DanceLive Festival is back! Citymoves Dance Agency’s annual celebration of dance is a programme of captivating and thought-provoking performances featuring local, Scottish and National artists and companies. Over the 4-day festival, our programme of performances will be held in our partner venues across the city centre. His Majesty’s Theatre, The Art Gallery, The Anatomy Rooms, Cheers Bar and a special night time performance and projection parade in the City Centre. A series of morning workshops and classes will be led by visiting artists and companies as well as a number of free pop-up performances throughout the city centre all weekend long! There are more details about DanceLive 2024 coming soon, so stay tuned!
Festival Programme
Tread
WALKER Movement Theatre Company
An empty space, but from its centre comes the cyclic whirring of a standard-size treadmill; this is WALKER Movement Theatre Company's vehicle for thought provocation. TREAD intertwines stunt performance techniques, contemporary dance, and minimalist development practices to create a mesmerising exploration of the Black moving body that invites audiences into a realm where joyful fantasy and brutal realities transcend and coexist.
When: 17th of October, 19:00
Where: The Anatomy Rooms
WALKER Movement Theatre Company would like to acknowledge, the following funders and creative partners: Arts Council England, The Place, Fabric, Tramway, Festival.org, Creative Crawley, Birmingham International Dance Festival, Trinity Laban Conservatoire for Music and Dance, and Serendipity Arts UK. Photo Credit: Leonardo Berti (leonardoisamu.com).
Small Town Boys
Shaper/Caper
Shaper/Caper presents Small Town Boys - an interactive show exploring the escapism of queer nightlife during the 80s AIDS crisis through dance and spoken word. The story follows a young man as he leaves his small hometown to find refuge in the bright lights and warm embrace of the big city. He discovers solace and cheer in the city's LGBTQ+ scene, but soon finds himself navigating a terrifying unfolding health crisis, almost completely ignored by the government. 
Our dancers will be taking over the floor of the nightclub with all your favourite 80s anthems, along with our LGBTQ+ community cast, immersing audiences in the joy and chaos of the nightlife scene by dancing alongside them. The show features choreography by the award-winning Thomas Small, set, costume design by Becky Minto, lighting design by Dylan Baillie, and specially commissioned music by Mark Franks, composer and member of platinum-selling band The Overtones.
Small Town Boys beautifully blends lively action and tender vignettes, breathing life back into memories of the time, and all the joy and tragedy they contain. Winner of the Proud Scotland Creative Arts Award 2024.
When: 17-20 October; 20:30 and 19th October; 16:00
Where: Cheerz Bar nb: This is an 18+ Venue
CONTENT/TRIGGER WARNINGS: 18+, Adult themes, strong language, homophobic language, grief and death.
Festival Artist Studio Class
Vince Virr
This Studio Dance Class invites Participants to explore the movement style and creative processes used by the dancers who bring POP! to DanceLive Festival.
When: 18 October; 10:00-11:30
Where: The Anatomy Rooms
Ready
Matthew Hawkins
In his new solo READY, Matthew Hawkins is travelling light. He turns up, dressed simply, with a few props, a CD player and a box set of Beethoven piano sonatas.
READY is a low-tech, site-sensitive solo piece which marks and celebrates over half a century of dance practice. It’s a flexible work which can be performed in studio contexts, found spaces or outside. Matthew currently performs it weekly in a ‘meanwhile’ space in a closing-down shopping centre near his home in Leith.
When: 18 October; 13:00
Where: Aberdeen Art Gallery
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Fields (Extract)
Merav Israel
Playful and poetic, Fields (Extract) is a compelling durational performance that draws the audience into a textured landscape of stone, where patterns of dwelling are made and unmade, shaped by land, by time and human hands.
Layered with detail and played out to an intermittent sound score of live and recorded sound, images emerge of agricultural labouring, the toil of turning stony ground and defending territories.
