Bach Dancing & Dynamite Society

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April is National Poetry Month — we’re sure you have that marked on your cal. Bach Dancing & Dynamite Society (pictured) does. Stephanie Jutt, flutist, and Jeffrey Sykes, pianist, will collaborate with former Wisconsin poet laureate Max Garland, Madison poet Catherine Jagoe and New York poet Mark Belair in this performance that underlines that words are music and music is a language.

press release: The Bach Dancing & Dynamite Society (BDDS) will weave a colorful and evocative tapestry of poetry and music in The Music of Words. The music will feature Stephanie Jutt, flutist, and Jeffrey Sykes, pianist, in collaboration words from poets Max Garland (former Wisconsin Poet Laureate and recent winner of the Brittingham Prize), Madison poet Catherine Jagoe and New York poet Mark Belair.

The Music of Words is scheduled for Saturday, April 6 at 8 p.m. Tickets are available at the Overture Center Ticket Office (201 State Street), by phone (608.258.4141) or online (overture.org). Groups of 10+ may be eligible for discounted tickets; for information, please call 608.258.4159.

About Bach Dancing & Dynamite Society: In 1992, Stephanie Jutt and Jeffrey Sykes created a new chamber music series in Madison from a need to play great music with great players. They wanted music hot off the press mixed with the classics. A touch of theater. Artistic challenge. An engaged audience. Fun. They also knew the name they wanted for their festival. Some years ago, Jutt had played in a jazz and classical music series in Half Moon Bay, California, that had been christened the “Bach Dancing and Dynamite Society” after audience members on one memorable evening were inspired to dance on the beach to Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos and set off fireworks after the performance. With a blessing from California, Jutt and Sykes borrowed the name and determined to recreate the spirit of spontaneous fun and the incredible music that made you want to dance. Now in its third decade, the BDDS vision has been enhanced by those who have invested their wisdom and talent in extraordinary measures.

Flutist Stephanie Jutt’s elegant artistry and passionate intellect have inspired musicians and audiences around the world. Her groundbreaking performances of new music, transcriptions and traditional repertoire have made her a model for adventurous flutists everywhere. Her recordings are available on Centaur, GM, and University of Wisconsin Press.

Acclaimed by the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung as “a commanding solo player, the most supportive of accompanists, and a leader in chamber music,” pianist Jeffrey Sykes has performed throughout the United States, Canada, Mexico, Chile, Europe, and Japan. He has garnered praise for his interpretations of music both old and new. Sykes is the founder and artistic director of the Bach Dancing and Dynamite Society of Wisconsin, a highly-acclaimed and innovative chamber music festival now in its twenty-sixth season.

Max Garland is the author of The Word We Used for It, winner of the 2017-18 Brittingham Poetry Prize. His poems, essays, stories and interviews have appeared in journals such as Poetry, New England Review, and featured on Wisconsin Public Radio. Born and raised in western Kentucky, Garland worked for nearly a decade as a rural letter carrier on the route where he was born, an experience that laid the foundation for his first book of poems, The Postal Confessions.

A poet, essayist and translator based in Madison, Wisconsin. Catherine Jagoe writes about the intersection between our outer and inner lives in their many forms — domestic, natural and emotional. As an immigrant and translator who has lived in several different countries, she is fascinated by the peculiarities of different landscapes and languages, and by the notion of home — the homes we lose and the homes we create.

Mark Belair is a talented and creative poet whose work has appeared in numerous journals, including Alabama Literary Review, Atlanta Review, Harvard Review, Poetry East and The South Carolina Review. Belair’s latest collection is Watching Ourselves (Unsolicited Press, 2017). Previous collections include Breathing Room (Aldrich Press, 2015) and Night Watch (Finishing Line Press, 2013). He has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize multiple times.