Dance at Great Velocity
This mixed repertory program showcases three works that blend energy, innovation, and intricate movement. Wayne McGregor’s Chroma fuses classical technique with modern fluidity, set to an eclectic score by Joby Talbot and The White Stripes. Christopher Wheeldon’s DGV: Danse à Grande Vitesse captures speed and power with relentless motion, set to Michael Nyman’s minimalist score. Twyla Tharp’s In The Upper Room demands raw energy and precision from dancers, paired with Philip Glass’s iconic music to create a transcendent experience.
Performances By Date
A popular favorite with audiences and critics, Chroma is a classic of contemporary ballet. Chroma explores the drama of the human body and its ability to communicate extremes of thought and emotion. The score, drawn from original music by Joby Talbot and his arrangements of music by The White Stripes, is combined with stark, minimalist designs by architect John Pawson. Against this backdrop is set the inventive and energy-driven choreography of Wayne McGregor.
Sir Wayne McGregor CBE is a multi-award-winning British choreographer and director. He is Artistic Director of Studio Wayne McGregor, encompassing creative collaborations in dance, film, music, visual art, technology and science; a touring company of dancers Company Wayne McGregor; and learning and research programmes. McGregor is also Resident Choreographer at The Royal Ballet, Director of Dance for the Venice Biennale, and is regularly commissioned by, and has works in the repertories of the most important dance companies around the world. In 2022 McGregor choreographed ABBA Voyage, the revolutionary concert that launched the Swedish pop sensations back onstage in an outstanding avatar performance.
Joby Talbot is a British composer who is both prolific and versatile. He has written for just about every musical genre, including choral, opera, film, and rock. In dance Talbot has collaborated mostly with British choreographers Wayne McGregor and Christopher Wheeldon. Talbot has composed an astonishing four full-length ballets, including Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (2011), A Winter’s Tale (2014), Like Water for Chocolate (2022) and Oscar (2024). Chroma (2006) was Talbot’s first big success in dance. It is a combination of original work by the composer as well as three arrangements of music by the band, The White Stripes.
The White Stripes were a Grammy-award winning duo formed in Detroit in 1997 by Jack White and Meg White. The group was known for a deliberately minimal musical approach, combining elements of blues, garage rock, and punk with a limited instrumental lineup. Their visual identity consistently featured a red, white, and black color scheme, which became closely associated with their public image and album artwork.
Set to a supercharged and minimalist score by Michael Nyman, Christopher Wheeldon’s DGV: Danse à Grande Vitesse propels 26 dancers through surging, relentless movement. Featuring four central couples, this ballet evokes a sense of momentum and progress, capturing the thrill and energy of travel through the five “regions” of Nyman’s score, originally commissioned for the inauguration of France’s high-speed train, the TGV.
Christopher Wheeldon, OBE trained at The Royal Ballet School and joined The Royal Ballet in 1991. In 1993, he joined New York City Ballet and was promoted to Soloist in 1998. He was named NYCB’s first Resident Choreographer in July 2001. Since then, Mr. Wheeldon has created and staged productions for the world’s major ballet companies.
Mr. Wheeldon is Artistic Associate of The Royal Ballet where he has created many works including Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and The Winter’s Tale, both of which were co-productions with The National Ballet of Canada. He has also choreographed for the Metropolitan Opera, created ballet sequences for the feature film Center Stage (2000) and Sweet Smell of Success on Broadway (2002), created a special excerpt for the Closing Ceremony of the London 2012 Olympics and was the Artistic Director for Les Arts Decoratif’s Fashion Forward exhibit in Paris (2016).
His many other awards include an Outer Critics Award for Best Choreography and Direction, the Martin E. Segal Award from Lincoln Center, the American Choreography Award, the Dance Magazine Award, multiple London Critics’ Circle Awards, the Leonard Massine Prize, the Benois de la Danse and an Olivier Award. In 2016, Mr. Wheeldon was named an Order of the British Empire (OBE) and was made an Honorary Fellow of American Academy of Arts and Sciences
Michael Nyman is a British composer, pianist, librettist, writer, musicologist, photographer and filmmaker whose work encompasses opera, concert music and film soundtracks of which The Draughtsman’s Contract and The Piano are the best-known. Since founding the touring Michael Nyman Band in 1977, he has worked with leading film directors and has collaborated with artists such as Mary Kelly, Damon Albarn, Carsten Nicolai and the Oscar-winning Man on Wire star Phillippe Petit. Recent work includes several contributions to a planned series of nineteen symphonies. Nyman’s music is available via an extensive range of recordings on his own label, MN Records.
Twyla Tharp commissioned composer Philip Glass to create a new score. “The music hints at things, but I tried to leave a lot of space for the dance to happen,” states Glass, “In that way the dancers complete it, fill it in.” Tharp’s choreography fuses a broad spectrum of movement into one vigorous vocabulary; boxing, tap dance, yoga, ballet, and full-out sprinting are intertwined. The dancers must push through the difficult steps, intricate timing, and aerobic demands of the choreography.
In The Upper Room synthesizes choreography, costumes, music, and lighting into a transcendent experience for both audience and performers. The dancers appear and disappear through fog and lights, and the costumes by Norma Kamali begin as black and white striped jumpsuits. As the piece progresses, the dancers shed layers of clothing, revealing bright red under-layers and sweaty skin.
Since graduating from Barnard College in 1963, Ms. Tharp has choreographed more than one hundred sixty works: one hundred twenty-nine dances, twelve television specials, six Hollywood movies, four full-length ballets, four Broadway shows and two figure skating routines. She received one Tony Award, two Emmy Awards, nineteen honorary doctorates, the Vietnam Veterans of America President’s Award, the 2004 National Medal of the Arts, the 2008 Jerome Robbins Prize, and a 2008 Kennedy Center Honor. Her many grants include the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Fellowship. She is a member of the American Philosophical Society, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and an Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters.
In 1965, Ms. Tharp founded her dance company, Twyla Tharp Dance. Her dances are known for creativity, wit and technical precision coupled with a streetwise nonchalance. By combining different forms of movement – such as jazz, ballet, boxing and inventions of her own making – Ms. Tharp’s work expands the boundaries of ballet and modern dance.
In 1992, Ms. Tharp published her autobiography PUSH COMES TO SHOVE. She went on to write THE CREATIVE HABIT: Learn it and Use it for Life, followed by THE COLLABORATIVE HABIT: Life Lessons for Working Together. In 2019, her fourth book was published, Keep It Moving: Lessons for the Rest of Your Life.
Today, Ms. Tharp continues to create.
Philip Glass was born in Baltimore, the son of Lithuanian-Jewish refugees. Glass’s father owned a record store and one of his uncles was none other than Al Jolson. At fifteen years old, Glass enrolled at the University of Chicago where he majored in math and philosophy, after which he attended Juilliard to study piano and composition. Although Glass experimented with several styles, the turning point came while he was a student of Nadia Boulanger in Paris: Ravi Shankar hired Glass to transcribe his music so that it could be performed by Western musicians. Inspired by not only the additive nature of Shankar’s work but also by Eastern philosophies, Glass went on to develop a Minimalist style of composition. His voracious curiosity about all music makes him one of the most wide-reaching composers of all time. Glass’s collaborators include Laurie Anderson, David Bowie, and Foday Musa Suso, to name just a few. Glass has written extensively for film, concerts, opera, and theater. His work has inspired countless choreographers, including Lucinda Childs, Twyla Tharp, and Jerome Robbins.
– Beatrice Jona Affron