Dead Can Dance with very special guest Agnes Obel
Dead Can Dance is an Australian-British musical project formed in 1981 in Melbourne by Lisa Gerrard and Brendan Perry. The band relocated from Melbourne to London in May 1982
Date/Time: May 4 2020, 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm
Vancouver, The Orpheum | Event calendar601 Smithe St.
Tickets
Cost: $40.00
Find tickets: here
Since their inception in Melbourne in 1981, Dead Can Dance have been informed by folk traditions from all over Europe, not just solely in terms of instrumentation, but also by secular, religious and spiritual practices.
The story to their 2019 album Dionysus took shape as Brendan Perry became fascinated by long established spring and harvest festivals that had their origins in Dionysian religious practices throughout Europe. The presence of the religion was suppressed during the ideological control of Christianity and Islam since the Roman Empire, and so the influence that Dionysus still had on these festivals would continue to manifest itself albeit in a more censored form.
The album’s story may be prominently inspired by that of Dionysus, but its cover detail comes from a mask made by the Huichol of the Sierra Madre Mountains in Mexico - famous for their yarn paintings and objects meticulously decorated with beadwork - who use peyote as a sacred rite and ritual for the purposes of healing and mind expansion. At its core, it’s this which is key to understanding the sentiment of Dead Can Dance’s latest opus - a celebration not just of humanity but of humanity’s working alongside nature with respect and appreciation.
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