Nora Chipaumire’s Miriam is a deeply personal dance-theatre performance that looks closely at the tensions women face between public expectations and private desires; between selflessness and ambition; and between the perfection and sacrifice of the feminine ideal.

Join Chipaumire along with Sheri Parks, UMD American Studies professor; Fatemeh Keshavarz, The Roshan Institute for Persian Studies; and Sarah Browning, director of DC Poets Against the War and Split This Rock.

The 30th anniversary production of this adjudicated showcase — a joint project of the Center and the Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission — celebrates the diverse talents of a new generation.

One patron summed up her experience with the showcase this way: “I didn’t know what to expect and was completely overwhelmed by the complexity, diversity and beauty of each and every dance performance.”

This year’s program includes four solo works:

Pianist Eliza Garth celebrates the John Cage centennial with a performance of Cage’s masterpiece for prepared piano, Sonatas and Interludes. 

Described by the writer James Pritchett as “a big piece with a quiet voice,” Sonatas and Interludes is meditative in its esthetic; the “preparation” of the piano transforms its sound into an ensemble of gongs, chimes, and magical effects.

Although Cage did not invent the instrument he named the “prepared piano,” he was a major force behind its development and is often associated with it.

Branford Marsalis and his quartet will perform an evening of music in conjunction with the opening of a new exhibit at the David C. Driskell Center, highlighting African American artists inspired by jazz.

A man of numerous musical interests — including jazz, blues, funk and modern classical works — Marsalis first gained acclaim through his work with Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers and his brother Wynton’s quintet before forming his own ensemble.

Choreographer Bill T. Jones and SITI Company’s Anne Bogart have always loved each other’s work, but they had never collaborated until this year, when they brought their formidable creative forces together to create this new piece.

In A Rite, these groundbreaking artists have deconstructed the original score of Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring to create a provocative meditation on the power of singular new works of art to alter the way we think.