ensembles: Halberstadt_Ballett des Nordharzer Städtebundtheaters

Portrait

The Ensemble Tanz Harz is a contemporary oriented dance company and creates 4 new productions per season. In addition, there are Site Specific performances and solo performances throughout the season. The company will host the first TanzArt Festival Saxony-Anhalt from June 2-11, 2023 in collaboration with TanzArt Netzwerk - the first ever contemporary dance festival in Saxony-Anhalt.

As its dramaturgical core, Tanz Harz understands the artistic reflection and questioning of current social and political issues with the help of different contemporary choreographic manuscripts. Guest performances have taken Tanz Harz to various national and international festivals, including Belgium and Italy. Invitations for further guest performances within Germany, Italy and China are in planning.

Tanz Harz strives to communicate its work to an intergenerational audience beyond its repertory productions. This includes large-scale education projects with schools and dance schools in the region workshops and training visits. It regularly offers so-called "tasting rehearsals," introductions to works, follow-up discussions, exclusive discussion groups for adult education classes, and opportunities for moderated training and rehearsal visits.

Cooperations with people with non-normative bodies, people with migration backgrounds and in the field of seniors are in preparation.

History and biography

On the ensemble´s history

Since the season 22/23 the Ensemble Tanz Harz consists of 10 dancers from five nations.

The qualities of the ensemble are diversity, flexibility, precision, teamwork and self-creativity. Currently the ensemble is reorienting itself. This includes creative research processes and an expanded group of training leaders. Different dance styles expand the movement repertoire of the ensemble. Planned for the next season are: ELEKTRA, DER KLEINE PRINZ, a chamber dance evening N.N. and another edition of the TanzArt Festival Saxony-Anhalt, as well as performances at the Halberstadt Cathedral Festival and others in planning.

Tarek Assam graduated in stage dance from the Cologne University of Music in 1985. He was ballet director at the Nordharzer Städtebundtheater in Halberstadt/Quedlinburg from 1995 to 2003, at the Stadttheater Gießen from 2002, back at the Nordharzer Städtebundtheater since 2022, and spokesman for the BBTK since 2017. He is often invited as a jury member to international choreography and dance competitions. He has been awarded choreography prizes and realized, for example, the opening performance of John Cage's 639 years organ project ASLAP2 and Heiner Goebbels' large-scale project SURROGATE CITIES. Assam is co-founder of the international TanzArt ostwest network, for which he is artistically responsible.

Assam is interested in social, existential questions. They offer mirrors and friction for artistic confrontations with today. The audience may decide for itself which projection surface the dance offers it.

Images

Eight dancers stand on a dark stage. Their lower bodies are oriented backwards, while their upper bodies and raised arms are turned in to the right. A dancer in the center stands in the spotlight and looks forward.

3 Choreografen | Can Arslan, Ricardo Fernando, Roberto Scafati | © Ray Behringer

On the right side of the picture, two dancers in frog costumes can be seen. Next to them is a woman in earthy garb, who raises her finger in warning.

Der Froschkönig | Gabriella Gilardi | © Ray Behringer

Three dancers stand in front of a colorful stage background. They look at each other in a curiously while they dance.

Der Froschkönig | Gabriella Gilardi | © Ray Behringer

Three dancers in frog costumes are on stage. Another dancer is on the back of the middle frog. A large golden ball can be seen at the top center of the picture. It is thrown between the other two frogs.

Der Froschkönig | Gabriella Gilardi | © Ray Behringer

Three dancers in colorful costumes are standing half close in the center. Their gaze is directed upwards and their bodies towards each other.

3 Choreografen | Can Arslan, Ricardo Fernando, Roberto Scafati | © Ray Behringer

Four dancers in blue shirts are standing on a dark stage. They stand in a bent position with their right arm raised to their head.

