Aaron Glass - Restored Edward Curtis Film with Live Music and First Nations Dance

CANADIAN PREMIERE: Curtis’s Landmark 1914 Silent Film of Pacific Northwest First Nations Culture—restored, re-evaluated, and framed with a live orchestral arrangement of the original score by the Turning Point Ensemble, and a performance by the Gwa'wina Dancers, descendents of the Indigenous cast.

The first feature-length film to exclusively star indigenous North Americans, this romantic melodrama—set before the arrival of Europeans—features love, war, and ritual among the Kwakwaka'wakw of British Columbia. On its premiere in 1914, the film was accompanied by an orchestral score composed by John J. Braham, best known for his work with Gilbert and Sullivan. Both the score and the film were later nearly entirely lost. Anthropologist Aaron Glass (00) discovered the score in the collections of the Research Library at the Getty Research Institute, and original nitrate reels of the film at the UCLA Film & Television Archive. He has been part of a team that has led the restoration of the film and score, and its presentation across North America.

For more information on the Curtis project and links to the Chan event, visit In the Land of the Head Hunters.

Chan Centre for the Performing Arts

June 22, 2008 at 7pm

Tickets $15