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solo|soul is a full length solo work created by and for Karen Jamieson, premiering as part of the Dancing on the Edge Festival. solo|soul will explore the transformation from inside out, the body as a temporary garment, and the transition from muscular to energy body that is demanded by the process of aging. 

“Time is running out for me. My body, the sole repository of rich dance experiences of a lifetime, is aging. Yet my understanding of the meaning and significance of the work that I have been doing these past years grows. There is a race going on – to render this understanding into choreographic form before my body ceases to be an expressive vehicle.” Karen Jamieson

Part of the 2014 Annual Dancing on the Edge Festival of Contemporary Dance, this new work seeks to provide audiences with opportunities or doorways to experience the dance not just with their eyes, but through other senses as well: to sense weight, to experience impact, to sense space through proprioception (the sensing of motion), to feel the energy of the dance fill the space, to experience qualities of energy that are rooted in emotion but transformed.

The diverse group of dance artists were drawn from the community to be partners in investigating an issue central to the creation of solo|soul; the concept of the “energy body”, an invisible body within the visible body, an internal source and generative power that propels and anchors both process and choreographic outcome. The “danced conversations” focus on this concept, interfacing and sometimes colliding with specific unique issues that each artist brings to the conversation.

Dancing on the Edge Festival & The Dance Centre Present The World Premiere of solo|soul

Dates: July 10 to 12, 8 pm
Venue: Scotiabank Dance Centre, 677 Davie Street, Vancouver
Tickets: Regular ticket, $28; students, seniors, $26; available online or via phoning 604.689.0926
DTES Member Tickets: $24; student/senior DTES members, $22 (membership $10)
Dancing on the Edge Passes also available

With over 30 different dance companies and artists from across Canada and beyond in 10 days of jam-packed dance, 2014’s Dancing on the Edge Festival brings some of Canada’s and Vancouver’s most exciting contemporary dance artists to the stage. For more info on solo|soul, visit Karen Jamieson Dance online.

Karen Jamieson Dance was formed in 1983. A winner of the Chalmers Award, Karen Jamieson has created over 90 original dance works with original scores by over 20 respected Canadian composers, performed in Canada, Europe, Japan, and the United States. Her work Sisyphus was named one of the 10 Canadian choreographic masterworks of the 20th century; ongoing projects with the residents of Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside are recognized nationally as groundbreaking in community-engaged and cross-cultural dance scenes.