Playful, adventurous, and idiosyncratic performances at the intersection of dance, theatre, music, and improvisation.
Part theatrical happening, part movement event, part improvised digital concert; Maggot Brain by Annalise Grammacione & Lifelong by Jennifer Clarke bring together artists whose practices blur disciplinary boundaries and invite audiences into worlds of imagination, transformation, and spontaneity.
Drawing on a rich tradition of Calgary-based interdisciplinary performance, these works treat movement, sound, story, and presence as equal collaborators. Expect inventive encounters, unexpected turns, and performances that are at once intimate, experimental, and deeply human.
Inspired by the legendary Funkadelic song, Maggot Brain is a jazz contemporary dance work exploring transformation, identity, and the unpredictable process of becoming.
Drawing from the life cycle of a maggot — egg, larva, pupa, and adult fly — the piece uses metamorphosis as a metaphor for the artist’s journey: the shedding of old identities, the uncertainty of growth, and the emergence of something new.
Created and performed by Annalise Grammacione, with performers Chantel Broderick and Jamie “Tea” Tognazzini, Maggot Brain blends vernacular jazz, contemporary movement, improvisation, and live rhythmic influences to explore the relationship between structure and freedom. The work examines what happens when we consume, break down, rebuild, and ultimately redefine ourselves. Through dynamic physicality, layered storytelling, humour, and vulnerability, the piece invites audiences into a world where transformation is messy, necessary, and deeply human.
Originally created as a five-minute work, Maggot Brain expands into a full-length performance experience featuring a collaborative cast of artists who bring unique perspectives, movement languages, and theatrical identities to the stage. With dramaturgy, live music, narration, and theatrical elements, the work creates an immersive landscape where movement becomes both a reflection of the body and a record of personal evolution.
At its core, Maggot Brain asks: What parts of ourselves must we release in order to grow? And who do we become when we finally allow ourselves to transform?
Lifelong: A Work in Progress is a lively excerpt from Jennifer Clarke's ongoing choreographic research exploring how we navigate instability, adaptation, and transformation.
Drawing on more than 25 years as a dance artist, improviser, and somatic educator, Clarke is interested in the body and mind's remarkable ability to reorganize, respond quickly, and find new possibilities when balance is disrupted.
This evolving work combines structured improvisation with live sound construction. Guided by a series of shared performance tasks, the dancers respond to one another in the moment, creating movement, voice, and found sounds in real time. Each performance unfolds through listening, curiosity, risk-taking, and collective decision-making.
Lifelong: A Work in Progress celebrates the unexpected. Sound is created live alongside the movement, becoming an equal creative partner that shapes the atmosphere and direction of the performance. Together, the dancers explore resilience not as returning to stability, but as an ongoing practice of adapting, connecting, and discovering what comes next.
This outdoor showing offers audiences a glimpse into an active creative process and the development of a larger performance work.
Lifelong: A Work in Progress is supported in part by the Alberta Foundation for the Arts and the Creative Residency Program and Decidedly Jazz.
Featured Artists
Annalise Grammacione · Dancer | Choreographer
Annalise Grammacione is an emerging dance artist, choreographer, and educator from Toronto, Ontario whose practice is rooted in jazz and contemporary dance. Drawn to storytelling, improvisation, and musicality, she creates work that explores transformation, rhythm, and human connection.
Annalise began her training at the Etobicoke School of the Arts, working with Gabby Kamino and Colleen Friedman, before continuing her studies at Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU). In 2020, she collaborated with Hannah Keil through Kenny Pearl’s Emerging Artist Residency, choreographing and performing in the dance film Together Inside Out. She later joined Frog in Hand Dance Company for its 2021 and 2022 seasons, expanding her practice through site-specific performance, theatrical creation, and clowning dramaturgy.
Her introduction to vernacular jazz at TMU led to three years in Decidedly Jazz Danceworks’ Professional Training Program, where she trained under Jamie Freeman Cormack and Ingrid Diaz Cespedes and developed a deep appreciation for the relationship between jazz music and movement.
In 2025, Annalise attended the Creating in Jazz program at Jacob’s Pillow under the direction of LaTasha Barnes, alongside Natasha Powell, Lisa La Touche, and Christopher McBride, receiving The School at Jacob’s Pillow Professional Advancement Award in Dance. She later performed with Ballet Creole Afro Cuban Contemporary Company, understudied Natasha Powell’s Dora-nominated production The Room Upstairs with Holla Jazz, and collaborated with Dreyser Garcia Latin Dance Company and The Parahumans Dance Collective as a performer and choreographer.
Annalise is currently developing and producing her original work Maggot Brain, supported by Calgary Arts Development, Springboard YYC, and Decidedly Jazz Danceworks. She continues to teach, choreograph, and collaborate across Canada, exploring jazz history, improvisation, and movement as a vehicle for storytelling.
Jennifer Clarke · Dancer | Choreographer
Jennifer Clarke recently relocated to Calgary after a 25 year career dance and making in Vancouver. She is now a Calgary-based dance artist, choreographer, improviser, somatic educator, and yoga teacher. Her work explores the continued, lifelong intelligence of the moving body. She works in contact improvisation, somatic exploration, sound construction and performance. With over 25 years of professional experience, her practice bridges contemporary dance, somatics, and live sound to create immersive performance environments. A graduate of the University of Calgary Dance Program, Jennifer has performed, taught, studied and created across Canada, Italy and New York. She is currently developing Lifelong, an Alberta Foundation for the Arts supported research project investigating adaptation, resilience, and the body's capacity to navigate change through movement and sound.