Songs of the Wanderers

Composer: Traditional

Choreographer: Lin, Hwai-min

Rustavi Ensemble

Wang, Rong-Yu

Wu, Chun-Hsien

Lee, Ching-Chun

Wang, Wei-Ming

Television Director: Vermeiren, Jef

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Catalogue Number: MID13245215

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Since its 1995 premier, Songs of the Wanderers, has gripped the imaginations of audience world-wide. It is the signature of the Lin Hwai-min's Cloud Gate Dance Theatre, Asia's leading contemporary dance company, and is possessed of a powerful meditative beauty.

Performed to Georgian folk songs, the choreography blends East and West dance styles and demands absolute focus and control from the dancers who, at times, appear to be have been transformed from human beings into body sculptures. The evocation of a quest for spiritual enlightenment through the experience and suffering is finely-wrought in imagery both abstract and literal. The passing of time sees to transcend normal boundaries. A monk-like figure stands motionless throughout, a steady stream of rice grains falling on his shaven head: an immovable living hour-glass. It is just one of the many ways in which Lin Hwai-min uses three tons of golden rice to striking effect. At first it is a river snaking in a neat heal across the stage, then it is a desert through which the pilgrims toil, later it falls as a dazzling rain as the dancers whirl in exultation. Finally, it is the task of one man to painstakingly rake the rice into a perpetual spiral.