FESTIVAL PROGRAM
Welcome to the It's Gonna Be Wild Adirondack Butoh Festival—a celebration of visceral, embodied performance in the wild beauty of this historic site. Once a working limestone quarry that helped build Glens Falls’ early infrastructure, this land now serves as a stage for immersive, site-specific expression.
Each artist chose a location that resonated most deeply with their vision. Other than the opening and closing pieces, there is no set order—let intuition, curiosity, and the environment be your guide.
We’re thrilled to be joined by our dynamic MC, Richard X Bennett, a genre-bending pianist and vibrant host who will help thread the wildness together.
FESTIVAL INVOCATION
Group Ensemble
We open with a collective offering honoring our Butoh masters and teachers, setting the tone and introducing the spirit of Butoh to the community.
Performers/Choreographers: Katherine Adamenko, Paula Jeanine Bennett, Deborah Butler, Denis Lafond, Kevin Segal, and Speranza Spir
Music: Gong and sound bowls improvisation by Bill Brender
THE WANTING CREATURE
Paula Jeanine Bennett
Incorporating movement, floor sculpture, soundscape, and poetry, Paula Jeanine Bennett’s “The Wanting Creature” builds a world exploring the many layers of self. The title and text are from a poem by 15th-century Indian mystic Kabir - a musing on illusion and intangible longing.
Performer/Choreographer: Paula Jeanine Bennett
Music: Included in the soundscape are recited phrases from “The Wanting Creature” as well as a suka knee-fiddle improvisation by Polish musician Maria Pomianowska. All other elements of “The Wanting Creature” are Paula’s creation, referencing her multimedia approach to making work (gesamtkunstwerk). The words “river, road, rope” are touchpoints for the piece, reflected in the sections of the floor sculpture: Paula’s attempt to unite with the flow of time.
Above All Else
SPY&DNY
It flutters in a drowsy awakening where it wishes for your fabulous senses. The illusion escapes its mystified eyes by a motionless and weary swoon, scattering the sound in dry shreds of rain. The horizon is not moved by a wrinkle, everything burns in the wild hour and inspiration upright under an ancient flood of light. Intoxicated, until the evening I look through it, the ripples of an animal once at rest. The flight, escape, or dive… and our blood, in love, flows for all the eternal swarm of desire without marking by what art together set off, we, perpetual nymphs.
Performers/Choreographers: SPY&DNY (Speranza Spir and Denis Lafond)
Music: SPY&DNY Compilation
Not Vanishing
Deborah Butler
Different phases of a woman’s life call for different ways of being. This one is “Not Vanishing,” an embodiment of the Feminine that is within and all surrounding and endangered. The title of the piece is from Christos’ book of poetry of the same title, a poet who first inspired me in my early 20s.
Performer/Choregraphers: Deborah Butler
Music: Rainstick by Hannah Brabbs, Blood of Earth by Deya Dova, Ee Che by Anna Homler and Steve Moshier, Land of the Ice Giants by Deya Dova
Of Flesh and Flight
Les Sœurs Cygnes/The Swan Sisters (Speranza Spir and Katherine Adamenko)
Les Sœurs Cygnes (The Swan Sisters) rise from the shadows of Strasbourg’s 1518 dancing plague—fevered, fragile, and bound by blood. As history forgets the reasons, their bodies remember: rhythm as affliction, movement as survival. Inspired by the real epidemic of choreomania, they dance not just from compulsion, but from a deeper knowing—one that lives between ecstasy and unraveling, tenderness and transformation.
Performers/Choreographers: Les Sœurs Cygnes (Speranza Spir and Katherine Adamenko)
Music: Speranza Spir Compilation
The Is Real Project: Action Is Real but I wish a lot that is happening was different
Kevin Segal
What is real? A battle between action and immobility.
Performer/Choreographer: Kevin Segal
The Butoh Bow
Group Ensemble
A ceremonial closing in true Butoh spirit, The Butoh Bow gathers performers and audience in a final shared breath. This concluding gesture honors the land, the body, and the ephemeral nature of the work—marking the end with presence, gratitude, and recognition.
Performers/Choreographers: Katherine Adamenko, Paula Jeanine Bennett, Deborah Butler, Denis Lafond, Kevin Segal, and Speranza Spir
Music: Gong and sound bowls improvisation by Bill Brender