Twyla Tharp presents one new creation and two golden oldies at the Joyce. Watching Reed Tankersley perform the long opening solo in Twyla Tharp’s 1980 Brahms Paganini confirmed my sense that Tharp considers dancers as heroes. In this work, which closes the program at the Joyce Theater billed as “Twyla Tharp and Three Dances,” Tankersley, alone onstage, performs Book I (a theme and fourteen … [Read more...]
So, Ludwig. . .
Ludwig van Beethoven must have had more stamina than he’s usually credited with. If you research his Fantasy in C Minor for Piano, Orchestra, and Chorus, Op. 80, you find that its first public performance in 1808 ended a program that lasted four hours and included among its nine items the premieres of Beethoven’s Fifth and Sixth symphonies (conducted by the 38-year-old composer), his Fourth Piano … [Read more...]