Win FREE Tickets for “It’s going to get worse and worse, my friend” @ EMPAC on Friday!

Counter to the childhood rhyme of “Sticks and stones can break my bones, but words will never hurt me,” we know that speech can be a mighty weapon. Throughout the centuries, it has fired up countless masses and mobilized them into action… for better or worse. It has unleashed revolutions and fueled wars. Such is the power of words.

With her dance-performance piece “It’s going to get worse and worse and worse, my friend,” Belgian-based choreographer-dancer Lisbeth Gruwez translates and transforms a recorded speech by ultra-conservative American televangelist Jimmy Swaggart into a disturbing dance form. Her body juggles words, syllables, shouts and stammers, at once horrifying and transfixing. The performance deals less with the direct meanings of words and phrases, and more with the violence that can lie in the rhetorical strategies of someone in a trance-like state.

EMPAC at RPI in Troy hosts a one-night-only performance of Lisbeth Gruwez’s “It’s going to get worse and worse and worse, my friend” at 8pm on Friday (May 10). Tickets are $18; students & seniors $13.

BUT WAIT… there’s more. We’re giving away a pair of FREE TICKETS for the performance to a lucky Nippertown reader! To enter the contest, just post a comment below. Please leave your email address, too. We won’t publish it, but we’ll use it to contact you if you win. Deadline to enter is 12noon on Friday (May 10). The winner will be selected at random and notified on Friday afternoon. Good luck! Congratulations to the winner, who has been notified by email.