3 Choreografen | Can Arslan, Ricardo Fernando, Roberto Scafati | © Ray Behringer

The figure of the wicked stepmother, dressed all in pink, sits on the right side. The gaze is strictly directed forward and her right foot is stretched out. Cinderella kneels next to it in dirty clothes and paints the stepmother's toenails with an irritated look.

Cinderella | Can Arslan | © Ray Behringer

The picture is colored in dark blue. On the left side, Cinderella is tiredly crouched next to a chair. On the right side, all in white and wearing pointe shoes, stands the fairy godmother, who addresses her.

Cinderella | Can Arslan | © Ray Behringer

In front of a glamorous pink background stands a row of dancers in masquerade ball attire.

Cinderella | Can Arslan | © Ray Behringer

A red-haired dancer is sitting on the floor. She wears black suit pants, a white shirt and black suspenders. She holds her hands in front of her face so that only her torn right eye is visible.

Nachtraum | Can Arslan | © Ray Behringer

A dancer leans with her hands on two white cloths on the floor. Her legs hang bent in the air. She rests her feet on a black table tilted forward. She is dressed in black pants, a white shirt and black suspenders. Her gaze is directed forward.

Nachtraum | Can Arslan | © Ray Behringer

Four dancers are spread out on a dark stage. They each wear black pants, a white shirt and black suspenders. They are currently in an outstretched position, hands and gaze directed upwards, jumping.

Nachtraum | Can Arslan | © Ray Behringer

In the center of the stage there is a man in a gray costume with a fixed gaze forward. On the floor around him, on both sides, lie a total of seven dancers. They have their eyes fixed on a cake in front of them. In the background you can see a well-filled clothes rail and a person in a black costume with an owl mask sitting on a chair.

Schwanensee | Can Arslan | © Ray Behringer

The image is dipped in red wavy lines. In the foreground a person is jumping with their legs spread and their eyes directed to the ceiling. In the background there is a dancer in black costume.

Schwanensee | Can Arslan | © Ray Behringer

Sportomania | © Ray Behringer

A dancer in a bent position holds a female dancer. Her upper body is stretched forward. They are wearing bright costumes.

Schwanensee | Can Arslan | © Ray Behringer

Winterreise (Plakat)

Winterreise

Productions

2022/2023
2022/2023
Productions from the 2022/2023 season

I. Gravitas
Chamber dance evening by Tarek Assam.
"Gravitas" is a playful performance about gravity; a playful, multimedia exploration of this unusual theme; an atmospheric combination of dance, science fiction, light and video. The interplay of choreography and stage creates a cosmic whole , in which space and time dissolve - a creation of states of gravity as well as unstable, dreamlike states of weightlessness. Isaac Newton and his theory of universal gravitation set the inspirational stimulus: bodies in the universe attract each other with a force that acts along the line connecting the bodies.
Cast: Caterina Cerolini, Ting En Chiang, Rebecca Gollwitzer, Masami Fukushima, Alessia Zaccharia, Michele Carnimeo, Daniele Cavuoti, Christian Colatriano, Harrison Rodrigues, Lukas Ziegele
Choreography: Tarek Assam
Set design: Michele Lorenzini
Videography: Lieve Vanderschaeve
We would like to thank the Theaterförderverein Halberstadt e.V. for their kind support of this production.
Premiere: 16.09.2022, Kammerbühne Halberstadt
First performance: 2016 Duration:56 min

II The Frog Prince
Family ballet by Gabriella Gilardi
Music by Sebastian Bund
"In the old days, when wishing still helped, there lived a king whose daughters were so beautiful that the sun itself, which has seen so much after all, was amazed as often as it shone in her face." Hardly any fairy tale begins with such heart-warming words and at the same time is as enigmatic as "The Frog King". How does an essentially cruel act come to bind two souls together in deep love? Gabriella Gilardi's imaginative and refined choreography, Mona Hapke's fairytale-like set and a mischievously high-spirited dance ensemble provide a highly enjoyable answer to this question.
Cast: Caterina Cerolini, Ting En Chiang, Rebecca Gollwitzer, Masami Fukushima, Alessia Zaccharia, Michele Carnimeo, Daniele Cavuoti, Christian Colatriano, Harrison Rodrigues, Lukas Ziegele
Choreography: Gabriella Gilardi
Set design: Mona Hapke
Revival: 19.11.2022, Großes Haus Halberstadt - Duration: 1,05 hours
Revival: 19.11.2022 Duration: 56 min

