“I intended to start off the 20th anniversary events for Groupe Grenade with an evening shared by three choreographers and myself; when seven choreographers responded to my invitation, I was able to create two programmes danced by the children and young people of Grenade.
The adventure was very rich in artistic emotion and technical rigour. Nothing was left to chance and it took all our know-how to achieve such a feat. When we toured these 20th anniversary performances, I met some choreographers and the idea of once again slipping into their distinctive worlds with my young dancers struck me as very appealing.
Thus, to take in this experience initiated with the 20th anniversary performances further, I would like to revisit pieces by renowned international choreographers and thus open my dancers to all these choreographic worlds. How can children or teenagers appropriate a Wayne McGregor duet or the repetitive movements of Lucinda Childs? This both fascinating and motivating challenge has been driving my work for two years.”

Source : Josette Baïz

“I intended to start off the 20th anniversary events for Groupe Grenade with an evening shared by three choreographers and myself; when seven choreographers responded to my invitation, I was able to create two programmes danced by the children and young people of Grenade. 

The adventure was very rich in artistic emotion and technical rigour. Nothing was left to chance and it took all our know-how to achieve such a feat. When we toured these 20th anniversary performances, I met some choreographers and the idea of once again slipping into their distinctive worlds with my young dancers struck me as very appealing.

Thus, to take in this experience initiated with the 20th anniversary performances further, I would like to revisit pieces by renowned international choreographers and thus open my dancers to all these choreographic worlds. How can children or teenagers appropriate a Wayne McGregor duet or the repetitive movements of Lucinda Childs? This both fascinating and motivating challenge has been driving my work for two years.”

Josette Baïz

Alban Richard discovered contemporary dance while he was pursuing literary and musical studies. From the late 1990s, he worked for various choreographers such as Odile Duboc, Olga de Soto and Rosalind Crisp.

In 2000, Alban Richard founded Ensemble l'Abrupt for which he created about thirty very different pieces, always in close interaction with a musical work whose writing and formal structure he questioned. Consequently, each creation opens up new research and a new performance style, setting itself apart from the previous one. The way he develops his shows, using restricted improvisations to devise the work directly on stage, encourages the performers to become creators of their own dance.

Alban Richard has collaborated with the Alla francesca ensemble, Les Talens Lyriques, Les Percussions de Strasbourg, the Ensemble intercontemporain, IRCAM and the Cairn, Instant Donné and Alternance ensembles, as well as with composers Arnaud Rebotini, Sebastian Rivas, Erwan Keravec, Jérôme Combier, Laurent Perrier, Raphaël Cendo, Robin Leduc, Paul Clift, Wen Liu and Matthew Barnson.

A prolific choreographer, Alban Richard is regularly invited by ballets and companies, both internationally (Canada, Lithuania, Norway) and in France, to create commissioned works.

Since 2015 he has been artistic director of the centre chorégraphique national de Caen en Normandie, with a project based on both his practice as an author and on connecting with the territory and its inhabitants.

More information : https://ccncn.eu/english/

https://ccncn.eu/english/