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Holland Festival

The Holland Festival is the Netherlands' leading festival, showcasing the best of what is being made internationally and nationally on the bigger stages.

#hf12 Shara Worden speaks about All Things Will Unwind. And sings a new song

Multi-instrumentalist and singer-songwriter Shara Worden - also known as My Brightest Diamond - is waiting for me, armed with her ukulele. Just before the interview, she wrote a new song. Worden laughs: "There are way too many videos on the internet of me playing the same songs over and over. I thought I should try something new." The Dodo was there... 

Nearly dies Wunderbaum's Detroit Dealers from an overdose of ideas, but survives through unexpected musicality #HF12

In Detroit Dealers, Wunderbaum mixes a personal family story with the decline of Detroit, once one of the most influential industrial cities in the world, and philosophical musings on the car, as a romantic metaphor of progress and the American Dream. The show swings in all directions. Detroit Dealers is part documentary film, jazz concert, performance, spoken word poetry, rap battle, and theatre. This overdose of... 

Passio-Compassio calls for philosophical reflection. A socratic dialogue. #hf12

Dodo reviewers Maarten Baanders and Mariska van der Meij both attended the performance Passio-Compassio, and struck up a conversation. - From the programme book of Passio-Compassio - All people experience suffering, regardless of religion or cultural background. Like love, suffering also results in passion. Art and religion are both capable of transcending the cycle of suffering and passion. If... 

Faustin Linyekula stages the "fundamental resemblance between Negroes and ballerinas" with "La Création du Monde" (Fernand Léger, Darius Milhaud), #HF12.

The 1923 Afro-Cubist dance classic can be seen at Music Theatre today and tomorrow, commented on by Congolese choreographer Faustin Linyekula. "Europeans have no idea that they are denying the shared history of Africa and Europe. Belgium is part of everyday life in Congo, but Belgians hardly know anything about Congo, or it is the clichés about poverty 

Fedja van Huet's lost dinner jacket and other Toneelgroep Amsterdam mysteries #HF12

Anyone who might think that making a stage show is a simple one-two punch of a genius director with a good team of creatives and perfect actors is wrong. Only, as a spectator once attending the performance, you don't notice any of that. And that is just as well. You come for the performance and you won't care if... 

Blood-soaked Macbeth fits festival theme perfectly but fails to touch #HF12

Imagine Arjan Robben. The much-troubled frontman of the Dutch national team has just seen a brilliant move rewarded with a penalty and he is ready to take it. Out comes a field hand with a new set of adhesive letters for his shirt because the numbers are no longer legible from the stands. Lots of lashing, shirt off, seconds glue. Circumstances, in short. After two minutes, the fielder is gone, the number readable and the referee's whistle sounds. Then try to hit the target.

Waiting for Miss Monroe a feast for the mind. But with earplugs in. #hf12

Soon, Twitter brought an initial reaction to Waiting for Miss Monroe, Robin de Raaff's opera that had its world premiere at the Stadsschouwburg last night. @DavidMPinedo: What an atrocious opera Raaff's 'Waiting for Ms. Monroe' is. An atonal fart that has NOTHING musical. Just screaming. And a second. @sandraeik: Exciting world premiere Waiting for Miss Monroe - incredible performance by Laura Aiken as Monroe.... 

Popcorn polishes off rock 'n' roll #hf12

Popcorn wants to build bridges and dissolve borders; away with the differences between high and low culture. Covers of the band's favourite songs are interspersed with new compositions, thus blurring boundaries. Unfortunately, they do not succeed in this and the band sounds mostly academic and soulless. Popcorn is an experimental performance in which a composite band aims to bridge the gap between... 

Enfant terrible Boris Charmatz puts finger on sore spot with confrontational choreography about the elusive child

 With enfant, choreographer Boris Charmatz broaches a difficult topic: how do we as adults deal with ourselves, and how do we deal with children? Charmatz draws on the French philosopher Lyotard, who pondered the "inhumanity" of adults and saw real people in children. The current image about physical contact with children is distorted and it is... 

Mahler Chamber Orchestra happily flirts with Haydn, but Russian composers will make you laugh #hf12

True story. There is laughter in classical music. At many an orchestral rehearsal, the viola jokes are all over the place. And in the Concertgebouw, you might catch some mock chuckles. But classical composers are not known for their humour. Except Joseph Haydn. The Viennese composer brought a cosy witticism to his works here and there. One of his... 

As gentle and intelligent as the very young dancers are handled, reactions to Boris Charmatz's 'Enfant' #HF12 are often wild.

Youth these days mostly evokes the thought of danger. Society suffers from a distorted ideal image that leaves real children little room to play. Eventually, therefore, they rebel in Enfant. But until then, the very young performers still mainly have the role of adjunct or capstone, complement or extension of the nine adult dancers. The new... 

In the wonderfully subtle The Speaker's Progress, Shakespeare's farce suddenly becomes a revolutionary weapon #hf12

Tight-lipped. Freshly cut. And with a beatific, apt voice, The Speaker - played by director Sulayman Al-Bassam - looks like a slick public relations man. Or better: a civilised Arab dictator with an Oxford degree. One of those who is supported by the West and deeply hated by his own people. He steps behind a lectern and narrates. Once upon a time,... 

