• Octavia E Butler's Parable of the Sower
Program Books/Octavia E. Butler’s Parable of the Sower

Octavia E. Butler’s Parable of the Sower

Friday and Saturday, May 5–6, 2023, 8pm
Zellerbach Hall

Run time for this concert is approximately 2 hours and 15 minutes without intermission. 

From the Executive and Artistic Director

Jeremy Geffen

As many of you already know, just a few weeks ago, Cal Performances announced details of its upcoming 2023–24 season. Beginning in October, with the Berkeley debut by the brilliant young Israeli pianist Tom Borrow, and continuing into May, when Icelandic pianist Víkingur Ólafsson will close the season with a performance of J.S. Bach’s timeless Goldberg Variations, you can look forward to a calendar packed with the very finest in live music, dance, and theater.

You’ll find more than 80 carefully curated events designed to appeal to the eclectic interests and adventurous sensibilities of Bay Area audiences. As you’ve come to expect at Cal Performances, the upcoming season offers a wide range of opportunities to discover new artists and artworks, featuring nearly 30 companies, ensembles, and solo artists new to our program, and many unfamiliar works, including six world premieres, six Cal Performances co-commissions, nearly one dozen local and regional premieres, and the West Coast premieres of Taylor Mac & Matt Ray’s Bark of Millions and Nathalie Joachim’s Ki moun ou ye (Who are you?).

Cal Performances also continues to invest in ongoing relationships with established and acclaimed artistic partners, many of whom are longtime audience favorites. We’ll see a thrilling collaboration between Germany’s Pina Bausch Foundation, Senegal’s École des Sables, and England’s Sadler’s Wells theater in a program that includes the first-ever Bay Area performance of Bausch’s pioneering The Rite of Spring (1975), as well as the renewal of a multi-season residency by The Joffrey Ballet, which this year will present its first full-length narrative ballet (Anna Karenina) at Zellerbach Hall. And I’m especially pleased that in March 2024, the renowned pianist Mitsuko Uchida will join us as Artist in Residence for two special concerts as well as additional opportunities for the campus and wider Bay Area community to engage with her singular artistry.

A focus of the season will be our multi-dimensional Illuminations programming, which once again connects the work of world-class artists to the intellectual life and scholarship at UC Berkeley via performances and public programs investigating a pressing theme—this season, “Individual & Community.” Concepts of “individual” and “community” have been at the forefront of public discourse in recent years, with some models increasing polarization and radicalization within our society. Questions have emerged as to how we can best nurture a sense of community and how the groups we associate with impact our own sense of self. Given our fast-evolving social landscape, how can we retain and celebrate the traits that make each of us unique, while still thriving in a world that demands cooperation and collaboration? With the performing arts serving as our guide and compass, our 2023–24 “Individual & Community” programming will explore the tensions that come into play when balancing the interests of the individual with those of the group.

Please make sure to check out our brand new 45-page season brochure and our website for complete information. We’re thrilled to share all the details with you, in print and online!

This weekend, of course, our current season draws to a close with long-awaited performances of Octavia E. Butler’s Parable of the Sower and our season-closing recital with the great Swedish soprano, Nina Stemme and pianist Magnus Svensson. It has been a joy sharing the entire year with you, and I look forward with great anticipation to seeing you again next season!

Jeremy Geffen
Executive and Artistic Director, Cal Performances

Jeremy GeffenAs many of you already know, just a few weeks ago, Cal Performances announced details of its upcoming 2023–24 season. Beginning in October, with the Berkeley debut by the brilliant young Israeli pianist Tom Borrow, and continuing into May, when Icelandic pianist Víkingur Ólafsson will close the season with a performance of J.S. Bach’s timeless Goldberg Variations, you can look forward to a calendar packed with the very finest in live music, dance, and theater.

