Eleven people who
refused safer jobs.
The Velvet & Sawdust troupe is eight performers, three musicians, two stage hands, one director, and a single old retriever called Posy who watches every show from the wings.
Mira Halpern
Aerial silk, trapeze“I learned my first drop falling.”
Brooklyn → Kyiv
Tomé Castelo
Hand-balancing, chair stack“Balance is just a slow falling.”
Lisbon
Nadège Olive
Mentalism, sleight of hand“Trust me, then catch me lying.”
Marseille
Ezra Ng
Tightwire, slack rope“The wire is a quiet teacher.”
Singapore
Saoirse Boyle
Cyr wheel, contortion“Spin until the room agrees.”
Galway
Yusuf Demir
Ringmaster, narrator“Stories rehearse you for love.”
Istanbul
Beatrix Lin
String quartet, lead violin“I score what the eye misses.”
Vancouver
Kasimir Vega
Fire, knife throw“I have never missed. Yet.”
Mexico City“We rehearse twice a week in a yoga studio in Red Hook. We argue about act order on long bus rides. We are not a family — we are eleven people who happen to keep choosing the same odd profession.”
How we got here.
Three roommates and a tarp.
Anya Demidova, Beatrix Lin and Yusuf Demir staged the first Velvet & Sawdust under a hand-stitched tarp behind a bowling alley in Red Hook. 22 people came. Half were friends. None of them paid.
Mira Halpern joins. The silks arrive.
A residency at the Brooklyn Music School lets us rig from a real beam for the first time. Mira pitches the Sawdust Hymn act in the parking lot. We open the next season with it.
First international tour.
Eight cities, three months, two visa scares. The Cedar Sessions debuts in Lisbon and the show finally finds its present shape: 90 minutes, no interval, a string quartet that argues with the rigging.
A permanent room of our own.
We sign a long lease at the Old Foundry on Pier 4. The current Cedar Sessions run is the first programme written for that specific room — and you can tell.
Auditions, internships, press.
We hold open performer auditions twice a year. Internships in lighting, sound, and stage management run alongside the season. Press inquiries respond within 48 hours.
Get in touch