Strauss 2225:
Dances for the Future
Ballet
from 1012 Termine
Strauss 2225: Dances for the Future
More dates
About the piece
How will we live ... How will we dance ... How will we make music ... in 200 years?
Johann Strauss is celebrating his 200th birthday and we are celebrating with him! On the occasion of the Waltz King's anniversary, NEST is presenting a ballet premiere in cooperation with JOHANN STRAUSS 2025 VIENNA that dares to look ahead. Johann Strauss' compositions are still popular at balls and parties today, and the "Danube Waltz" is danced with loved ones at the turn of the year - and not just in Austria. But what might his music sound like in the future?
Canadian choreographer Robert Binet explores this question with Strauss 2225: Dances for the Future: "Anyone who looks at two centuries of history also has the responsibility to think two centuries into the future. So the question arose for me: Who will be the Strauss of the future? Someone who creates music that connects people and keeps them dancing all night long. I'm not just interested in the dance itself, but also in the world in which people will be dancing in 200 years' time."
In order to include as many perspectives as possible in the piece, the choreographer invited four authors from different backgrounds to write texts about a world in the year 2225: blind scientist and author Devon Healey focuses on blindness as an alternative form of perception; choreographer Donald Byrd, whose artistic work is primarily concerned with social justice, travels through time; Christiana Figueres, former Executive Secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and collaborator on the Paris Climate Agreement, writes about the eternal, powerful connection between humans and nature, and finally three young people - two young composers, a young dancer and choreographer - and their unfiltered conversation about topics that concern them.
These four libretti form the basis for four new musical compositions by young international female composers who bring Strauss to life in their works. On this basis,Robert Binet creates a ballet with the dancersof the Ballet Academy's youth company: 12 people between the ages of 18 and 21 who have completed their training in Vienna and other places around the world and now form the young ensemble of the Vienna State Ballet.
Four extraordinary visions - four new compositions - a vibrant homage to dance! Let's get carried away and dance towards the future!
What it Sounds Like
Strauss 2225: Dances for the Future
Based on the new texts and music, a ballet in four parts has been created that shows the ensemble of the youth company in a choreography that has the vocabulary of classical ballet and yet is completely anchored in the contemporary. The young dancers give themselves completely to the music, their personalities, hopes and longings become part of the creation, which shows them not only as dancers, but above all as people. Honest - pure - moving - these are the Dances for the Future.
How can the sounds of Johann Strauss inspire the music of the future? Four young composers have tackled this creative task: Gity Razaz, who was born in Iran and comes from the USA, Annamaria Kowalsky, who lives in Vienna, Claire M. Singer from Scotland and Gediminas Žygus from Lithuania, who lives in Berlin.
The result is four different compositions ranging from string quartets and quintets to electronic sounds - music between concert hall and club. Strauss' compositions such as his waltzes Wiener Blut and Wo die Zitronen blühen are thus interpreted by the artists in a contemporary way, audible in the form of quotations and fragments, sometimes completely pure and then distorted again.
To mark this year's World Ballet Day, which is organized by the Royal Ballet London and invites ballet companies around the world to take part, the Vienna State Ballet is collaborating with Ich bin O.K., a dance association for people with and without disabilities. Under the motto "Access Becomes Art: World Ballet Day 2025", topics such as inclusion and diverse, broader approaches to ballet art will be explored.
Robert Binet, who is this year's World Ballet Day ambassador, will perform a choreography together with dancers from the youth company and the Ich bin O.K. Compagnie to develop a choreography based on Strauss 2225: Dances for the Future. The process and the work will be shown in digital form on November 12.