III Sportomania
Dance piece by Sara Angius
Shawow!!! Two people are catapulted to a fantastic place. There they start a race against time, because they have to reach a certain goal together. The two start a journey through an absurd world full of obstacles and surprises.
In this mobile school production, the gymnasium is transformed into a place full of magic, where the gymnastics equipment is part of the scenography. Combined with contemporary dance, this tells a story about pressure to perform, determination and teamwork.
Cast: Ting En Chiang, Alessia Zaccharia, Daniele Cavuoti, Harrison Rodrigues
Musical direction: Erich Wesowski
Production: Sara Angius
Set design: Julia Burkhardt
Choreography: Sara Angius
First performance: 2020 Duration:

IV. Winter Journey
Dance evening by Tarek Assam
Music by Franz Schubert - texts by Wilhelm Müller
Dream, memory and reality blur in the experience of a winter traveler to a web of emotions that negates any boundary between the worlds. With a sore heart she leaves the place of a former love without a destination in the winter night, wandering, away from civilization, into the wayless. Together with the wanderer, choreographer Tarek Assam and his dance ensemble embark on a gender-neutral journey into solitary contemplation and engagement with nature. Franz Schubert's enchanting, somberly associative song cycle "Winterreise, op. 89" draws the guiding thread for this exploration.
Cast: Caterina Cerolini, Ting En Chiang, Rebecca Gollwitzer, Masami Fukushima, Alessia Zaccharia, Michele Carnimeo, Daniele Cavuoti, Christian Colatriano, Harrison Rodrigues, Lukas Ziegele
Choreography: Tarek Assam
On the grand piano: MD Johannes Rieger
Vocals: Regina Pätzer
Set design: Katharina Andes
Premiere: 24.02.2023, Great House Halberstadt
V. TanzArt east-west Saxony-Anhalt
- 2.6.2023 Opening of the Halberstadt Cathedral Festival
- Organization of the festival TanzArt Sachsen-Anhalt from June 2-11, 2023

