by Sedgwick Clark
The music of Edgard Varèse (1883-1965) has a singular voice—harsh, aggressive, dissonant, dynamic, often witty, uncompromising—the very embodiment of a city rising. For once, the nearly always misused word “unique” applies to a composer’s sound; despite his early influences—most obviously Stravinsky and, here and there, Ives—there is absolutely no possibility of mistaking Varèse’s [...]
By Cathy Barbash
“Front of House” critics have been raving about Zaha Hadid’s recently opened Guangzhou Opera House. However, this just in from backstage:
Yes, the space is amazing, but they made a major flaw in the electricity design: the smaller theater electricity can only be used if the large theater is also in use, therefore, if [...]
Aside from a few intrepid pioneers who independently gravitated toward technology (Loïe Fuller, Alwin Nikolais, Yvonne Rainer), dancers have historically stuck to dancing. The hi-tech aspects of their productions they have outsourced to others.
But times are changing.
The carefully constructed division between dance making and dance production is going the way of the typewriter. Anyone with [...]
by Sedgwick Clark
It’s time to say “no” to water bottles on the concert stage.
When did this unseemly swig become acceptable? It was said that Franco Corelli would wander offstage for refreshment between arias. (I do remember him unaccountably disappearing mid-scene a couple of times in the Met’s Macbeth 38 years ago, the only time I [...]
By Rachel Straus
When Bill T. Jones’s narrator began referring to President Obama in the same breath as Abraham Lincoln, I knew that Fondly Do We Hope, Fervently Do We Pray wasn’t going to be low on didactics. Jones is a preacher choreographer. His work about Abraham Lincoln has an agenda. It’s large scale and in [...]
by Sedgwick Clark
Last night as we girded our loins for the murder, rape, and mayhem report on the 11 p.m. news, and I impatiently awaited inspiration for the weekly and almost inevitably tardy words that absorb you now, Central Park reverberated with what sounded like World War Three. We were surprised because we had expected [...]
by Cathy Barbash
I recently caught up with Sonia Kolesnikov-Jessop’s excellent NYTimes article, “China’s Offering New Culture Venue to Its Citizens.” While one correction was made re: the Nederlander’s corporate structure, there is another China-side correction necessary, should the Times choose to make it.
The article states that the Beijing Music Festival is managed by The China [...]
by Rachel Straus
In the summer of 1976 my creative movement teacher took out a mat, asked us to tuck our chins into our chests, and do a somersault. I was horrified. I refused. This, my six-year-old self counseled, was not dance. I had developed this philosophy while prancing through the house in a torn tutu [...]
by Cathy Barbash
Ping Chong’s Cathay: Three Tales of China will finally premiere in China in late October 2010. Almost five years ago, the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts’ month-long Festival of China commissioned Ping Chong to set a new work on the Shaanxi Folk Art Theatre’s puppetry troupe. Ping Chong worked with the company [...]
by Sedgwick Clark
Friday night I’ll be dog sledding with Sergeant Preston of the Yukon!
Gawd, does that date me. How many of my loyal readers have the vaguest notion of what I speak? The title music for this mid-’50s TV show was the Overture to Donna Diana by Emil Nikolaus von Rezniček. True, the Sarge couldn’t [...]
