TEDxSalem

Ideas worth spreading

performance

Beyond Limits Aerial Dance to thrill audience at TEDxSalem

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Grav­i­ty adds a sense of won­der and thrill to watch­ing dancers who leave the safe­ty of the ground to twirl from rings and oth­er geo­met­ric shapes over­head.

That’s the expe­ri­ence that Beyond Lim­its Aer­i­al Dance will bring to TEDxSalem Jan. 4. It’s rem­i­nis­cent of the soar­ing wild gamut of emo­tions you feel on a roller coast­er with­out the dis­joint­ed move­ments of a rick­ety track.

Jes­si Fouts and EJ Reinagel are the artis­tic direc­tors behind the Salem dance com­pa­ny Beyond Lim­its. They hail from mul­ti­ple locales from around the coun­try includ­ing New York, Cal­i­for­nia and Mis­souri.

To cre­ate the com­pa­ny, the cou­ple take pro­fes­sion­al dancers, often hand­picked, and put them in the air. Jes­si dances in some of the pieces, too.

They chore­o­graph pieces that help dancers move through prob­lems and issues they are fac­ing per­son­al­ly. Their work incor­po­rates all of that into the dance so not only is the audi­ence get­ting some­thing beau­ti­ful to watch, but the actors are releas­ing their scope of emo­tions as well in each aer­i­al twirl, swoop and dive.

Sec­ond, they write all the pieces with a spe­cif­ic theme or an event they would like to explore fur­ther. Their dances are expres­sions of time­less emo­tions sig­nif­i­cant to all peo­ple; love, joy, pain, loss.

“Every­one has expe­ri­enced feel­ings like loss on some lev­el,” says EJ, who is an artis­tic direc­tor of Beyond Lim­its.

While they both chore­o­graph the dancers’ move­ments, EJ is in charge of the appa­ra­tus­es that will help cre­ate the emo­tion­al peaks and val­leys the audi­ence sees. Jes­si brings a back­ground in dance with a Bach­e­lor of Fine Arts in dance per­for­mance.

She’s the one who stum­bled on to this art when she was fin­ish­ing school. Some­one need­ed aer­i­al dancers, she said, and she thought she would give it a try.

When they don’t have their heads in the clouds, Jes­si is an occu­pa­tion­al ther­a­py assis­tant and EJ teach­es at Willamette Uni­ver­si­ty. They dream of offer­ing class­es and pro­vid­ing a space to explore envi­ron­men­tal and social issues through mul­ti­me­dia plat­forms.

Even though this isn’t their bread and but­ter just yet, they hope it will be one day. EJ believes it is impor­tant for them to have a place to cre­ate a com­mu­ni­ty that can give back, a place where they can empow­er peo­ple to be their best selves.

You can see their lat­est work Sat­ur­day, Jan­u­ary 4 at TEDx Salem. Don’t miss this ride.

For more infor­ma­tion about Beyond Lim­its go to https://www.beyondlimitsaerialdance.com/

TEDxSalem VII

TEDxSalem VII is an all-day event fea­tur­ing talks, per­for­mances, refresh­ments, lunch and swag. It takes place from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Sat­ur­day, Jan. 4, 2020, at the Salem Con­ven­tion Cen­ter. Click here for tick­ets. Fol­low us on Face­book for the most up-to-date news from our com­mu­ni­ty, and check our web­site reg­u­lar­ly for new infor­ma­tion. You can also reach us at info@tedxsalem.com

Michelle LaFontaine brings Bollywood dance to TEDxSalem VII

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When Michelle LaFontaine and her troupe Sun­dari Bol­ly­wood take to the TEDxSalem stage in Jan­u­ary, expect an inter­ac­tive expe­ri­ence.

“Plan to move to the music,” said LaFontaine of the East Indi­an-inspired dance per­for­mance. “The music is so upbeat and fun, one can’t help them­selves!”

LaFontaine made the move from bel­ly-danc­ing to Bol­ly­wood dance after hear­ing about an open audi­tion when she lived in Seat­tle in 2011. She had a sched­ul­ing con­flict, but the direc­tor invit­ed her to try out a class the next week.

“I showed up, jumped in head first as I tend to do,” LaFontaine said. “She was impressed with my abil­i­ty to pick up chore­og­ra­phy quick­ly and asked that I be a part of her team. So I start­ed learn­ing.”

Learn­ing soon turned to per­form­ing, which in 2014 turned to teach­ing.

“Dance is an incred­i­ble way to express one­self through move­ment and gain both body aware­ness and con­fi­dence,” she said. “It’s also an incred­i­ble form of exer­cise and helps main­tain youth in the body and brain.”

She now teach­es week­ly class­es in Salem and hosts month­ly shows for those who decide they’d like to per­form.

“I want to encour­age every­one to explore some form of dance, in par­tic­u­lar, women,” she said. “I believe the boost­ing of our­selves is of utmost impor­tance!”

LaFontaine is excit­ed to bring the joy and expres­sion of Bol­ly­wood to even more of Salem through TEDx. The city has been home “for about 12 years, minus the four years I was in Seat­tle.”

“I enjoy the com­mu­ni­ty, espe­cial­ly the diver­si­ty of our com­mu­ni­ty,” she said. “I love work­ing in Salem as a small busi­ness own­er and strive to sup­port my local busi­ness­es.”

She’s also involved in the Indi­an com­mu­ni­ty via the board for INDUS, a non­prof­it whose vision is “to pro­mote and strength­en friend­ship and under­stand­ing of cul­tures between the peo­ples of Indi­an Sub-con­ti­nent and Unit­ed States.”

“I get the plea­sure of help­ing pre­pare the events we hold and per­form for the com­mu­ni­ty of peo­ple I tru­ly adore,” she said.

So when you see Sun­dari, be ready to move.

“My favorite part about per­form­ing is see­ing the smiles on my audience’s faces and con­nect­ing with them,” LaFontaine said. “They often can’t help but tap their foot to the music and clap their hands, and their involve­ment makes per­form­ing even more fun for me and my group!”

TEDxSalem VII

TEDxSalem VII is an all-day event fea­tur­ing talks, per­for­mances, refresh­ments, lunch and swag. It takes place from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Sat­ur­day, Jan. 4, 2020, at the Salem Con­ven­tion Cen­ter. Click here for tick­ets.  Fol­low us on Face­book for the most up-to-date news from our com­mu­ni­ty, and check our web­site reg­u­lar­ly for new infor­ma­tion. You can also reach us at info@tedxsalem.com

TEDxSalem poet explores identity, female empowerment through words

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Poet. Col­lege stu­dent. Black woman. Hait­ian immi­grant. Adoptee.

These are just a few of Jolie Brownell’s many iden­ti­ties.

When the 20-year-old takes the stage at TEDxSalem, the audi­ence will hear her grap­ple with these iden­ti­ties through her poet­ry.

“I want to express through poet­ry my walks of life, the inter­sec­tions of my dif­fer­ent iden­ti­ties, and what that means to me and to soci­ety,” Brownell says.

Brownell, who grad­u­at­ed from Sun­set High School in Beaver­ton, is a sopho­more at Loy­ola Mary­mount Uni­ver­si­ty in Los Ange­les. She’s major­ing in women and gen­der stud­ies.

Her choice of major wouldn’t sur­prise any­one who knew her in high school.

By age 19, Brownell had already won awards for her blog, “Me Too Girl,” and she had self-pub­lished a book with the same title. The book is a col­lec­tion of mes­sages and poems on girl empow­er­ment.

She has giv­en speech­es on this top­ic to hun­dreds of women and girls in the Port­land area, and led work­shops in part­ner­ship with Girls Inc., I Am That Girl, Pro­duced By Her, and Chick­Tech.

Brownell is orig­i­nal­ly from Haiti, but a Port­land fam­i­ly adopt­ed her when she was 3.

She first became ded­i­cat­ed to female empow­er­ment issues when she was just 13.

“Like many young girls around that age, I was con­sumed with self-hatred, self-doubt, lack of con­fi­dence,” she says. “Dur­ing the sum­mer between mid­dle school and high school, I decid­ed to shift gears because I real­ized that I’m going to have this body, I’m going to be this per­son for the rest of my life. Do I want to spend the rest of my life hat­ing this per­son, or do I want to spend it try­ing to teach myself how to love myself?”

Her essays and jour­nal entries about self-dis­cov­ery even­tu­al­ly led to her blog and her book.

“I’ve always loved the pow­er behind words, and I want­ed to use my words to uplift and inspire oth­ers,” Brownell says.

Brownell hopes that TEDxSalem audi­ence mem­bers will expe­ri­ence that inspi­ra­tion dur­ing her per­for­mance. But, ulti­mate­ly, the work to improve self-con­fi­dence is an indi­vid­ual pur­suit, she says.

“I’m try­ing to encour­age and uplift women. But I can only do so much and then you must car­ry it; you must do the work, the final step of lov­ing your­self,” she says. “I encour­age the audi­ence to find the deep­er mean­ings in my work and what that means for them.”

