Photo by Hibbard Nash
Tuesday September 13th, 2016 - This evening at the Martha Graham studios on Bethune Street, an intimate rehearsal showing of DARK MEADOW SUITE, part of the GrahamDeconstructed series, inaugurated a new season for the Graham Company. This studio series offers valuable insights into Graham's work, and provides an opportunity to experience the incredible Graham dancers at close range.
Graham's DARK MEADOW premiered in 1946. It is set to a score by which Martha Graham had originally commissioned for her planned ballet MEDEA. When the composer began to miss deadlines, Graham took the opportunity to re-assign the MEDEA scenario to Samuel Barber (resulting in CAVE OF THE HEART). Carlos Chávez finally submitted a completed score, and Graham created DARK MEADOW to it. As it turns out, this game of musical chairs was all to the good.
From its first performance, DARK MEADOW was controversial. Some considered it minor-league Graham while others viewed it as one of her masterpieces. As of tonight, I stand emphatically with the latter group.
In its original form, DARK MEADOW was fifty minutes long, making it impractical for programming on tours. Wanting to give audiences today the opportunity to experience this Graham masterwork, the Company's artistic director Janet Eilber arranged the current DARK MEADOW SUITE. In July 2014, part of DARK MEADOW was presented in an evening marking the end of that year's Graham Summer Intensive; tonight in a rehearsal setting we saw the SUITE, and it makes a vivid impression.
Ms. Eilber opened the evening by asking the dancers to show two brief excerpts from DARK MEADOW, danced without music: a women's quintet and a men's trio (known as the Fetish dance). These excerpts displayed movement motifs that are seen meaningfully in the ballet.
Above: Stuart Hodes and Janet Eilber; photo by Brigid Pierce
Former Graham dancer Stuart Hodes then joined Ms. Eilber for a chat. Mr. Hodes told some charming tales about the history of DARK MEADOW and of working with Martha Graham. He explained the use of the term fetish in the ballet's context: "an inanimate object worshiped for its supposed magical powers or because it is considered to be inhabited by a spirit". Each of the men in DARK MEADOW carry such an amulet.
Mr. Hodes agreed with what Senator Dale Bumpers once said of DARK MEADOW: "It's about sex." In the original staging of the ballet, large phallic set pieces by Isamu Noguchi appear in meadow of Até, who is the Greek goddess of mischief, delusion, ruin, and folly; it is here that a young woman, She Who Seeks, finds her sexual awakening in a youthful demi-god, He Who Summons. During a passage from the ballet called 'The Ecstasy of the Flowering Branch', one of the set pieces sprouts leaves, rather a counter-poise to the Pope's staff blossoming at the end of Wagner's TANNHAUSER. In the opera, this miracle is a sign of God's forgiveness; in DARK MEADOW, it takes on a very different meaning.
The space was then cleared and DARK MEADOW SUITE was presented on a bare stage, the dancers in practice clothes. It is a sumptuously powerful work, mythic, sexy, and lyrical by turns. Iconic Graham motifs of movement and gesture are stunning to behold, leaving us once again in awe of the choreographer's musicality, her surety of structure, and the imparted sense of drama resonating throughout the work.
The women - Laurel Dalley Smith, Charlotte Landreau, Leslie Andrea Williams, Anne Souder, and Konstantina Xintara - form a deliciously beautiful chorus, performing their stylized movements with clarity and a feeling of sisterhood. They form demi-units, doing different things at the same time: it's ultra-Graham at its most fascinating.
The resonant song of the cello signals the appearance of Anne O'Donnell as She Who Seeks. Ms. O'Donnell's entire body is expressive, her arms and hands shaping a deeply feminine response to the music, her lovely gaze questing the space. Lorenzo Pagano, as He Who Summons, brings an ideal face and form to his role: half poet, half athlete, showing just the right subtle touch of arrogance. The duet of the couple unfolds with complete naturalness as the music grows increasingly tender.
A procession arrives; the men - Lloyd Mayor, Ari Mayzick, and Tim Delporte - being circled by the women's chorus. Four couples dance the Sarabande (to which Mr. Hodes had alluded), a marvelous interlude of intimate partnering. The men, on the floor, support the standing women as they lean forward, arm extended, in a motif that has a contemporary echo in Wheeldon's AFTER THE RAIN. With each couple standing back-to-back, the women lace their arms across the men's chests and hang in gentle suspension. The music takes on an almost Baroque aspect. Everyone trembles in the after-glow.
The men's trio erupts, with demanding jumps in place and spirited allegro work: Lloyd, