earthdancers

earthdancers is a Sudbury-based, youth-directed, contemporary and modern dance company. Their mission is to promote environmental awareness within their community through annual benefit performances, in which all ticket sales are donated to environmental causes locally, nationally, and globally. They strive to be leaders in rejuvenating and sustaining the planet for their ‘tomorrow,’ setting this precedent through the universal communication of dance. Since 1989, they have succeeded in donating over $191 000 to various environmental organizations. This year, they will present their 30th annual benefit performance.

Heidi Strauss, David Strauss and

Heidi Strauss makes work as a way to examine human behaviour from different perspectives. In her work, relationships form a basis to consider our current social and environmental moment. She is interested in the ‘realness’ of where and who we are, here and now – how we are affected by the world around us. She is interested in challenging how we see/experience performance by shifting the physical perspective of the audience, creating immersive, installation, ambulatory, site-sensitive and digital works for theatre and non-theatre environments. Heidi is the artistic director of Toronto-based adelheid, and a KM Hunter and multi-Dora Award winning choreographer. She has been a resident artist at the Factory Theatre, The Theatre Centre, Harbourfront Centre, and currently at The Citadel. Her film collaborations have been screened at dança em foco (Rio de Janiero), nu2’s IDN festival (Barcelona) d:mic (Toronto) and site-specifically through Art Spin. She has been commissioned by/choreographed for Toronto Dance Theatre, Mocean Dance, The Frankfurt Opera, The Canadian Opera Company, Volcano Theatre, and the Stratford Festival. She runs re:research, a non-product based creation intensive for emerging dance artists and is currently pursuing an MFA at Transart Institute. She was one of the founders of earthdancers. 

David Macdonald is a graduate of the Music Performance program at McMaster University and has played with many orchestras in Central and Northeastern Ontario. He is looking forward to upcoming Sudbury performances with earthdancers and Sinfonia Ancaster in May and the Sudbury Symphony Orchestra in June. By day, David is a Distance Learning Program Development Specialist at the University of Guelph. For R and R, David enjoys reading, canoe-tripping, and international travel with his family.