Doug Varone
The Company
Doug Varone and Dancers
The 2014/15 season marks the Company's 28th year. Since its founding in 1986, Doug Varone and Dancers has commanded attention for its expansive vision, versatility, and technical prowess. On the concert stage, in opera, theater and on the screen, Varone's kinetically thrilling dances make essential connections and mine the complexity of the human spirit. From the smallest gesture to full-throttle bursts of movement, Varone's work can take your breath away.
At home in New York City, Doug Varone and Dancers is the resident company at the 92nd Street Y Harkness Dance Center. On tour, the company has performed in more than 100 cities in 45 states across the U.S. and in Europe, Asia, Canada, and South America. Stages include The Kennedy Center, Lincoln Center, Brooklyn Academy of Music, San Francisco Performances, London's Queen Elizabeth Hall, Toronto's Harbourfront, Moscow's Stanislavsky Theater, Buenos Aires’ Teatro San Martin, the Venice Biennale, and the Tokyo, Bates, Jacob's Pillow and American Dance Festivals. In opera and theater, the company regularly collaborates on the many Varone-directed or choreographed productions that have been produced around the country.
Doug Varone and Dancers are among the most sought after ambassadors and educators in the field. The company's multi-discipline residency programs on tour capture their concepts, imagery and techniques across disciplines and for people of all ages and backgrounds, reaching out to audiences in unique ways that directly relate to their lives and interests. The company was selected to tour as part of 2013’s DanceMotionUSA(SM) program, a joint project between BAM and the US Department of State, touring, performing and teaching in Argentina, Paraguay and Peru for a month. This project culminated in the premiere of a new commissioned work for Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Next Wave Festival, in collaboration with the Argentina-based Brenda Angiel Aerial Dance.
For the past 15 years, annual summer intensive workshops at leading universities attract students and professionals from around the country. The company's multi-discipline residency programs on tour capture their concepts, imagery and techniques across disciplines and for people of all ages and backgrounds, reaching out to audiences in unique ways that directly relate to their lives and interests.
Varone, his dancers and designers have been honored with 11 New York Dance and Performance Awards (Bessies). In celebration of their 28th year, the Company will be touring and reconstructing major dances from past repertory, as well as recent new works and company premieres.
Doug Varone Artistic Director
Award-winning choreographer and director Doug Varone works in dance, theater, opera, film, and fashion. He is a passionate educator and articulate advocate for dance. By any measure, his work is extraordinary for its emotional range, kinetic breadth and the many arenas in which he works. His New York City-based Doug Varone and Dancers has been commissioned and presented to critical acclaim by leading international venues for close to three decades.
In the concert dance world, Varone has created a body of works globally. Commissions include the Limón Company, Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, Rambert Dance Company (London), Martha Graham Dance Company, Dancemakers (Canada), Batsheva Dance Company (Israel), Bern Ballet (Switzerland) and An Creative (Japan), among others. In addition, his dances have been staged on more than 75 college and university programs around the country.
In opera, Doug Varone is in demand as both a director and choreographer. Among his four productions at The Metropolitan Opera are Salome with its Dance of the Seven Veils for Karita Mattila, the world premiere of Tobias Picker’s An American Tragedy, and Stravinsky’s Le Sacre du Printemps, designed by David Hockney. His Met Opera production of Hector Berloiz’s Les Troyens was recently broadcast worldwide in HD. He has staged multiple premiers and new productions for Minnesota Opera, Opera Colorado, Washington Opera, New York City Opera, and Boston Lyric Opera, among others. His numerous theater credits include choreography for Broadway, Off-Broadway and regional theaters across the country. His choreography for last season’s musical Murder Ballad at Manhattan Theater Club earned him a Lortel Award nomination. Film credits include choreography for the Patrick Swayze film, One Last Dance. In 2008, Varone’s Bottomland, set in the Mammoth Caves of Kentucky, was the subject of the PBS Dance in America: Wolf Trap’s Face of America.
Varone received his BFA from Purchase College where he was awarded the President’s Distinguished Alumni Award in 2007. Numerous honors and awards include a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship, an OBIE Award (for direction/choreography of Lincoln Center’s Orpheus and Euridice), the Jerome Robbins Fellowship at the Boglaisco Institute in Italy, two individual Bessie Awards, two American Dance Festival Doris Duke Awards for New Work, and four National Dance Project Awards.
As an educator, Varone teaches workshops and master classes around the world for dancers, musicians and actors. He is currently on the faculty at Purchase College, teaching composition and choreography.
