Audition Notice

Spring Festival of Dance
Call for Dancers for Lamentation Variations by the Martha Graham Dance Company
Choreographer Laila Franklin

Auditions:
Sunday, March 16: 3:00 - 5:00 PM*
Ashamu Dance Studio
*Auditionees will not be admitted late

This will be a group Contemporary Dance Audition. Please be prepared to dance barefoot. 

From this audition, Laila Franklin will cast 5-7 dancers with a diverse skill set in contemporary dance. Participants should expect to remain for the full two hours of the audition and engage in both composed and improvisatory audition materials. Please be prepared to work both in solo and in group work.

Note: to be considered for this cast, dancers must be available for all rehearsal and performance dates and hold availability for the listed tech dates.

The Cast will be notified via email by the end of the day Monday, March 17

Rehearsal Dates:
April 12: 11:30 AM - 5:30 PM
April 13: 12:00 - 6:00 PM

Tech Rehearsals:
April 26 - May 2

Performances:
May 1: 8PM 
May 3: 2PM & 8PM
The Lindemann Performing Arts Center

Lamentation Variations was an event originally conceived to commemorate the anniversary of 9/11. It premiered on that date in 2007. The work opens with a film of Martha Graham dancing movements from her then-new, and now iconic, solo, Lamentation. The variations that follow were developed under specific creative conditions. Each choreographer was asked to create a spontaneous movement sketch of their reaction to the Graham film, and was required to adhere to the following conditions: only 10 hours of rehearsal, public domain music or silence, basic costumes and lighting design. Though it was planned to be performed on only one occasion, it has now become an ongoing creative project licensed by the Martha Graham Dance Company. 

Laila Franklin will create one variation on a group of Brown University students to be presented at the Spring Festival of Dance on May 1st and 3rd, 2025 in the main hall of the Lindemann Performing Arts Center. The May 1st performance will feature the Lamentation Variations performed by Brown students in a shared playbill with the Martha Graham Dance Company. 

Laila J. Franklin is a multidisciplinary dance artist based in unceded Massachusett and Pawtucket land (Boston, MA). As a choreographer, she has been commissioned by Boston Conservatory at Berklee, Brown University, and Salem State University. Her work has been presented by Public Space One, Vivid Oblivion, Kairos Dance Theater’s Cotuit Dance Fest, Loculus Collective’s Sideways Door Festival, Movement Research at The Judson Church, and School For Contemporary Dance and Thought. As a performer, she has worked on projects with Miguel Gutierrez, Dr. Christopher-Rasheem McMillan, Melinda Jean Myers, Stephanie Miracle, Ruckus Dance, and detritus dance, and as a guest artist with ContraTiempo Activist Dance Theater and Dianne McIntyre. She serves as a dramaturg for detritus dance and as an archival assistant to Stew Stewart and Jennifer Harge. She has been featured as one of Dance Magazine’s “25 to Watch”. Laila holds an MFA in Dance from the University of Iowa, a BFA in Contemporary Dance Performance from The Boston Conservatory, and is a proud alumna of the dance department of Duke Ellington School of the Arts in Washington, DC.

For questions, please contact Shura Baryshnikov (shura_baryshnikov@brown.edu ) and Patricia Seto-Weiss (patricia_seto-weiss@brown.edu)