You’ll find more than 80 carefully curated events designed to appeal to the eclectic interests and adventurous sensibilities of Bay Area audiences. As you’ve come to expect at Cal Performances, the upcoming season offers a wide range of opportunities to discover new artists and artworks, featuring nearly 30 companies, ensembles, and solo artists new to our program, and many unfamiliar works, including six world premieres, six Cal Performances co-commissions, nearly one dozen local and regional premieres, and the West Coast premieres of Taylor Mac & Matt Ray’s Bark of Millions and Nathalie Joachim’s Ki moun ou ye (Who are you?).

Cal Performances also continues to invest in ongoing relationships with established and acclaimed artistic partners, many of whom are longtime audience favorites. We’ll see a thrilling collaboration between Germany’s Pina Bausch Foundation, Senegal’s École des Sables, and England’s Sadler’s Wells theater in a program that includes the first-ever Bay Area performance of Bausch’s pioneering The Rite of Spring (1975), as well as the renewal of a multi-season residency by The Joffrey Ballet, which this year will present its first full-length narrative ballet (Anna Karenina) at Zellerbach Hall. And I’m especially pleased that in March 2024, the renowned pianist Mitsuko Uchida will join us as Artist in Residence for two special concerts as well as additional opportunities for the campus and wider Bay Area community to engage with her singular artistry.

A focus of the season will be our multi-dimensional Illuminations programming, which once again connects the work of world-class artists to the intellectual life and scholarship at UC Berkeley via performances and public programs investigating a pressing theme—this season, “Individual & Community.” Concepts of “individual” and “community” have been at the forefront of public discourse in recent years, with some models increasing polarization and radicalization within our society. Questions have emerged as to how we can best nurture a sense of community and how the groups we associate with impact our own sense of self. Given our fast-evolving social landscape, how can we retain and celebrate the traits that make each of us unique, while still thriving in a world that demands cooperation and collaboration? With the performing arts serving as our guide and compass, our 2023–24 “Individual & Community” programming will explore the tensions that come into play when balancing the interests of the individual with those of the group.

Please make sure to check out our brand new 45-page season brochure and our website for complete information. We’re thrilled to share all the details with you, in print and online!

This weekend, of course, our current season draws to a close with long-awaited performances of Octavia E. Butler’s Parable of the Sower and our season-closing recital with the great Swedish soprano, Nina Stemme and pianist Magnus Svensson. It has been a joy sharing the entire year with you, and I look forward with great anticipation to seeing you again next season!

Jeremy Geffen
Executive and Artistic Director, Cal Performances

About the Performance

Tonight we are in exploration of family. The one you are born into—the one you choose—the one you find—the one that finds you.

Sometime in the future, we meet Lauren Olamina, a 15-year-old girl living inside the remnants of a walled community kept secure by a locked gate. This is a community being held together by her father’s will and vision. A community that did not choose to be together, but is forced to work together because of the massive deterioration of the world around them: a widening economic gap, privatization of what were once public resources, rampant corporate take-over, 21st-century sharecropping, drugs, violence, and an overwhelming disregard for life. All these things chip away at what little sense of security Lauren feels. She comes to know that she is not safe behind that wall. She comes to know that the God of her father is not her God. And so, even as she prepares to leave, she begins to create her own religion: Earthseed—The Books of the Living.

When the wall comes down, Lauren loses her family. She leaves home with a few old maps, and starts out on an unknown journey north, out of the suburbs of Los Angeles, passing as a man with two wounded friends at her side, gathering more along the way. Finding love, finding com­rades. Teaching Earthseed.

All that you touch
you Change.
All that you Change
Changes you.
The only lasting truth
is Change.
God
is Change.

Octavia E. Butler’s Parable of the Sower

Created by Toshi Reagon & Bernice Johnson Reagon
Co-Directed by Signe Harriday & Eric Ting
Music and Lyrics by Toshi Reagon & Bernice Johnson Reagon

with
Abby Dobson, Afi Bijou, Alex Koi, Alina Carson, Be Steadwell, Evie Schuckman, Isaiah Stanley, Josette Newsam, Marie Tatti Aqeel, Neil Dawson, Noah Virgile, Shelley Nicole, and Toussaint Jeanlouis

Orchestra
Chogyi, Fred Cash, Jr., Bobbie Bird, Monique Brooks Roberts, and Zach Brown

