The National Arts Centre (NAC) raised its curtains for the first time in 1969, to become Canada’s foremost showcase for the performing arts. Today, the NAC works with thousands of artists, both emerging and established, from across Canada and around the world, and collaborates with dozens of other arts organizations across the country. The NAC is strongly committed to being a leader and innovator in each of the performing arts fields in which it works – classical music, English theatre, French theatre, dance, variety, and community programming. It is at the forefront of youth and educational activities, supporting programmes for young and emerging artists and programmes for young audiences, and producing resources and study materials for teachers. It is the only multidisciplinary, bilingual performing arts centre in North America, and one of the largest in the world. 

This is an amazing time for the arts in Canada’s cultural history … a time when people in every country in the world are discovering Canada through the voices of its artists.  

All of us at the National Arts Centre (NAC) are proud of the extraordinary successes being achieved by our artists in music, comedy, theatre and dance as well as literature, and we’re privileged to be playing a critical role in nurturing and sustaining our artists in communities all across the country. In addition, Canada has become a key destination for talented performers from around the world.
 
The NAC’s mandate is unique in that it features such a wide range of performing arts disciplines. It embraces the culture of Canada's two official languages, English and French. And, most importantly, it serves as a catalyst for the performing arts nationally.  

The NAC has had the good fortune (and foresight) to recruit arguably one of the best artistic leadership teams in North America – Maestro Pinchas Zukerman, Peter Hinton, Denis Marleau, Cathy Levy and Michel Dozois – all of whom have had an amazing impact across the country… and around the world. Under their leadership, the NAC is enjoying one of its most innovative periods ever in music, theatre and dance. In addition to creating superb program seasons for NAC audiences, each of our artistic leaders has the vision to be able to create those “magical” artistic moments that patrons remember and talk about for years to come. 

Moments such as Pinchas Zukerman in concert with acclaimed cellist Yo-Yo Ma; or Dance producer Cathy Levy’s major coup last year bringing international superstar Pina Bausch and her groundbreaking dance company, Tanztheater Wuppertal, to Canada for its only Canadian appearance in almost 20 years; English Theatre’s exquisite and intimate production of Trying, an award-winning play by Canadian playwright Joanna Glass or John Mighton’s powerful and evocative new play, Half Life; Denis Marleau’s innovative productions like Les sept doigts de la main and the equally stunning Les Aveugles; and back by popular demand, the NAC’s Fourth Stage presentation of 5 Shades of Geggie, an improvisational jazz series featuring renowned double bass player, John Geggie. 

While presenting world-renowned talent on the NAC’s four stages is a significant aspect of our work, so too is promoting and encouraging support for Canadian artists at home and abroad. In so many cases, it’s not a hard sell.Already, in many parts of the world audiences line up for blocks to buy tickets to an Angela Hewitt piano recital, to attend a Pinchas Zukerman performance with the National Arts Centre Orchestra… or to hear a Céline Dion, Joni Mitchell or Oscar Peterson concert.  

In theatre, the cutting edge Quebec director Robert Lepage regularly stages new shows around the globe. Cirque du Soleil created a new theatrical art form by completely reworking our ideas about circus, to the point where the company not presents multi-media shows when in Las Vegas, Disney World or the Far East.– not bad for a company that started out performing acrobatics in communities across Quebec and Ontario.  
Over the past few years, the NAC’s Denis Marleau has opened new productions to rave reviews at both the Avignon Festival in France… and the Edinburgh Festival in Scotland; singer Louise Pitre generated the same kind of notices in her smash Broadway hit, Mamma Mia; Luc Plamondon’s stylish productions of Notre-Dame-de-Paris and Roméo et Juliette were big hits in Montreal and Paris; while Ottawa’s Pierre Brault wowed audiences in nine cities across Ireland with his one-man show two years ago. 

Canadians have realized wonderful success stories across all artistic disciplines, from music to theatre to dance, and more – and the NAC has been there as a national cornerstone for the arts in Canada. 
 
The NAC is tremendously excited by what’s been happening here over the past few years… yet we believe that the best is still to come. We encourage you to come and be part of this wonderful artistic adventure.