Bard SummerScape Festival Sets 2007 Season

The works of 19th-century composer Edward Elgar and his contemporaries will provide the inspiration for the Bard SummerScape 2007 Festival, to be held at Bard College’s campus in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York, July 5-August 19. Many of the events will take place at Bard’s Richard B. Fisher Center for the Performing Arts, designed by Frank Gehry.

Highlights of the festival will include a production of George Bernard Shaw’s Saint Joan, directed by Gregory Thompson; Gilbert and Sullivan’s little-known operetta The Sorcerer, directed by Erica Schmidt; new dance works by Doug Varone and Susan Marshall; and a production of A Florentine Tragedy and The Dwarf, two one-act operas by Alexander von Zemlinsky.

In addition, the Bard Spiegeltent will feature such performances as a variety show from artist Martin Creed, winner of Britian’s prestigious Turner Prize; From a Basement on a Hill, Daniel Fish’s adaptation of Elliot Smith’s song cycle; the Bindlestiff Family Cirkus; and The Blackamoor Angel, an opera by Carl Hancock Rux, Deirdre Murry, ad Karen Coonrod.

The festival will also include a film series, British Postwar Classics, featuring 11 works including The Third Man, The Red Shoes, Black Narcissus, Oliver Twist, and Topsy-Turvy.

For more information, call 845-758-7900 or visit www.fishercenter.bard.edu.