I.-V. Funded by the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media in the NEUSTART KULTUR program, graduate:ing funding DIS-TANZ-START of the Dachverband Tanz Deutschland."
2021/2022
2021/2022
Productions from the 2021/2022 season
Nacht(t)raum (2020)
Choreographer: Can Arslan
Music by Ludovico Einaudi
Dancers: 4 female dancers, 4 male dancers
Stage dimensions: 8 m x 7 m
Duration: approx. 1 hour 15 minutes, no intermission
Cinderella (2021)
Choreographer: Can Arslan
Music by Sergei Prokofiev
Dancers: 4 female dancers, 4 male dancers
Stage dimensions: 8 m x 9 m
Duration: about 1 hour 15 minutes, no intermission
Der Froschkönig (The Frog Prince) (2021)
Choreographer: Gabriella Gilardi
Music by Sebastian Bund
Dancers: 4 female dancers, 4 male dancers
Stage dimensions: 8 m x 9 m
Duration: approx. 1 hour 5 minutes, no intermission
Schwanensee (Swan Lake) (2020)
Choreographer: Can Arslan
Music by Peter Tchaikovsky, performed by the Harzer Sinfoniker
Dancers: 6 female dancers, 4 male dancers
Stage dimensions: 8 m x 9 m
Duration: approx. 2 hours, one intermission
3 Choreografen (3 choreographers) (2022)
Choreographers: Can Arslan, Ricardo Fernando, Roberto Scafati
Dancers: 4 female dancers, 4 male dancers
Stage dimensions: 8 m x 9 m
2020/2021
2020/2021
Productions from the 2020/2021 season
Nacht(t)raum (2020)
Choreographer: Can Arslan
Music by Ludovico Einaudi
Dancers: 4 female dancers, 4 male dancers
Stage dimensions: 8 m x 7 m
Duration: approx. 1 hour 15 minutes, no intermission
2019/2020
2019/2020
Productions from the 2019/2020 season
Salome (Kammertanzabend) (2019)
Choreography: Can Arslan, music: Sebastian Bund, stage: 8m x 7m
8 dancers, duration ca. 60 min.
Die Schöne und das Biest (Märchenballett) (2019)
Choreography: Can Arslan, music: Sebastian Bund, stage: 8m x 9m
8 dancers and children´s ballet, duration ca. 60 min.
Schwanensee (2020)
Choreography: Can Arslan, music: P. I. Tschaikowsky
stage: 8m x 9m, 10 dancers and Orchester des Nordharzer Städtebundtheaters
previous seasons
previous seasons
Productions from the 2018/2019 season
Pandora (2018)
Choreography: Can Arslan, music: Béla Bartók among others, stage: 8m x 7m
8 dancers, duration ca. 60 min.
Die kleine Meeresjungfrau (2018)
Choreography: Can Arslan, music: Sebastian Bund, stage 8m x 9m
7 dancers, duration ca. 60 min.
Mozart-Requiem (2019)
Choreography: Can Arslan, music: Wolfang Amadeus Mozart, opera choir and support choir from the Nordharzer Städtebundtheater, stage: 8m x 9m
7 dancers

Productions from the 2017/2018 season:
Premiers
Carmen (2018)
Choreography: Can Arslan, music: Georges Bizet i.a. Orchester des Nordharzer Städtebundtheaters
8 dancers TBC, stage: 8 x 9 m

Repetoire
Hänsel und Gretel (2017)
Choreography: Can Arslan, music: Basti Bund
8 dancers, children's ballet (6 girls), stage: 8 x 9 m, duration ca. 60 min
Traumfänger (Kammertanzabend)
Choreography: Can Arslan, Ingrid Magriña Martinez, Masami Fukushima, Vinicius Augusto Menezes da Silva, music: Nils Frahm, Heitor Villa-Lobos, Jóhann Jóhannsson, Damián Rieza Muñoz, Greg Haines, Max Richter
8 dancers, stage: 8 x 7, duration: ca. 70 min

Productions from the 2015/2016 season
Stars
Choreography: Francisco Sanchez Martinez
8 participants, 80 min
Der Nussknacker
Choreography: Can Arslan, music: Pjotr Iljitsch Tschaikowsky
8 participants, 70 min
Coppélia
Choreography: Can Arslan, music: Léo Delibes

Productions from the 2014/2015 season
Peer Gynt (2014)
Choreography: Can Arslan, music: Edvard Grieg
10 participants, 90 min
Die Schneekönigin (2014)
Choreography: Alexandre Tourinho, music: Joachim Kielpinski
20 participants, 60 min
Strawinsky-Abend (2014)
Choreography: Francisco Sanchez Martinez, music: Igor Strawinsky
10 participants, 120 min

Productions from the 2013/2014 season
Giselle (2014)
Choreography: Anna Vila, music: Adolphe Adam, orchestra of the Nordharzer Städtebundtheater
15 participants, orchestra of the Nordharzer Städtebundtheater, 120 min
Schneewittchen (2013)
Choreography: Jaroslaw Jurasz, music: Joachim Kielpinski
20 participants, 60 min
Triptychon (2013)
Choreography: Jaroslaw Jurasz, Martin Kaempf, music: Paul Hindemith, Gustav Holst, F. Chopin
10 participants, 120 min