Words and Images Courtesy of the Virginia Arts Festival
Virginia Arts Festival is pleased to present Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, returning to Coastal Virginia for the first time since 2018. The legendary dance company performs Tuesday, April 25 at the Ferguson Center for the Arts in Newport News and Friday, April 28 - Sunday, April 30 at Chrysler Hall in Norfolk.
Tickets can be purchased online at www.vafest.org, by phone at 757-282-2822 or by visiting the Virginia Arts Festival Box Office located at 440 Bank Street in Norfolk.
Beloved by generations of audiences and revered by critics around the world, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater lifts audiences to their feet with performances of classics by their founder, the Presidential Medal of Freedom-awarded Kennedy Center Honoree Alvin Ailey, and some of the most exciting contemporary choreographers of the 20th and 21st century.
“The dancing is wonderful – assured, skillful, incredibly fast. The evening concludes, as does every performance, with Ailey’s Revelations, from 1960, set to spirituals and gospel, a triumphant hymn to the human spirit, moving from a sense of sorrow to joy-filled life” (The Guardian, UK).
Of course, the Virginia Arts Festival engagement would be incomplete without Alvin Ailey’s American masterpiece Revelations. Since its creation in 1960, Revelations has been seen by more audiences around the world than any other modern work, inspiring generations through its powerful storytelling and soul-stirring spirituals. Springing from Ailey’s childhood memories of growing up in the south and attending services at Mount Olive Baptist Church in Texas, Revelations pays homage to the rich cultural heritage of the African-American and explores the emotional spectrum of the human condition. Hailed by The New York Times as "modern dance's unquestionable greatest hit," this American masterpiece was choreographed when Alvin Ailey was only 29 years old and is as relevant now as ever.
About Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater
Artistic Director Robert Battle leads Ailey’s 32 extraordinary dancers as they continue the Company’s legacy of using the African-American cultural experience and the American modern dance tradition to uplift, unite, and enlighten. The company’s expansive repertory includes returning favorites, new productions, and world premieres by some of the freshest choreographic voices in modern dance.
Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, recognized by U.S. Congressional resolution as a vital American “Cultural Ambassador to the World,” has performed for over 25 million people in 48 states and in 71 countries on 6 continents, celebrating the African-American cultural experience and the American modern dance tradition. Ailey’s permanent home is The Joan Weill Center for Dance, the largest building dedicated to dance in New York City, the dance capital of the world.
About Virginia Arts Festival
Since 1997, the Virginia Arts Festival has transformed the cultural scene in southeastern Virginia, presenting great performers from around the world to local audiences and making this historic, recreation-rich region a cultural destination for visitors from across the United States and around the world. The Festival has presented numerous U.S. and regional premieres, and regularly commissions new works of music, dance, and theater from some of today’s most influential composers, choreographers and playwrights. The Festival’s arts education programs reach tens of thousands of area schoolchildren each year through student matinees, in-school performances, artists’ residencies, master classes and demonstrations.
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