'Barbu Electro Trad Cabaret' is a show that delves into the history of the Montreal Fairground, and brings it into the 21st Century, while throwing aside any notion of political correctness.
The Adelaide Fringe Festival is in for an acrobatic, and heavily-bearded treat. Cirque Alfonse is a young circus company from Saint-Alphonse-Rodriguez in the province of Quebec, and was established in 2005. They are a collective of professional acrobats graduated from École Nationale De Cirque De Montréal, as well as a professional dancer, an ex-skiing champion and a trio of musicians. 'Barbu' will be their second production brought to Australian shores, with their first ('Timber!') having been well received at last year's Sydney Festival.
Artistic Director and performer Antoine Carabinier gave his summary of what the Cirque Alonse collective are bringing with 'Barbu'. “It's a show that we created, in a way that we want to perform. Traditional circus, but mixed with a twist. We have a band with us playing traditional folk music from Quebec, but blended with electronic music. There will be seven artists on stage – two girls and five guys – and we are doing a lot of circus performance but as well we have comedy, magic, and things like that. Part of the show is quite traditional circus, but the second part of the show is more kinky and naughty.”
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Antoine explains the inspiration behind the show as being both traditional circus style, as well as the visual aesthetic of the early 1800s fairground performers in the group's native Quebec. “There was a fairground in Montreal at the beginning of the 19th Century. It was a lot of big muscular guys, using their strength. So we wanted that feeling of traditional performance. [The acrobats] are all big guys with big beards.”
The Cirque Alfonse have taken their talents all across the world, and even to the streets as they endeavour to interact with the general public and bring their form of artistic expression to as many people as possible. “We do a lot of street dance performances when we travel. It is always fun to meet a lot of people when we perform like that.”
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Along with their strive for authenticity, 'Barbu' incorporates a visual media aspect along with the electro/ folk soundtrack, and the Artistic Director makes it clear that this show has no coherent storyline like previous productions. It is more of a wild and wonderful party split into two parts. “Behind us we will have a video that will meld with the music and the circus performers. This show starts of with more circus-style, then the second part is more of a party. It's much more fun with things that you will never have seen before. It's a really fun show for the audience, and we are really looking forward to coming to Australia for it.”
'Barbu Electro Trad Cabaret' performs The Royal Croquet Club 12 February – 14 March as part of Adelaide Fringe Festival.
