BALLAD is a double-bill composed of two new creations for MM Contemporary Dance Company, as to be:
ELEGIA_CARE LANDSCAPES by Enrico Morelli, choreographer of the Company and BALLAD, by Mauro Bigonzetti, which gives the title to the evening:
ELEGIA_CARE LANDSCAPES
People are in search of their own path and identity, united by the same inclusion in one historical period, in an era like the present one that brings dizziness and bewilderment. Individuals who trace new trajectories and look for new ways to recover their own route, in a moment of exile from normality. It is a story of lost moments and relationships, as well as the search, in one's own memory, for images and landscapes that were familiar and comforting to us.
BALLAD
The creation is a tribute, a choral story, a complete portrait of the 80s. A narration through musical images that recovers the sensations of a generation, its erased euphoria, collective nonsense, "dreams thrown overboard", but at the same time revives the way of life of those years, the perfumes of vitality and dense experimental artistic creativity that characterized a rapidly changing society, which was gradually transforming to the rhythm of the momentum of sharing and the anxiety of change.
MICHELE MEROLA - MM Contemporary Dance Company artistic director
After graduating at the Associazione Balletto Classico directed by Liliana Cosi and Marinel Stefanescu in Reggio Emilia, Michele Merola dances with Aterballetto, Toulon Opera House, Arena di Verona Company. Currently Mr. Merola is the artistic director and chief choreographer of MM Contemporary Dance Company, founded in 1999 in Reggio Emilia.
He created for MM Contemporary Dance Company many choreographies, including Mattanza (winner of the Hannover 17th International Competition of Choreography, Germany 2003), La Capinera (Best Choreography Award, Serbia 2007), La metà dell’ombra (winner of the Anita Bucchi Award, Italy 2010), Con le labbra dipinte (world premiere at the Seul International Dance Festival Sidance 2010, Korea), Bolero (Europa in Danza Merit Award to Choreography, 2017), Pulcinella (2016), Gershwin Suite (2018), Vivaldi Umane Passioni (2019), Pastorale (2020), Balada (2021), Short Stories (2022) and others.
In 2008 Mr. Merola wins the Dance Award Positano “Leonide Massine per l’Arte della Danza” and in 2016 he wins the GD Awards 2016 as “Best Italian Choreographer”. Mr. Merola also created works for many other dance companies: Aterballetto (Reggio Emilia), Teatro San Carlo (Naples), Dominic Walsh Dance Theatre (U.S.A.), Teatro Massimo (Palermo), Balletto di Toscana (Florence), Teatro Terazijama (Serbia), Tanzcompagnie Landesbühnen Sachsen (Dresden), Teatro dell’Opera (Rome).
Since 2010 Michele Merola and Enrico Morelli are the artistic directors of the Agora Coaching Project - Reggio Emilia, advanced training program for dancers.
MAURO BIGONZETTI (choreographer)
Mauro Bigonzetti is the most internationally known Italian choreographers. His career as dancer started in Rome in 1979, at Balletto del Teatro dell’Opera and continued 1983 in Reggio Emilia when joining the company Aterballetto. After this experience, his career focused on commissions for the major ballet and dance companies in the world, such as La Scala Ballet, N.Y.C. Ballet, Bolshoi Ballet, Staatsballett Berlin, Gulbenkian Foundation, a.o. His special collaboration with MMCDC started in 2020, when he staged for her his Duetto Inoffensivo. Ballad is his first creation for the Company.
ENRICO MORELLI (choreographer)
Dancer and choreographer, he studied at Accademia Nazionale Danza in Rome, attending also a teachers' specialization. He won several choreographic competitions in Italy and was awarded as dancer with the Silver Medal of the President of the Italian Republic in 2001. In Italy he choreographed for MMCDC, further for Astra Roma Ballet, Palermo InDanza, Company KAOS-Firenze, Teatro Massimo of Palermo; abroad for Szeged Contemporary Dance Company and Milwaukee Ballet. Since 2004 he is dancer of MMCDC. Actually he is also joint-director of Agora Coaching Project - an advanced training program for dancers.
