June-December 2025 ­­– alumni groups return to the U.S. for independent month-long tours: Khumariyaan (Pakistan), Kurbasy (Ukraine), Mohamed Abozekry (Egypt), and Papermoon Puppet Theatre (Indonesia)

Art plays a vital role in opening avenues for connection and dialogue among diverse audiences.  Center Stage centers artists with insights into how we can deepen trust and understanding, renew our sense of community, and build a shared future of peace and prosperity.

For its last planned edition, Center Stage, the landmark cultural exchange program initiated by the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs and produced by New England Foundation for the Arts (NEFA), has invited four alumni ensembles to engage with people around the U.S. on stage, off stage, and online. This public-private partnership is the largest public diplomacy effort to bring foreign artists to American stages in recent history.

Through in-person engagements and virtual interactions, these ensembles will meet with communities across the U.S. via performances, workshops, talk back sessions, artist jams, shared meals, and other activities that bolster mutual understanding. A new digital education component will virtually link the artists with students throughout the 2025 calendar year. 

Tours are being booked now. LBMI (Lisa Booth Management, Inc.), Center Stage’s general manager since the program’s inception in 2012, works with communities to craft and organize the residencies that make up each independent month-long tour. Affordable and accessible, international expenses are largely underwritten; travel, promotion, and logistics from visas to taxes are comprehensively managed by LBMI.

Center Stage offers opportunities to arts presenters and artists intent on strengthening understanding and connections between Americans and creative arts makers from countries and cultures which are not often enough directly represented in the U.S.

Meet the Ensembles 

Khumariyaan (Peshawar, Pakistan)
6-7 on tour: 5 musicians and staff; indoors or out in clubs, amphitheaters, concert halls, and festival stages.
Available June-August 2025

With its propulsive, furious sound, Khumariyaan, "The Intoxicators," has reawakened the live music scene in Peshawar, the ancient crossroads through the Khyber Pass that links Pakistan and Afghanistan. The lute-like Pashto rubab is the meeting point for this transfixing, hyper-folk jam band that intertwines the djembe-like zerbaghali (clay or wooden goblet drum), sehtar (long-necked lute), and searching vocals. Underpinning these instruments with driving acoustic guitars, Khumariyaan’s rolling pulse and richly layered sound builds to frenzied intensity. It’s an addictive and accessible pleasure that has ushered in a new era for an eclipsed music.

Kurbasy (Lviv, Ukraine)
Songs of the Forest
9 on tour; 6 performers; concert halls and theaters with excellent acoustics and with projection capability
Available September-November, 2025

An affirmation in a time of violence and resistance, Kurbasy’s urgent, time bending Songs of the Ukrainian Forest vibrates in tight vocal harmonies, distinctive, textural instrumentation, and phantasmagoric visual imagery, channeling contemporary connections to an archaic past. This song cycle was conceived by Kurbasy’s founders and friends of 24 years, actor-vocalists Natalia Rybka-Parkhomenko and Maria Oneshchak, in a time of pandemic lockdown and then national invasion. The duo is performing the work at home and abroad as a polyphonic vocal piece while building the larger instrumental frame that will surround it on tour to the U.S. in 2025.

Mohamed Abozekry Sextet (Cairo, Egypt)
8 on tour: 6 musicians, 2 staff; clubs, recital halls, black box and site-specific listening rooms
Available September-October 2025

Virtuoso oudist, composer and singer Mohamed Abozekry returns with Roh el Fouad (The Heart’s Soul), his latest exploration of intrinsically improvisational Egyptian music. Diving into the boundless world around him, he leads a cross-continental sextet that fuses oud, bass, drums, keyboard, Egyptian percussion, saxophone, and vocals in tightly crafted tracks that swing, bop, and roll.

Papermoon Puppet Theatre (Yogyakarta, Indonesia)
Puno: Letters to the Sky (50 minutes, non-verbal mixed media puppetry) 
12 on tour: cast and crew of 10; proscenium or black box spaces 100-500 seats
Recommended for children ages 7 and adults
Available September 1-October 15, 2025

How do we experience loss and hold onto what is precious? Words may fail us. Puno: Letters from the Sky is the story of Tala, a young girl who is coping with her father’s passing and learning about life and death. With its universal touchstones, Puno and Tala’s story of separation and grief joins every human being in a shared space of love, longing, and memory in this beautifully rendered non-verbal work for children young and old, and their families.

Transcending Borders

Journalists from the ensemble’s home countries will be embedded in the U.S. with each group to share their experiences at home through traditional and social media, deepening the reach and impact of each tour.

U.S. Embassies in Cairo, Jakarta, Islamabad, and Kyiv will support, extend, and amplify these vital conversations and connections. As Secretary of State Antony Blinken said, "Cultural exchanges are a powerful way for people to connect across borders and for countries to build respect for each other."

World Culture in Context

A package of virtual educational materials about each ensemble, tailored to students in upper elementary through high school, will provide a better understanding of the context in which these artists thrive. Produced and distributed by the Center for Cultural Vibrancy (CCV), World Culture in Context digital packages will expand reach in host communities and non-tour sites with virtual class visits.

About Center Stage

Center Stage is among the most successful programs to bring contemporary international performing artists into direct contact with people across a wide range of U.S. communities, and to share these experiences globally.

As hosted by colleges and universities, festivals, music clubs, cultural centers, and artist-run organizations, Center Stage artists engage with audiences on stage, off stage, and online, sharing their work in the U.S. and with friends and fans at home to build mutual understanding through shared cultures and values.

Since 2012, Center Stage has hosted 308 artists, arts managers and staff in 47 ensembles from 17 nations. Hundreds of communities in 37 U.S. states and Washington, DC have hosted engagements. Sixteen journalists from participating countries have traveled to report on these tours. Hundreds of thousands of people have attended live performances and participated in activities like jam sessions, panel discussions, and potluck dinners. Many more connect digitally via social media, livestreamed events, and on-demand digital content.

Center Stage’s significant impacts, and the relationships it fosters, serves professional artists, journalists and other cultural leaders, participating embassies and their in-country constituents, and American audiences, students, professionals, and community members.

Center Stage is an initiative of the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs with funding provided by the U.S. Government. It is administered by the New England Foundation for the Arts in cooperation with the U.S. Regional Arts Organizations. General management is provided by Lisa Booth Management, Inc. 

Keep up with Center Stage and find additional information at centerstageUS.org, on Facebook and  Instagram.

Join Center Stage! 

Presenters, community organizations, and venues interested in partnering with Center Stage can find detailed information at www.centerstageUS.org. 

Contact Deirdre Valente at LBMI (Lisa Booth Management, Inc). Tel +1-646-271-8765 artslbmi@msn.com