New York Notebook

ABT Goes Modern Dance

Returning to City Center for its fall season, American Ballet Theatre digs into its repertoire and pulls out some modern dance gems. To honor Merce Cunningham, they perform his Duets to music by John Cage. They also revive Paul Taylor’s Black Tuesday, an evocative ballet about the Depression (now newly appropriate), and The Garden of Villandry, a ménage à trois by Martha Clarke, Robert Barnett, and Felix Blasca. Tharp’s exhilarating In the Upper Room and her uber-quirky “junk duet” from Known by Heart are on the agenda too. Thrown into the mix are Ratmansky’s lovely Seven Sonatas and a new work by Stuttgart Ballet’s Demis Volpi. If you can’t wait for the NYC season Nov. 8–13, see the company at Bard on Nov. 4.  www.abt.org.

 

 

Move Moves Martha Back to 1963

Richard Move’s uncanny channeling of Martha Graham got even more uncanny last year with his Martha@…The 1963 Interview. It draws from a recorded interview Graham did with dance writer Walter Terry at the 92nd Street Y. Move, who earned a 2001 “25 to Watch” for his Martha@Mother nightclub act, performs this ode to the Martha of 1963 at New York Live Arts (formerly DTW) Nov. 16–19. Graham dancer Katherine Crockett and alum Catherine Cabeen join him, as does Lisa Kron, who impersonates Walter Terry. Isaac Mizrahi leads a post-show talk on Nov. 16, and Lucy Sexton appears pre-show on the 18th.  www.newyorklivearts.org.

 

 

Deep Wonder, Postmodern Style

The witty and whimsical John Jasperse brings his new, full-length Canyon to BAM’s Next Wave Festival. Entranced by how a canyon “has split open from beneath you, as if the earth gasped,” he’s aiming to arrive at a sense of awe—surely by his usual disjointed, sometimes bizarre, route. The collaborative performers include Erin Cornell, who was a wild woman in his Truth, Revised Histories, Wishful Thinking, and Flat Out Lies last year, and composer Hahn Rowe. Nov. 16–19.  www.bam.org.

 

From top: Isadora Loyola and Blaine Hoven in

Duets. Photo by Fabrizio Ferri, Courtesy ABT; Richard Move. Photo by Josef Astor, Courtesy R. Move; John Jasperse (center) in his new Canyon. Photo by Tony Orrico, Courtesy BAM.