Dodo Holland Festival journal becomes Dodo Holland Festival Hangout #HF12

 We've already had one episode on it, and it was obviously a huge success, but right at the climax you have to start something new. That's why tonight at 22:30 we have a new thing: The Dodo Holland Festival Hangout. Live, interactive and online. Innovative, in other words, as you know it from us. You know them: those reporter trucks with metres of spaghetti... 

Dodo Holland Festival journal becomes Dodo Holland Festival Hangout #HF12

 We've already had one episode on it, and it was obviously a huge success, but right at the climax you have to start something new. That's why tonight at 22:30 we have a new thing: The Dodo Holland Festival Hangout. Live, interactive and online. Innovative, in other words, as you know it from us. You know them: those reporter trucks with metres of spaghetti... 

Micha Hamel's Requiem is beautifully spatial but lacks substantive urgency #hf12

In his Requiem for tenor, narrator and ensemble, Micha Hamel makes the most of the space of Amsterdam's De Duif church. Musicians play on the altar, from the balconies, mingle among the audience and push out a piano. - But what does Hamel really want to say? In front of a sold-out house, Micha Hamel's Requiem premiered last night. He ... 

With Antony Hegarty and the Metropole Orchestra in a fairytale forest #hf12

Antony Hegarty gives away the layered and emotionally charged show Cut the World with his pianist and the Metropole Orchestra. He shows that it need not be an issue to present more of the same. Meanwhile, the audience imagines itself in the fairytale forest, eating out of his hand. It is not the first time the androgynous child-man Antony has... 

Survive the carnage, smeared nudity and frenzied screams in Requiem 3, and note the moving lyrics #hf12

Vincent Macaigne strikes me as a director you shouldn't fight with. Right from the first seconds of Requiem 3, he rams full steam ahead with the most hysterical opening scene I have seen in ages, and keeps on hacking relentlessly for 80 minutes. It takes a while to get through. But suddenly, in this tsunami of... 

Holland Festival news #HF12: Spectacle and emotion hand in hand in opening weekend

Claron Macfadden did it on her own, Alain Platel with 150 people and Andrea Breth in 54 scenes: touching. And convey a message. Dodo-reporters Mariska van der Meij, Daniël Bertina and Wijbrand Schaap look back at the first weekend of the Holland Festival 2012, and reviewer Maarten Baanders looks ahead to Emio Greco/PC's special performance. Kind of... 

Zwischenfälle is a breathtaking barrage of 54 hilarious, short scenes about clumsy humans. You rarely see it this virtuoso #hf12

Two men are sitting together at a table eating spaghetti. One is wolfing down the plate of pasta in no time, while at the same time telling an amusing anecdote - just barely intelligible - with fierce gestures and self-righteous grunts. The other, an elderly guy, is totally ignored. Despite frantic attempts, the poor man just cannot manage to... 

Hit in the heart by opening performance by Alain Platel, and then find solace. #hf12

At two-thirds, the lump shoots in to not go out until the end. It happens at every Alain Platèl performance. Heartfelt sobs from the audience, lots of swallowing around you and the inevitable tears welling up like a natural disaster. To call the Flemish choreographer's work predictable because of this is going too far. What he and his company Les... 

Opening Holland Festival on twitter and facebook: tenue de wtf, ns-#fail, sublime dance theatre and mozzarella sticks #hf12

[View the story "Opening Holland Festival 2012" on Storify] Opening Holland Festival 2012 On 1 June, the Holland Festival opened at Theater Carré. We were there, saw Platel's C(h)oeurs and tasted the atmosphere. Although it almost went wrong. This is what of it was witnessed on social media Storified by Cultureel Persbureau - Sat, Jun 02 2012 08:37:18... 

The Dodo goes out of its way to tell you all about the Holland Festival 2012 #hf12

 Top theatre from all corners of the world, big names we had never dared hope for, and a newsreel that we will broadcast at unexpected times. Festival day newspaper The Dodo, now a household name in festival land, is going all out at this year's Holland Festival. Of course. It is the dream of every blogger, professional or amateur, to be at the performances of the... 

Unforgettable stage version of Man Without Qualities gets undeserved dessert from Yves Petry #hf12

Maybe it is also just the wrong choice to see part three immediately after the first two parts. Maybe after a day of you or some settling down you will be able to appreciate Petry's text, on its own merits. Imagine a three-star dinner. A sensuous succession of small and medium-sized dishes, prepared with the... 

Holland Festival: diary of the 2011 edition

On 28 February, Pierre Audi will present the programme of the 2012 Holland Festival at the City Theatre. As in 2010 and 2011, we will follow that festival closely with our online festival daily newspaper at www.dedodo.nl. That daily newspaper has now proven its right to exist, as more and more festivals want to collaborate with the Cultural Press Agency on this unique initiative. To the 'product-range'... 

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