Toshi Reagon, Music Direction
Millicent Johnnie, Choreography
Arunulfo Maldonado, Scenic Designer
Dede M. Ayite, Costume Designer
Christopher Kuhl, Lighting Designer
John Kemp, Audio Systems
Abigail Deville, Art Installation
Yasmine Lee, Movement Director
Jojo Franjoine, Production Manager/Lighting Director     
Chris De Camillis, Production Stage Manager
Caroline Pastore, Assistant Stage Manager
ArKtype/Thomas O. Kriegsmann, Co-Tour Producer
Sami Pyne, Associate Tour Producer
Shannon Molly Flynn, Company Manager/CovidCM
Henry Muller, Assistant Production Manager
Noah Phillips, Front of House Sound Engineer
Laura Brauner, 2nd Audio Technician
Alex Dakoglou, Lead Sound Engineer

The Pre-Show Soundscape includes the music of Bernice Johnson Reagon, Jason Moran, Meshell Ndegeocello, Arooj Aftab, Climbing PoeTree, and Alicia Hall Moran. News Reporter – J. Bob Alotta.

Produced by Wise Reagon Arts
Consultant Shanta Thake

Based on the novels Parable of the Sower and Parable of the Talents by Octavia E. Butler.
Courtesy of the estate of Octavia E. Butler.

Originally commissioned by The Public Theater, and co-commissioned by The Arts Center at NYU Abu Dhabi. World Premiere at The Arts Center at NYU Abu Dhabi on November 9, 2017. Made possible with funding by the New England Foundation for the Arts’ National Theater Project, with lead funding from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. Octavia E. Butler’s Parable of the Sower was developed with support by The Public Theater and during a residency at the Baryshnikov Arts Center, New York, NY. Additional support provided by the Apollo’s Salon Series Program. Fiscally sponsored by Cal Shakes.
Originally Produced by Wise Reagon Arts LLC and Meiyin Wang.

Learn more about the Parable of the Sower collaborators and journey at www.parableopera.com.

SETTING
Part 1: The walled community of Robledo, a suburb of Los Angeles, CA, in the near future.
Part 2: Later, on the road north. 

PERFORMERS
Talents: Abby Dobson, Shelley Nicole, Toshi Reagon

Part 1
Marie Tatti Aqeel, Lauren Oya Olamina
Neil Dawson, Rev. Olamina
Isaiah Stanley, Keith Olamina
Afi Bijou, Cory Olamina
Noah Virgile, Harry Balter
Toussaint Jeanlouis, Richard Moss
Alina Carson, Zahra Moss
Be Steadwell, Joanne Garfield
Alex Koi, Tracy Dunn
Josette Newsam, Mrs. Sims
Evie Schuckman, Mrs. Hsu

Part 2
Josette Newsam, The Ancestors
Isaiah Stanley, Grayson Mora
Marie Tatti Aqeel, Lauren Olamina
Noah Virgile, Harry Balter
Alina Carson, Zahra Moss
Neil Dawson, Travis Douglas
Afi Bijou, Gloria Natividad Douglas
Alex Koi, Jillian Gilchrist
Be Steadwell, Allison Gilchrist
Evie Schuckman, Emery Tanaka Solis
Toussaint Jeanlouis, Taylor Franklin Bankole

ORCHESTRA
Bobbie Bird, Percussion
Fred Cash, Jr., Bass
Zach Brown, Cello
Monique Brooks Roberts, Violin
Chogyi, Guitar & Keyboard

Special Thanks
Very special thanks to our friends at Cal Performances—Jeremy Geffen, Katy Tucker, Robin Pomerance, and team, Kobi Conaway and Andrew Owen, Dominique Bischoff-Brown, Margot Kenley, Jacqueline Woodson, Lanita Foley, Brown Estate, Meghan Kirksey, Barbara Luciani, Amy Laura Cahn, Ann Hackler, Lydia Mann, Elana Dykewomon, Diane S & Jewelle G, Jan Foust Hurt.

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