Naïma Mazic / n ï m company
ALBUM, the muse at work
ALBUM, the muse at work, by dancer-choreographer Naïma Mazic with percussionist-vibraphonist Evi Filippou and a record player, is based on nine of countless songs named after romantic partners of jazz musicians or written by female composers. Hear and now: polyrhythmic choreographies of care and inspiration. Informed by the divine figure of the muse, ALBUM manipulates her position, questioning the patriarchal utilization of reproductive labor. n ï m company shares a record of nine love stories by co-musing with Carla Bley, Moki Cherry, Mary Lou Williams and more.
Being named after a jazz ballad, having grown up in a jazz club and a big band, dancer-choreographer Naïma Mazic started to investigate songs that she felt drawn to dance to – endless tunes named after women, dedicated to romantic partners that are managers, producers, mothers, artists. ALBUM is an interaction between these songs and the music written by female composers. Shared polyrhythmic choreographies between dance and music, together with percussionist-vibraphonist Evi Filippou and a record player, tell stories of creative and reproductive labor and the patriarchal structures that distort them. The performers’ bodies, movements, and musicality shift from tune to tune, from A side to B side, to contain a relationship that swings from intimate to professional and inspiring to possessive. The piece unfolds as a dramaturgy of a concert, yet between nine tracks, narratives emerge, passing through New York jazz clubs, Viennese bedrooms, and your living room. One ballad composed to seduce- the melody of another love story. Communing with the goddess, arranging scores of text, biography, and feminist utopias, and honoring the legacy of displacement, labor, and fragmentation within the historically Black American music, ALBUM proposes co-musing as a politic of care.
We celebrate the women that have been lazily mythologized, just as the nine divine muses:
We celebrate the women who have inspired songs.
We celebrate the women who have written songs.
We celebrate the women who cleaned the rooms in which songs were composed.
Naïma Mazic lives and works in Vienna and Berlin. In 2016, she founded the n ï m company and the association more2rhythm. She has a master’s degree in performance studies from the NYU Tisch Schools of the Arts and studied at P.A.R.T.S., the IcelandAcademy of Arts in Reykjavik and the Music and Arts Private University of Vienna. She was a resident choreographer at K3 Tanzplan Hamburg/Kampnagel and part of the Hip-Hop Continuum at the Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, USA and ImPulsTanz DanceWeb 2015 and 2022. Since her youth, she has been working at the Porgy & Bess jazz club in Vienna. Her most recent works featured at the New York Judson Church, el cierbo encantado, Havana, the Vienna Art Week, brut Wien, DOCK 11 Berlin, and the Leipziger Jazztage. In 2024, she will take on the artistic direction of LAKEStudios Berlin.
Evi Filippou lives and works in Berlin. The percussionist-vibraphonist holds degrees from the Volos Conservatory, Greece, and the Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler, Berlin. She performs in various orchestras and ensembles for contemporary music (such as the Bolshoi Ballet Orchestra and Ensemble United Berlin), but also solo and in collaboration with jazz and world music artists such as Katerina Fotinaki, Hayden Chisholm, Chris Dahlgren, and Stefan Schultze. Evi Filippou likes to work in (musical) theatre. She is a founding member of Opera Lab Berlin and regularly performs with theatre ensembles such as the Neue Werkstatt of the Berlin State Opera or Rimini Protokoll. In 2023, she won the German Jazz Prize.
Maeve Johnson is a queer-feminist artist, kinesiotherapist, and dramaturge based in Berlin. Their primary interest is in creating works that re-invent the body as an intersection of human intimacies, sentiments, and imaginations. More generally, they are interested in concepts of the collective and relational self. Maeve’s work consists of groovy dance movements, atmospheres, sentiments, and queer fantasies that are woven into a continuous whole. Recently, they have worked with the n ï m company, Björnsonova, systering collective, Joni Barnard, Azzie McCutcheon, and Elisa Purfürst. Maeve enjoys listening to, and being inspired by, Sampa the Great, Linn da Quebrada, and OSHUN.
Hanna Naske grew up in Vienna and Luxembourg. She studied fine arts at the St. Joost School of Art & Design in Breda, the Netherlands, photography (with professor Silke Grossmann) and stage design (with professor Raimund Bauer) at the University of Fine Arts Hamburg. Collaborations with Ela Baumann, Patricia Carolin Mai, Kerstin Steeb and staatsoper24 took her to such venues as the Hamburg State Opera, Kampnagel, Thalia Theater, Wuppertaler Bühnen, Musiktheater im Revier Gelsenkirchen, LOFFT – das Theater Leipzig, Theaterfestival Lüneburg, Köln Biennale Young Talents, OUTNOW! Festival Bremen, the Mainz State Theatre, PURPLE Tanzfestival Berlin, Konzerthaus Vienna, MuTh Vienna, Rotondes Luxembourg, and Centre des Arts Pluriels Ettelbruck, Luxemburg.
Is Ali is a doctoral candidate at the Institute of Theatre Arts and Performance Studies at Brown University. He is originally from California, and his research interests broadly include multimedia art, design, and engineering as sites of futurist kinship work throughout the African diaspora. Anchored in a three-pronged concept he is currently calling kin-aesthetics, Is seeks to respond to the ways Black social and community life has been disaggregated since the spawn of neoliberalism through critical explorations of the digital and blackness’s relationship to gender, sexuality and movement as displacement.
Credits
Director, concept, choreography, dance Naïma Mazic Vibraphone, drums, percussion & musical arrangement Evi Filippou Music by Mary Lou Williams, Carla Bley, Charlie Haden, Alice Coltrane, Bill Evans, John Coltrane, mathias rüegg, Lil' Hardin Armstrong Dramaturgy, co-concept Maeve Johnson Stagedesign, research Hanna Naske Concept development Is Ali Costume design Naïma Mazic Costumes Tamara Yael & Gabriela Reyna Movement coaching Cat Paz Jimenez Outside eyes Sara Ostertag , Vera Rivas Musicologist Harald Kisiedu Production more2rhythm, Naïma Mazic & Senem Kahraman Co-production brut Wien
Thanks to Alaa Alkurdi, Makisig Akin, Anya Cloud, Robyn Schulkowsky, Golnar Shahyar Supported by: BMÖKKS Austria, MA7 Vienna, Porgy & Bess Jazz & Musicclub Vienna, Bears in the Park Vienna, LAKE Studios Berlin
Supported by the Federal Ministry of Art, Culture, Civil Service and Sport, the City of Vienna’s Department of Cultural. Affairs, Porgy & Bess – Jazz & Music Club, Vienna, Bears in the Park Vienna, LAKE Studios Berlin.
Dates & Tickets
Fri, 13 October: Artist Talk following the performance (moderated by Is Ali)
Sat, 14 October, 5:30–6:30 pm: Intro, co-musing & musicking with Is Ali & Maeve Johnson
Sun, 15 October, DJ set / Vinyls by Altroy Jerome following the performance
October 2023
Choose your price category € 22/€ 16/€ 11
Choose your price category € 22/€ 16/€ 11 / *Followed by an artist talk (Moderation: Is Ali)
Choose your price category € 22/€ 16/€ 11 / **5:30 to 6:30 pm: Intro, co-musing & musicking with Is Ali & Maeve Johnson
Choose your price category € 22/€ 16/€ 11 / ***DJ set & Vinyls following the performance
studio brut
Zieglergasse 25, 1070 Wien
Downloads
Evening programme_ALBUM, the muse at work (PDF)
