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<\/p>\n Jen Campbell, Vicki Tobia and Alyson Boell-Marchand are dancers in the multimedia production \u201cPassage,\u201d which is set for River Valley Ranch in Carbondale on Saturday.\u00a0<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n Many dreams have been born on a day-long hike among friends. It usually starts with the simple question, \u201cWouldn\u2019t it be great if we \u2026\u201d<\/p>\n Trips around the world, marriages, summer road trip plans, the decision to learn mahjong and myriad life adventures have all been conceived while tromping up a mountain.<\/p>\n One such idea that was hatched by two friends hiking will be realized this Saturday when the multimedia production \u201cPassage\u201d happens at 7 p.m. Saturday as part of the ongoing Barn Music Series. The location is the Old Thompson Barn at River Valley Ranch in Carbondale.<\/p>\n The hikers in question were composer and violinist MinTze Wu and dancer and choreographer Jen Campbell. The hike itself was a daylong adventure to summit Mount Sopris in 2024.<\/p>\n \u201cJen is an amazing artist and dancer,\u201d Wu said. We\u2019d collaborated on a few small projects but I really wanted to do a much larger work together. \u201cWe love to hike together and it was on this 13-hour hike to summit Mount Sopris that this idea really took shape.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of shared admiration,\u201d Campbell said of the collaboration. \u201cI have a deep respect for what MinTze does, her creativity and her force in the world. \u201cI\u2019m grateful to be working with her and working with such a beautiful artist.\u201d<\/p>\n The Barn Music Series dates back to the pandemic when it came to life as The Garden Music Series. Once restrictions were lifted, the series moved to River Valley Ranch. The first show at the barn was held in 2023.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThe space speaks everything about Carbondale and about the Valley,\u201d Wu said. \u201cIt\u2019s very simple but very elegant, overlooking the majestic Mount Sopris. It also has beautiful acoustics.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cPassage\u201d is the sixth program that Wu\u2019s Benfeng Productions (which means \u201crunning with free spirit\u201d in Chinese) has produced at the RVR barn. Wu, a Roaring Fork Valley resident since 2018, founded Benfeng in 2013.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cEvery single project looks totally different,\u201d Wu said. \u201cThey might as well be from a different planet. \u201c\u2018Passage\u2019 is a program where we bring ourselves in as musicians, dancers\u00a0 and artists. It\u2019s an all-women production and we\u2019re continually exploring the intersection of art and life.\u201d<\/p>\n The artistic team behind \u201cPassage\u201d includes Wu as artistic director, violinist and pianist; Campbell as dancer and choreographer; Enion Pelta-Tiller Fadolin as composer and vocalist; Shannon Johnson on vocals; and dancers Alyson Boell-Marchand and Vicki Tobia.<\/p>\n Like other Benfeng productions, Wu employs the music of classical composers and words by renowned poets. The music that will be featured in the production includes Antonio Vivaldi\u2019s \u201cSovente il Sole,\u201d Enion Pelta-Tiller\u2019s \u201cDeeper Well,\u201d India Arie\u2019s \u201cSoulbird Rise,\u201d Maurice Ravel\u2019s \u201cAdagio Assai,\u201d Enion Pelta-Tiller\u2019s \u201cOpen Up\u201d and Ljova\u2019s \u201cMelting River.\u201d<\/p>\n Poetic works include Naomi Shihab Nye\u2019s \u201cThe Whole Self,\u201d Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer\u2019s \u201cOde to the Woman of Odd Jobs,\u201d Andrea Gibson\u2019s \u201cHow the Worst Day of My Life Became the Best\u201d and Lucille Clifton\u2019s \u201cThere is a Girl Inside.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n All Benfeng concerts are free to those 18 and under.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe want our work to resonate with the youth and I believe this will,\u201d Wu said. \u201cOur stage manager is a 16-year-old and I hope this will leave them with something to talk about or think about, or reflect on.\u201d<\/p>\n The collaboration between Campbell and Wu since that first hike has been continuous, and out of that, a title for the show emerged.<\/p>\n \u201cIt has been a humongous and wonderful creative opportunity to really invest all of my creative juices into this performance,\u201d Campbell said. \u201cMinTze and I have been collaborating and talking through the year and sort of culling ideas and letting it kind of germinate with us individually and then together. What drew me to this work is this idea of passing through thresholds in our life and the challenges and the beauty that arises in these fertile times of change. These experiences offer us the opportunity to grow, change, shift and evolve, and that led us to the title of the show \u2014 \u2018Passage.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Wu said that the six members of the show are all at a similar point in their lives.<\/p>\n \u201cSomething really beautiful is that this sextet of women are all between the ages of 48 and 60,\u201d Wu said. \u201cWe are unapologetic. We are there to really find the essence. It\u2019s not about the makeup anymore, it\u2019s about the essence of every single one of us, and what we are collectively portraying.\u00a0<\/p>\n Campbell continued the thread, saying, \u201cThe beauty of this project, whether it\u2019s dancing, poetry or music, is that it\u2019s woven together in a way that is hopefully powerful and authentic and intimate and honest, from each of us.\u201d<\/p>\n Wu said she hopes the show provides some catharsis for audience members \u2014 that it provides a way for them to identify with their own transitions in life.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s really an invitation toward greater presence in your life, greater awareness as we\u2019re moving through our days and seasons and years,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n \u201cI hope that there is a resonance with what they\u2019re feeling and seeing in their own life, that it might bring up questions around this idea of \u2018what kind of passage am I in at this particular moment.\u2019 I also hope that they will leave uplifted with the honesty and beauty of what they\u2019re seeing and listening to and kind of take it all in,\u201d Wu added.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.aspendailynews.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Jen Campbell, Vicki Tobia and Alyson Boell-Marchand are dancers in the multimedia production \u201cPassage,\u201d which is set for River Valley Ranch in Carbondale on Saturday.\u00a0 Courtesy of Benfeng Productions Many dreams have been born on a day-long hike among friends. It usually starts with the simple question, \u201cWouldn\u2019t it be great if we \u2026\u201d Trips […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2241757,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25172],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2241756","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entertainment"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Artists-in-flight-lives-in-transition-Arts-Entertainment.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2241756","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2241756"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2241756\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2241758,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2241756\/revisions\/2241758"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2241757"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2241756"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2241756"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2241756"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n Courtesy of Benfeng Productions <\/span>
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