FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 15, 2001

Banff, AB-- Sleeping Buffalo Mountain (Tunnel Mountain) is the setting for a series of events that will appeal to a wide and diverse audience. Beginning June 25^th with an Aboriginal lecture series and concluding with the world premiere of BONES: An Aboriginal Dance Opera on August 8^th, 10^{th ,} and 12^th, there is a strong focus on Aboriginal Arts at this summer’s Banff Arts Festival. After two years in development under the guidance of Sadie Buck and Alejandro Ronceria, and a public workshop last summer, this fusion of music and dance was described by a workshop audience member as "Spectacular – beautiful visually and musically – a gift to the world."

Buck, who first came to the Aboriginal Program as the program director of the Aboriginal Woman’s Voices Projects says, "The story of BONES is the life of a people. The Indigenous people of the world have many similarities. Many paths that are the same. Worldviews from diverse locations mesh – become one. Many, many stories saying the same in many different ways. Using many different words. Using many different symbols."

Leading up to the dance opera is a series of public lectures by a group of distinguished Aboriginal artists entitled "Spirit…I am your BONES," a celebration of the oral tradition practiced and perpetuated in Aboriginal cultures. On June 25, Muriel Miguel, a featured performer in BONES, talks about her international career as a director, performer, and founder/artistic director of New York City’s Spiderwoman Theatre. Muriel Miguel…a Retrospective takes place at 8 pm in The Club (lower level of the Theatre Complex) at The Banff Centre.

On July 11^th in The Club at 8 p.m., composer Russell Wallace will launch the new CD, Music from Chinook Winds Aboriginal Dance 1996/97. It features highlights from musical scores created for the dances in the Chinook Winds Aboriginal Dance program. The evening includes a presentation by Wallace, who will offer insights into his creative process as well as live performances by the Wallace family singing group, Tzo'Kam, and the Kehewin Native Performance and Resource Network.

On July 30^th at 8 pm in the Rolston Recital Hall, Music Building, cultural historian John Snow, author of These Mountains are our Sacred Places and storyteller Wilton Goodstriker share their perspectives on the connection between the land and the people.

On August 7^th at 7 pm in the Walter Phillips Gallery, the visual arts are featured. The evening marks the opening of the exhibition MULTIPLES:: Tsa de yoh don's, featuring ten contemporary artists of First Nations ancestry. MULTIPLES runs from August 8^th to September 30^th. On August 9^th at 2 pm, exhibition curator Tom Hill expands on the exhibition in the gallery, discussing multiple image-making in First Nations visual art. Hill is museum director and curator of the Woodlands Cultural Centre in Ontario.

At a pre-show chat on Friday, August 10^th, Sadie Buck and Alejandro Ronceria will share stories about the process of creating the landmark theatrical work BONES: An Aboriginal Dance Opera. The chat takes place at 7 pm in the West Lobby of the Eric Harvie Theatre.