Using conversations with his nephew, Jones is navigating familial relationships within the context of a larger socio-political history. Performed in Paris, Singapore, Boston, and Macau, each iteration serves as a snapshot of life in a specific place, incorporating references to local culture, customs and architecture as they relate to world events. Featuring Janet Wong’s haunting projections, composer Nick Hallett’s delirious score, and live performance by baritone Matthew Gamble and Hallett, Jones’ cultural critique is rewritten for the time and place of every performance, flashing by each night like a feverish hour of the evening news.

The Making of A Letter to My Nephew
How to weave the events of the present into a reflection on the past? How to honor the struggle of a particular loved one in the context of systemic racial and political violence?

Swirling through vogue balls, hospital rooms, and scenes of forced migration, Bill T. Jones’s latest work is an impressionistic collage that seeks answers to these unwieldy questions. Watch Jones and Associate Artistic Director Janet Wong open up about A Letter to My Nephew.

VIEW VIDEO –Courtesy BAM