The Mark Morris Dance Group performs in its own Brooklyn space. Music often takes Mark Morris in directions I couldn’t have anticipated, as the programs for his company’s season at the Mark Morris Dance Center make clear. Only occasionally does a score’s history enter the picture, and, if it does, it enters with an enigmatic twist. His 2005 Cargo is set to Darius Milhaud’s La Création du … [Read more...]
Come Spring!
The Mark Morris Dance Group performs at BAM. Was it George Balanchine who said he wanted us to see the music and hear the dancing when we were watching his ballets? Maybe he said only the first part of that. Mark Morris, I think, hopes for something similar when we see his choreography—not meaning that we should hear feet hit the floor, but that the dancers carry the music in their bodies, … [Read more...]
For Eyes and Ears
Mark Morris Dance Group. James and Martha Duffy Performance Space, Mark Morris Dance Center, Brooklyn, New York. April 3 through 14. You can’t predict much about a dance by Mark Morris. There’s no doubt that he responds to music and —with love and respect—choreographs that response into what he hears. He acknowledges with great sensitivity a composer’s tempi and structures and atmosphere, … [Read more...]