WAAPA dancers shine as Rise hits the stage this June

Rise, WAAPA’s mid-year dance season, offers audiences a perfect mix of ballet and contemporary dance performed by the stars of tomorrow, as the second- and third-year dance students take to the stage of the Geoff Gibbs Theatre from Friday 9 to Thursday 15 June. International and Australian guest choreographers work in collaboration with commissioned local composers to create an exciting program of dance works set to original music. Headlining the program is Dark Half, an excerpt from 2 One Another by Rafael Bonachela, Artistic Director of Sydney Dance Company (SDC). Described as ‘a startling, high-octane shot across the bows of contemporary dance’, the piece features dance duets, a solo and a trio which build to a powerful finale as the dancers express the highs and lows of the human condition. The lyrical style of Bonachela’s work has won critical acclaim around the world. WAAPA is delighted to welcome former SDC dancer David Mack to restage Dark Half on its contemporary dance students. Mack is an award-winning dancer with more than 20 years’ experience, performing with SDC, West Australian Ballet, Co3 Contemporary Dance, and in the UK with Rambert Dance Company and Phoenix Dance Theatre. UK-based Sam Coren, known in Perth for his quirky, sci-fi inspired dance works, will create a new challenge for the third-year contemporary dance students, with an original score by WAAPA alumnus, electronic music composer Louis Frere-Harvey. Isabella Stone, a 2009 WAAPA graduate and former Artistic Director of Hobart’s DRILL Performance Company, will choreograph a new contemporary work with the second-year contemporary dance students with original music by Perth composer Felicity Groom. The final work on the Rise program is Sillage, a neo-classical work choreographed by WAAPA Classical Ballet Coordinator Kim McCarthy with WAAPA’s second-year ballet students. Performed to an original score by local composer and WAAPA music lecturer Stuart James, Sillage is an exploration of the impression made in space after something or someone has been and gone. Get tickets and experience the incredible talents of WAAPA's rising stars here.

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