programs The New Victory Theater provides to nearly 36,000 students throughout each school year. The New Victory Theater looks forward to sharing live performances on stage, exploring the art form in classrooms and building relationships that will have an impact on NYC kids from summer to summer.

Award-winning choreographer and director Doug Varone works in dance, theatre, opera, film, and fashion. He is a passionate educator and articulate advocate for dance. His work is known for its emotional range, kinetic breadth and the diversity of genres in which he works. His New York City-based Doug Varone and Dancers has been commissioned and presented to critical acclaim by leading international venues for three decades. In the concert dance world, Varone has created a body of works globally. Commissions include the Limón Company, Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, Rambert Dance Company (London), Martha Graham Dance Company, Dancemakers (Canada), Batsheva Dance Company (Israel), Bern Ballet (Switzerland) and An Creative (Japan), among others. In addition, his dances have been staged on more than 75 college and university programs around the country. In opera, Doug Varone is in demand as both a director and choreographer. Among his four productions at The Metropolitan Opera are Salome, the world premiere of Tobias Picker’s An American Tragedy, and Stravinsky’s Le Sacre du Printemps, designed by David Hockney. His Met Opera production of Hector Berloiz’s Les Troyens was broadcast worldwide in HD. He has directed multiple premieres for Minnesota Opera, Opera Colorado, Washington Opera, New York City Opera, and Boston Lyric Opera, among others. His numerous theatre credits include choreography for Broadway, Off-Broadway and regional theatres across the country. His choreography for 2012’s musical Murder Ballad at Manhattan Theatre Club earned him a Lortel Award nomination. Film credits include choreography for the Patrick Swayze film, One Last Dance. In 2008, Varone’s Bottomland, set in the Mammoth Caves of Kentucky, was the subject of PBS’s Dance in America: Wolf Trap’s Face of America. Last season, he directed and choreographed MasterVoices’ production of Dido and Aeneas at New York City Center, starring Tony Award winners Kelli O’Hara and Victoria Clark, alongside the Company. Most recently, he directed the staging of Julia Wolfe’s Pulitzer Prize winning oratorio, Anthracite Fields for the Westminster Choir and the Bang on a Can All-Stars. Varone received his BFA from Purchase College where he was awarded the President’s Distinguished Alumni Award in 2007. Numerous honors and awards include a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship, an OBIE Award (for Lincoln Center’s Orpheus and Eurydice), the Jerome Robbins Fellowship at the Boglaisco Institute in Italy, two individual Bessie Awards, two American Dance Festival Doris Duke Awards for New Work, and four National Dance Project Awards. In 2015, Varone was awarded both a Doris Duke Performing Artist Award and a Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Dance Guild. Varone teaches workshops and master classes around the world for dancers, musicians and actors. He is currently on the faculty at Purchase College, teaching composition and choreography.

Celebrating its 30th Anniversary this year, and the recipient of 11 Bessie Awards, Doug Varone and Dancers has toured to more than 125 cities in 45 states across the US and in Europe, Asia, Canada, and South America. Stages include The Kennedy Center, Lincoln Center, Brooklyn Academy of Music, New York City Center, San Francisco Performances, London’s Queen Elizabeth Hall, Toronto’s Harbourfront, Moscow’s Stanislavsky Theatre, Buenos Aires’ Teatro San Martin, the Venice Biennale, and the Tokyo, Bates, Jacob’s Pillow and American Dance Festivals. In opera and theatre, the Company regularly collaborates on the many Varone-directed or choreographed productions that have been produced around the world. Doug Varone and Dancers continues to be among the most sought-after ambassadors and educators in the field. The Company’s multidisciplinary residency programs take audiences deeper into the work, with a hands-on approach that moves beyond the studio to speak directly to people of all ages and backgrounds, both dancers and non-dancers alike. Our annual intensive workshops at leading universities have attracted students and professionals from around the country, and through our innovative DEVICES choreographic mentorship program, we are training the next generation of artists and dance-makers. Whether on the concert stage, in opera or theatre or on the screen, choreographer Doug Varone creates kinetically thrilling dances with rich musicality and emotional depth. From the smallest gesture to full-throttle bursts of movement, Varone’s work can take your breath away with both its athleticism and its passion. www.dougvaroneanddancers.org

The New Victory Theater brings kids to the arts and the arts to kids. Created in 1995 on iconic 42nd Street, this nonprofit theater has become a standard-bearer of quality performing arts for young audiences in the U.S. Reflecting and serving the diverse city it calls home, The New Victory is committed to arts access for all students, teachers, kids, families and communities of New York to experience and engage with the exemplary international programming of theater, dance, circus, puppetry and more on its stages. A leader in arts education, youth employment and audience engagement, The New Victory Theater has been honored by the President’s Committee on the Arts and the Humanities with the 2014 National Arts and Humanities Youth Program Award, by Americans for the Arts with a national Arts Education Award, and by the Drama Desk for “providing enchanting, sophisticated children’s theater that appeals to the child in all of us, and for nurturing a love of theater in young people.”

Founded in 1990, The New 42nd Street is an independent nonprofit organization charged with the continuous cultural revival of 42^nd Street between 7^th and 8^th Avenues, building on the foundation of seven historic theaters to make extraordinary performing arts and cultural engagement part of everyone’s life. The New 42nd Street fulfills this purpose by ensuring the ongoing vibrancy of 42^nd Street’s historic theaters; supporting performing artists in the creation of their work at the New 42nd Street Studios and The Duke on 42nd Street; creating arts access and education at The New Victory Theater, New York’s premier theater for kids and families; and through the New 42nd Street Youth Corps, its model youth development initiative, which pairs life skills workshops and mentorship with paid employment in the arts for NYC youth.Inspired by the city it serves, The New 42nd Street is committed to the transformational power of the arts.

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