For more infor­ma­tion about Jolie Brownell, check out her web­site at www.joliebrownell.com

TEDxSalem VII

TEDxSalem VII is an all-day event fea­tur­ing talks, per­for­mances, refresh­ments, lunch and swag. It takes place from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Sat­ur­day, Jan. 4, 2020, at the Salem Con­ven­tion Cen­ter. Click here for tick­ets.  Fol­low us on Face­book for the most up-to-date news from our com­mu­ni­ty, and check our web­site reg­u­lar­ly for new infor­ma­tion. You can also reach us at info@tedxsalem.com

It’s not too late to join the TEDxSalem party today

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You for­got to buy tick­ets, you thought you would­n’t be in town or you just put it off to the last minute?

That’s OK. We have tick­ets at the door so it’s not too late to join this par­ty. It’s going to be epic. Eleven bril­liant speak­ers, med­i­ta­tion, dance and per­for­mances from Sleep Mil­len­ni­um and Rian Gayle.

But wait, there’s more: thought­ful break­out ses­sions, snacks, a fab­u­lous lunch and an after par­ty. Join us at Tap­root in down­town Salem to cel­e­brate the day and hang out some more.

Tick­ets will be avail­able for pur­chase at the door for $60 cash or card only. No checks.

We hope to see you at the Salem Con­ven­tion Cen­ter, 200 Com­mer­cial St. SE. Doors open at 7:45 a.m., and event starts at 9 a.m.

Friends explore music and spoken word on stage at TEDxSalem Saturday

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Chris Ross and Nathan Olsen, two accom­plished and unique souls, will share their long-stand­ing friend­ship on stage for the first time in the form of a musi­cal con­ver­sa­tion at TEDxSalem Sat­ur­day.

One will play the key­board. The oth­er will speak.

The dis­cus­sion will tack­le themes such as how to make things bet­ter, the pas­sage of time, com­ing and going, trust­ing our­selves, and how to be thought­ful­ly inten­tion­al. The idea of play and being play­ful will thread through­out the con­ver­sa­tion; Chris with words, Nathan with music. The audi­ence will expe­ri­ence all the feels on the jour­ney with them through their vision of RE.

Chris has been in Salem about 15 years after liv­ing in Upstate New York, Ari­zona and Cal­i­for­nia. We can thank his wife who prompt­ed the move to Ore­gon after tak­ing a job teach­ing law at Willamette Uni­ver­si­ty.

By day Chris teach­es preschool here in Salem. He also works with the Her­itage School, a small K – 8 pri­vate school, also in Salem. He has been work­ing with chil­dren for 40 years. He says he is very play­ful, and the chil­dren keep him young.

When he isn’t work­ing with kids or spend­ing time out­doors with his fam­i­ly, he oper­ates his very small “Uber ser­vice” (his words) which trans­ports his daugh­ters to and from their many activ­i­ties.

“I like things that go in a lot of direc­tions at the same time,” Chris said. He likes to see lay­ers of things and inter­pre­ta­tions from dif­fer­ing views. It makes sense then, that he is a world trav­el­er, hav­ing seen every con­ti­nent but Antarc­ti­ca. Don’t wor­ry, it is on his list.

It was dif­fi­cult for him to give me favorites. “I like to like things,” he said. So, in keep­ing with his love of trav­el, he loves all types of music and food.

As for his stage part­ner Nathan Olsen, they have been friends a long time and have often talked about how to do a per­for­mance like this. The oppor­tu­ni­ty has final­ly pre­sent­ed itself.

Nathan is a Salem-based, self-taught musi­cian who works as a con­sul­tant, teacher, com­pos­er, and per­former. He majored in com­mu­ni­ca­tions in col­lege and worked in pub­lic rela­tions for a while before final­ly decid­ing to fol­low his pas­sion. Accord­ing to his web­page biog­ra­phy, he has an exten­sive resume and plays in a vari­ety of music gen­res. He will say, though, that his favorite music includes Funk and Jazz Fusion.

And he is proud that, “After many years work­ing as a side­man, this year I’m final­ly fronting my own instru­men­tal Jazz/Funk trio.”

Rather than words, he uses music to express his thoughts and feel­ings. He “lets his fin­gers do the talk­ing.”

Hear this unique con­ver­sa­tion of words, music and friend­ship with Chris and Nathan at TEDxSalem Sat­ur­day.

