VIVER BRASIL DANCE COMPANY
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Mission Statement
Viver Brasil honors Brazil's African legacy through bold contemporary dance theater and increases awareness of the rich history of Afro-Brazilian dance and music through performances, arts education, community programs and an annual cultural immersion travel program to Salvador, Bahia. Through rigorous research and continuous dialogue with living masters and virtuoso musicians and choreographers in Bahia and the US, Viver Brasil drives contemporary representations of Afro-Brazilian dance in the United States, addressing 21st century African diasporic issues of humanity, race, social equity and ancestry.
About This Cause
Viver Brasil, under the artistic direction of Linda Yudin and Luiz Badaró, captivates audiences with its irrepressible blend of bold Afro-Brazilian dance theater and exuberant physicality, power, and passion drawn from a wide dance and music vocabulary. The dancers unveil history, ignite the present, imagine and inflame the future. Vocalists become part of the action and musicians take polyrhythms to new heights. Viver Brasil has created an international footprint, providing a living bridge between its home, Los Angeles and its sister city, Salvador, Bahia, with Dancing at the Source, its signature international cultural immersion program to Bahia. The company also produces vital arts education and community engagement programs for all ages, and seamlessly incorporates such programs into dance theater tours. Viver Brasil has had twelve premieres since 2013, including Yabas/Queens, which toured throughout New Mexico and the West Coast; The Gift on the Water; Mo Ife: Love Stories, Xirê/Celebration; and Feet on the Ground, which toured throughout the US; and Peace Transcends, which in 2015 culminated the inaugural Aratani World Series in Los Angeles, in collaboration with Ford on the Road Series. As a LA-based dance company, Viver Brasil reflects the vitality of its global home, with members hailing from LA to Knoxville, TN, to Washington, D.C., to Salvador, Bahia, and Rio de Janeiro. Company members embody a deep mastery of a number of different styles, including traditional orixa dance and music vocabulary, and samba and contemporary Afro-Brazilian dance such as dança afro and bloco afro, Silvestre and Dunham modern dance techniques, capoeira and the social dance forró. Company musicians have been trained in equally diverse traditions, including West African and orchestral. In August of 2016, Viver Brasil will premiere a new Bloco Afro Bahian Carnival piece at LA’s Hollywood Bowl, featuring 28 dancers and 10 musicians with the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra, as part of “An Olympic Carnival featuring Sergio Mendes & 50 Years of Brasil ’66.” For Cor Da Pele, preliminary touring plans include a premiere at the Ford Amphitheatre as part of its Signature Series, a series of performances at the Ebony Repertory Theatre-Nate Holden Center for the Performing Arts in LA, and at State University of New York at Brockport, while in residency with its Sankofa African Dance and Drum Ensemble. Viver Brasil has toured nationally and internationally and since 2013, has performed at Disney California Adventure Park’s “Disney ¡Viva Navidad!” family fiesta street party. Partial list of touring venues: Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts (Miami); The Strathmore Theater (Bethesda, MD); Lensic Center for the Performing Arts (Santa Fe); National Hispanic Cultural Center (Albuquerque); Queens Theatre (Flushing, NY); Nazareth College (Rochester); John Anson Ford Theatre (LA); Mendocino Music Festival (Mendocino); Colorado State University (Ft Collins); Diane Wortham Theatre (Asheville, NC); Zorn Arena (Eau Claire, WI); Herbst Theatre (San Francisco); University of NC (Wilmington); American Theatre (Hampton, VA); Cerritos Center for the Performing Arts (Cerritos, CA); Johnson State College (Vermont); Stephens Auditorium (Ames, IA); World Festival of Sacred Music (LA); Arden Theater (St. Albert, Canada); Keyano Theater (Ft. McMurray, Canada); and International Book Fair (Guadalajara, Mexico). Viver Brasil's key Programs are: “Celebrating Samba" is a signature interactive show that brings electrifying Afro Brazilian dance, music and culture to venues where individuals could use a jolt of joyful color, thrilling rhythms, and communal celebration. "Samba in the Streets" is a series of sequential dance and music workshops modeled on Afro Brazilian Bloco Afros, in which participants learn to prepare and to present a public procession as if during Brazilian Carnaval. "Community Class" meets every Monday (for close to 20 years) at Nate Holden Performing Arts Center for FREE classes taught by Viver Brasil's founding artistic directors Linda Yudin and Luiz Badaró. "Dancing at the Source" is a 15-day cultural immersion to Salvador, Bahia, Brazil, and has for 18 years provided travelers with daily dance, music, and Afro-Brazilian culture classes taught by experienced faculty, and curated cultural tours. "Viver Brasil Institute" hosts visiting pioneering maestros and contemporary virtuosos from Bahia who join Yudin and Badaró to provide scholarly and informational Afro Brazilian History/Culture Workshops; Dance/Music Workshops; Master Classes; Oral History Exchanges; and Jam Sessions.