A Canadian choreographer and crafty ambassador for modern dance, Noémie Lafrance, has found a ready-made world stage for her shows by exhibiting them on architect Frank Gehry's buildings.

Dancers, equipped with bungy chords, harnesses, and ropes, leap and bounced all over a Gehry structure at Bard College in New York two weeks ago. With the architect’s blessing, Lafrance has eight more performances planned.

Next up? The Guggenheim museum in Northern Spain and the Walt Disney concert hall in Los Angeles. (No dates have been announced.) The whole thing projects an air of pretentiousness, but watching spidermen and women legally climb around on some of the world's most revered modern buildings holds a decent amount of appeal.

Related Stories:
· Dancers on a Hot Gehry Roof [IHT]
· Alain Robert's Climbing Stunts Map [Jaunted]

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We normally disregard all those handy stretching guides in the back of airport magazines, but moving around in the terminal can forestall the plane jitters. That's why we love the Aeroports de Paris plan to offer in-terminal dance lessons at Charles de Gaulle and Orly airports this summer.

Learn anything from tango to twist on your layover this month before the program ends on August 17. Visit Gate 17 at Orly South, Gate 40 at Orly West and Gate E51 (Terminal 2E) at Charles de Gaulle to show 'em your best moves.

Related Stories:
· Flying to Cuba? Paris Airports Can Teach You Salsa [AP]
· Dansez à l'Aéroport! [Official Site, in French]
· Dance Dance! At Dance Valley [Jaunted]
· The Beach Volleyball Scene at Munich Airport [Jaunted]

[Photo: napix]]]> egw 2008-08-01T13:30:02-05:00 http://www.jaunted.com/story/2008/7/9/85445/27395

Actually, the term "dance recital" is a weak descriptor of "in-i," a new program at the National Theatre in London that asks, "If the Greeks had 14 words to describe different ways of loving, how many dare we experience?"

The new collaboration between British-Bangladeshi choreographer Akram Khan (who has worked with Kylie Minogue on tour), designer Anish Kapoor (who created Chicago's "bean" in Millennium Park) and actress Juliette Binoche ("Chocolat") promises to shock and delight as well as break a personal barrier for Binoche, who has never danced on-stage before.

Tickets for "in-i" go on sale today for priority members of the National Theatre; the rest of us should mark down July 23 to get our seats for performances September 6-October 6.

Related Stories:
· National Theatre Productions: in-i [Official Site]
· Beyonce Knowles' Flash Dance in Toronto [Jaunted]
· Mumbai's Bar Girls Win Big In Court [Jaunted]

[Photo: Guardian]]]> egw 2008-07-09T11:00:13-05:00 http://www.jaunted.com/story/2008/4/14/15257/7532

Tired of wasting your time in New York's Chinatown gulping down noodles and getting three I ♥ NY shirts for $10? Turn up your budget one notch, and check out Swing Fridays at Grand Harmony Palace on Mott Street.

Cover is $15 and includes live music until midnight. Food and the full bar are available but aren't included. Fear not, first-timers: Lessons are on the house at 9 pm.

Upcoming weekends will feature Michael Arenella and the Dreamland Orchestra as well as George Gee and the Jump, Jivin' Wailers. Totally reminds us of that scene in "Swingers" when Jon Favreau dances with Heather Graham. But, you know, in Chinatown instead of Hollywood.

Related Stories:
· Grand Harmony Palace [Myspace]
· Dim Sum Palace Swings Into High Gear on Fridays [NYM]
· Dancing coverage [Jaunted]]]> pbb 2008-04-14T15:30:01-05:00 40.717308 -73.997443 http://www.jaunted.com/story/2008/4/10/113745/496

Ballet=boring, right? What if the dances were set to Big Boi tracks instead of snoozy classical music? You'll find it at the Atlanta Ballet, starting tonight.

The show's called "Big," and it's a seriously limited engagement. The dancing is all professional ballet, but Big Boi, the hip hop group Konkrete and others will provide the tunes live.

It's a little cheeky, sure, but there's nothing wrong with appealing to a younger audience. As choreographer Lauri Stallings says:

If Mozart was here, I think he'd really dig this.

Related Stories:
· Big [Official Site]
· Big Boi Gives Ballet an Edge in Atlanta [NPR]
· Dance coverage [Jaunted]]]> pbb 2008-04-10T11:38:55-05:00 33.772635 -84.385580 http://www.jaunted.com/story/2007/1/29/42551/1491

We don't mention dancing enough here: apart from the occasional reference to the well-known bird flu dance, we don't get those hips swinging often enough. So here's our dance tip for the week: Samba City in Rio de Janeiro is there to educate tourists about the way of the samba. It's open 5 days a week (in fact, every day except those starting with T!) and you can watch samba dancers and traditional drummers or even learn some steps yourself.

Disneyland-style, an 8 p.m. parade finishes the day, including fireworks and the opportunity for visitors to get involved in the festivities too. In fact, they bill it as a year-round version of Carnival. It's a government-sponsored project with a secondary purpose: many samba schools of the city are based there and prepare year round for Carnival in a facility known as the Sambodrome!

Originally advertised to open some three years ago, the bosses must have been samba-ing their time away instead of working, but Samba City finally got up and running last year. If you can't stay away from a place with a name as cool as the Sambodrome or you just feel the urge to get those feet moving, check out Samba City for an experience of Carnival without the hefty hotel price hikes.

[Photo: Andreas Helke]

Related Stories:
· Bird Flu Dance [Jaunted]
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While you'd think that most of Seattle's Craigslist Missed Connections would happen in coffeeshops, apparently you're most likely to be spotted if you're mobile--the majority of missed connections appear to be hotties either riding the bus or driving their cars.