Soul Food: Merce Cunningham Dance Company

Cash has been tight due to my slothly state of being, but Saturday night I gave myself a big treat and went to see the Merce Cunningham Dance Company show at the NAC. It was excellent. I completely enjoyed it and it took me back strongly to the past phase of my life when it revolved around dance. I'll write about that later.

The show was really great. Merce Cunningham is one of the godfathers of modern dance in the 20th century. He was a staple in our dance history classes in uni. He danced in Martha Graham's legendary company from 1937 to 1945. He left her and in 1953 started his own company. He must be at least 86 years old, and he's still choreographing (this entire show), though his health wasn't good enough to travel to Ottawa for this show. The company hasn't been here for over 20 years, so I felt really lucky to catch this show.

I thoroughly enjoyed it, and was riveted the entire time. I don't know if it was my fresh eyes (haven't seen a dance show for so long) or if he is truly genious, but I was blown away by the show. (I think it was definitely a combination of both). He directed bodies into shapes and patterns that made me gasp out loud - shapes that echoed each other, but were inside-out versions of each other - so simple, but a feast for my eyes (to be cliche about it).

Check out this article about the show.

I have neglected this area of my life for the past five years, (five! my goodness.) with travelling, living in Nfld (broke), and then living here in Ottawa (see other post). It is a mistake I will try not to make again. I do need it, for my soul. There is nothing like the moment when the lights go down, the red curtain is lit, there is a hush, and then the curtain raises and there is a whole new world in front of you - filled with expectation and energy, waiting for you to jump into it - and then the first note of music sounds. I love that holding-your-breath moment.

I felt this show in my cells. I could feel the movements of the dancers in my body - the stretch and linger of an extension, the release of breath in a contraction. I could feel bodies expanding into space away from their own centre, the suspension of an arc, the bones of the metatarsal moving individually into a pointed foot, the collapse into gravity. They caught my breath. My eyes were drinking shapes and eating patterns, I gasped when they surprised me with randomness.

Mr. Cunningham has a fondness for unitards, which is kind of old-school, and I'm not usually a fan. But in this case they were effective. The costumes didn't distract from his genious composition, and turned each individual dancer into simply a body on which he (and they) could create shapes and movement. It was very pure, and I liked it very much.

For the third piece of the evening Mr. Cunningham asked Radiohead and Sigur Ros to compose pieces of music for the dance, without having seen the movement. On stage, dice are rolled five times to determine which piece will be danced to which music, which background, which lighting plot, and which costumes. This means that the dance will be a completely different aesthetic experience every night. Very interesting.

Anyways, I'm tired of writing. It was awesome.