Chris Ross

Home­town: Pitts­burgh, New York

Edu­ca­tion: BA in Busi­ness and Psy­chol­o­gy from State col­leges in New York; MA in Edu­ca­tion, North­ern Ari­zona Uni­ver­si­ty

Fam­i­ly: Wife, War­ren, and two daugh­ters still in school

Hob­bies: ski­ing, hik­ing, moun­tain climb­ing, camp­ing

Favorite recent movie: The Post, Black Pan­ther

Favorite music: Music of all kinds. Grew up on jazz, blue­grass, music fes­ti­vals and hun­dreds of Grate­ful Dead shows

 

Nathan Olsen

Home­town: Salem, OR (moved here in 3rd grade)

Edu­ca­tion: Radio Broad­cast­ing at Mt Hood Com­mu­ni­ty Col­lege, Com­mu­ni­ca­tions at Maryl­hurst Uni­ver­si­ty

Fam­i­ly: One broth­er, His par­ents are founders of and teach­ers at Her­itage School

Hob­bies: hik­ing – he feels “con­tin­u­al­ly for­tu­nate to live in the Pacif­ic North­west

Favorite recent movie: The orig­i­nal Star Wars tril­o­gy

Favorite music: Funk and Jazz Fusion

 

TEDxSalem VI

TEDxSalem VI is an all-day event fea­tur­ing talks, per­for­mances, refresh­ments, lunch and a swag bag. It runs 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Sat­ur­day, Jan. 5 at the Salem Con­ven­tion Cen­ter. Tick­ets are on sale now for $55, $45 for stu­dents. Fol­low us on Face­book for the most up-to-date news from our com­mu­ni­ty, and check our web­site reg­u­lar­ly for new infor­ma­tion. You can also reach us at info@tedxsalem.com.

Experience Salem-based band Sleep Millennium at TEDxSalem VI

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TEDxSalem atten­dees will get to expe­ri­ence the artis­tic expres­sion of Salem-based band Sleep Mil­len­ni­um as one of the enter­tain­ment fea­tures of this year’s event.

Found­ed by award-win­ning artist and song­writer-turned-DIY film­mak­er Josh Schroed­er (gui­tar, keys, lead vocals), the band also includes Jarred Ven­ti (bass, keys, vocals), Ronan Bak­er (gui­tar, keys, vocals) and David Aizuss (drums).

The con­cept of Sleep Mil­len­ni­um is some­thing evolv­ing said Josh.

“…It is the mech­a­nism through which I’m try­ing to explain (or process) my expe­ri­ence of that “yin/yang” of order and chaos and dis­cov­er/derive/shed-light on mean­ing and truth,” he said. “The world is incred­i­bly com­plex. There’s a seem­ing­ly end­less uni­verse to draw inspi­ra­tion from. From the begin­ning of Sleep Mil­len­ni­um as a group, we decid­ed that there would be no bar­ri­er to explore what we want­ed to do. And that we would chal­lenge our­selves to dream big­ger about what was pos­si­ble giv­en our resources or lack-there­of. It’s also about hav­ing the best time we can while attempt­ing to make art we can feel excit­ed about and proud of.”

Sum­ma­riz­ing their sound as some­what exper­i­men­tal, but only to the degree that the group grav­i­tates toward a spacey, almost film-score-like approach to pro­duc­tion, Josh said: “At the end of the day these are pop songs in their form, and we’ve orches­trat­ed them to have a com­mon the­mat­ic thread. Any­thing goes in terms of genre, but you’ll hear ele­ments of rock, pop, elec­tron­ic, and touch­es of the avant-garde.”

And of being asked to per­formed at TEDxSalem VI, Josh said: “Our first thought was that it’s a huge hon­or. And with that hon­or we feel it’s our respon­si­bil­i­ty to do our best to per­form at the high­est lev­el we can. It’s hum­bling to have been asked to per­form at TEDxSalem and the four of us are very excit­ed.”

Keep an eye on Sleep Mil­len­ni­um through its web­site at www.sleepmillennium.com.

“We have a series of sin­gles we’ve been work­ing on that we’re get­ting ready to release,” Josh said. “There’s talk of some tour­ing abroad, the sec­ond annu­al Blood Moon Music Fest is also some­thing we’re think­ing about, and we’re begin­ning to imag­ine what we might do to chal­lenge our­selves to dream even big­ger on our next full-length album.”

But until then, catch them when they per­form live at TEDxSalem VI on Jan­u­ary 5.

TEDxSalem VI

TEDxSalem VI is an all-day event fea­tur­ing talks, per­for­mances, refresh­ments, lunch and a swag bag. It runs 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Sat­ur­day, Jan. 5 at the Salem Con­ven­tion Cen­ter. Tick­ets are on sale now for $55, $45 for stu­dents. Fol­low us on Face­book for the most up-to-date news from our com­mu­ni­ty, and check our web­site reg­u­lar­ly for new infor­ma­tion. You can also reach us at info@tedxsalem.com.