Performed by Merav Israel and Claire Pençak with a recorded sound score by Nik Paget-Tomlinson with Jem Le Lievre.
Fields (Extract) was made with Support from Dance Base, Citymoves and Tramway.
When: 18 October; 15:00
Where: Breathing Space Studio
Sense of Centre
Jack Webb in Association with Feral Arts
Sense of Centre is a moving dance solo from award-winning choreographer Jack Webb. Dance, object manipulation and projection combine to explore our longing for home, our need for connection and the body as a place of sanctuary from the modern world. A compelling meditation on our increasing sense of loneliness and isolation and the basic human need for a centre of gravity. In a world that is fractured and breaking apart, Sense of Centre is a powerful return to the simplicity of nature and the importance of belonging. Jack is an award-winning choreographer/director, movement director, dancer and teacher working across dance, theatre, opera and film. He is based in Edinburgh, Scotland, and has been working internationally for the past 17 years.
When: 18 October; 19:00
Where: The Anatomy Rooms
Curtain Raiser by: Fusion Youth Dance Company
Festival Artist Studio Class
Shaper/Caper
This Studio Dance Class invites Participants to explore the movement style and creative processes used by the dancers who bring Small Town Boys to DanceLive Festival.
When: 19 October; 10:00-11:30
Where: The Anatomy Rooms
POP!
Presented by Vince Virr
Pop! Is a high energy dance duet that is designed for non-theatre spaces where the audience can watch or pass by as and when they see wish.
When: 19 October; 12:30 & 14:30
Where: Aberdeen Art Gallery
Featuring: Citymoves' Pulse Youth Performance Group
NOW
Jasmin Vardimon Company
‘NOW’, a new creation by choreographer Jasmin Vardimon MBE, will celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Jasmin Vardimon Company. It will reflect the current moment, the present, the now, and the continuous movement of time. With an interest in contemporary lives, the structures of our society, and the ever-changing socio-political dynamics, Jasmin uses her distinctive dance theatre and creative approach to tell a story of our time.
With a remarkable international cast of performers, and relevant & iconic moments from the Company repertoire, NOW will celebrate the beauty of imagination and art.
This Scottish Premier comes to DanceLive Festival in Partnership with Aberdeen Performing Arts.
​When: 19 October; 19:30
Where: His Majesty's Theatre
Content Warning: Contains some adult themes.
Festival Artist Studio Class
Jasmin Vardimon Company
This is a unique opportunity to work with a professional dancer from the Jasmin Vardimon Company who will use their intimate and first-hand experience of Jasmin’s work to lead this creative movement workshop. The workshop will focus on the Company’s new work ‘NOW’, and explore the movement style and creative methodology used by Jasmin Vardimon Company
When: 20 October; 10:00-12:30
Where: The Anatomy Rooms
STRUT
Megahertz and Feral Arts
STRUT is a nighttime outdoor performance and mobile projection parade by visual theatre makers MHz, produced by Feral, featuring 5 local dance heroes in each location who perform personal choreographies in their own dance styles. STRUT is designed as a procession of outdoor dance performances partnered with stunning large-scale building-mapped projections and a light show for audiences to encounter from their pavements, windows, and doorsteps. With the global trend for viral dance routines becoming a new way for people to connect across cultures and geographical locations, MHz were inspired to consider how they could create a context to celebrate the dance heritage of their neighbourhood. Using the power of freestyle dance as a universal expression of freedom, happiness and tactile connection to our surroundings.
When: 20 October; 19:00
Where: St Nicholas Square
My Friend Selkie
What Moves You
A 50-minute dance theatre show with live music for children ages 3 - 8 years old.
“A child-like delight that encourages audience interaction and offers a charming introduction to Scottish folk tales" The Skinny, EdFringe August 2023
"The adults loved it as much the children" Parent, 2023
"My favourist show" Child, 2022
When: 20 October; 14:00-14:50
Where: Fittie Community Hall
