Walken Schweigert is an award-winning actor, musician, composer, writer and director from St. Paul, MN. His vibrant, multi-dimensional work has been formed by unique training experiences including touring with internationally renowned Double Edge Theatre, busking on the street in over 11 countries, and floating down the Mississippi River on a raft with a handful of other clowns.
A Jerome Foundation Fellow, Schweigert is the founder and artistic director of Open Flame Theatre, an all queer/trans ensemble creating surrealist & trans-centered theatre on the occupied Dakota, Ho Chunk and Anishinaabe territories also known as Minnesota and Philadelphia Community Farm.
A Bard of the Night and a weaver of tales, Schweigert has spent years curating a pedagogy that informs the spiritual, psychosomatic, emotional and physical experience of the queer/trans body. Schweigert is available to local, national and international artists, performers, ensembles and theatre companies as a commissioned performer & director, composer and writer.
”Schweigert’s work engages struggles and traumas faced by queer and trans people and places those stories into a symbolic and spiritual landscape.”
- Sun Yung Shin, American Composers Forum
“activity is amplified by the virtuosic music and sounds created by Schweigert, who plays a saw, a guitar, a violin and possibly a hurdy-gurdy, in addition to underscoring scenes with his powerful, keening voice.”
-Chris Hewitt, Star Tribune
“The music from the violin continued. Its dirgelike melody, now deep within me, stirred me to desperate concern, and captivated me beyond my ability to break my attention.”
— John Gajdos
