PRESENTED this August at Edinburgh’s Zoo Southside, the only Fringe stage large enough to host its spectacular visuals, is Century Song, a live performance event created by soprano Neema Bickersteth looking at the past century in North America from the perspective of black women.
The latest show from Canada’s Volcano Theatre, Century Song is an entirely wordless piece, comprised of vocalises (wordless songs), live improvised instrumental music, dance and projected visuals from Germany’s fettFilm.
Inspired in part by Virginia Woolf’s Orlando and Alice Walker’s In Search of Our Mother’s Gardens, it aims to celebrate black women’s unspoken histories by dispensing with dates and names to be – the company says – “a pure exploration of human emotion as expressed through art”.
Veteran critic Lynn Gardner says the show, which tours to Rwanda before hitting Edinburgh in August, is “a dead cert” for this year’s Fringe.
See the trailer at www.volcano.ca/centurysong
Aug 3 to Aug 18 (not 8 or 15), Zoo Southside, Edinburgh, 3pm, £9 to £14. Tel: 0131 662 6892. edfringe.com
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