Music on Main brings the world premiere of The Tempest Project, to Vancouver Playhouse, July 17-22.
The audience is invited on a music-filled journey as this incredible production takes them through the sound-and-light enveloped lobbies, halls, and backstage areas of the 62-year-old civic venue. Drawing upon themes found in Shakespeare’s The Tempest, this musically and theatrically bold production weaves love, magic, and wonder into a poetic meditation on universal challenges.
![MOM Modulus - Jan Gates](https://i0.wp.com/www.jayminter.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/05_MOM-Modulus-2021_Photo-Credit-Jan-Gates_Music-on-Main_One-Time-Use.jpg?resize=640%2C257&ssl=1)
“Shakespeare’s final play, The Tempest, has inspired artists for more than 400 years. It’s filled with storms and magic, and its themes of revenge, forgiveness, power struggle, and freedom continue to feel so relevant today,” says David Pay, Artistic Director of Music on Main and Director of The Tempest Project. “We’re using those themes as the inspiration for musical scenes that we’re setting throughout the Playhouse, and we’ll lead small groups of audiences on various paths through the theatre. As they travel, they’ll be greeted with live performances, recordings from hidden speakers, projections, lighting, audio-and-optical illusions, and more. The ultimate aim is to pull audiences into a ‘strange new world’ and challenge their very definition of what a music performance can be.”
Inspired by the themes that have made Shakespeare’s Tempest such an endearing work, The Tempest Project’s world premiere experience uses music to access motifs of revenge and forgiveness, freedom, betrayal, and redemption.
![MOM Davala - Mike Southworth](https://i0.wp.com/www.jayminter.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/04_Dalava_Photo-credit-Mike-Southworth_Provided-by-Music-on-Main_One-Time-Use.png?resize=640%2C360&ssl=1)
Collaborating over the last five years, the diverse ensemble of musicians and creators developing the project – The Tempest Project Company – are a rich team of musicians, composers, designers, and theatre practitioners. Led by Artistic Director David Pay and Artistic Planning & Operations Manager and Producer Shayna Goldberg, the Company has blended techniques from devised theatre, intercultural collaboration, and contemporary music composition, along with workshops on a vast array of subjects, including history and social sciences.
To craft the work’s otherworldly sounds, the project has commissioned pieces from a collection of acclaimed composers whose works will be performed by a talented ensemble of musicians and vocalists.
Witness this world premiere experience for yourself as Music on Main presents The Tempest Project for eight performances at Vancouver Playhouse, July 17-22, 2024. Find more details and tickets online at musiconmain.ca/event/the-tempest-project