Upcoming Shows

Pinch Cabaret #53 | Sat Oct 24, 2026 - 8pm

KW’s monthly variety show, performance laboratory, and community arts party.

Featuring a surprising mix of Bellydance, Storytelling, Ukrainian Folk Music, Performance Art, Burlesque, Zines & who knows what else!

Expect the unexpected with:

• Sandy Pearl is a Waterloo and Toronto-based burlesque performer whose work explores the delicious intersection of sweetness and seduction through playful, character-driven performance. Holding an Honours BFA in Dance, she merges technique with sensuality and humour bringing a refined, flirtatious essence to stages throughout southern Ontario.

• Murád Alizada-Hamidlinski is an Azerbaijani-Canadian PhD candidate, military war crimes historian, former park ranger, hotel manager, butcher, baker, foreman, postman, librarian, archivist, archaeologist, surveyor, (poet and playwright?) who was at some point officially born in XIX century, as a sickly Victorian child. For his Pinch act titled "Painless Parker: A Play in Three Acts", you shall hear poems I have written for characters who are definitely fictional and have no connection to my real life experiences (which in turn crystallized into gripping aesthetic tales, slowly accumulated their own life, and came back to haunt me and exact a bitter revenge).

• Nataliia Zhygaltsova is a Ukrainian culture ambassador with deep roots in community-support in Ukraine and Canada. A peacemaker, passionate about supporting and empowering others, inspiring change through care and music. Her bandura is an instrument that has a voice of its own, and it speaks Ukrainian. At Pinch you’ll hear Ukrainian music, followed by familiar melodies in a new sound transformed by the bandura.

• Sandra Teppo is a Chaldean-Canadian artist and arts administrator whose practice is based in Waawwiaatanong and Kitchener-Waterloo. Using childhood imagery and hyperfeminine aesthetics, Teppo explores the intersection of her identity, femininity, queerness, community, and body. For Teppo's BFA thesis at the University of Waterloo, she created an installation titled "the princess and the pea" inspired by the classic fairy tale. At the centre of said installation was an oversized pea made of yarn. At Pinch Cabaret #53, Teppo will unravel the pea.

• Embers & Honey is a Synchronized Group Improvisation bellydance troupe based in Hamilton, Ontario, that formed in early 2024. This style of bellydance is a fusion form blending Egyptian Bellydance with Flamenco, Classical Indian Dance and North African dance. What makes this dance style unique is that there is no choreography. Instead, dancers read body language to create dance in the moment.

• And a brand new zine by Casper!

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Advance tickets are $5 / $10 / $20 / $30 – you choose the option that’s right for you.

Indigenous community members are welcomed to attend for free.

Enormous thanks to Waterloo Region Community Foundation, Ontario Arts Council, Cities of Kitchener & Waterloo, Region of Waterloo, Uptown Waterloo BIA, and the Registry Theatre for their generous support, allowing for accessible ticket pricing!

VENUE:
We're back at Button Factory Arts (25 Regina St, Waterloo)

Pinch Cabaret thrives on new acts, and that means you!
Email Ben@PinchCabaret.com to submit.
All acts paid $$$!
All experience levels welcome.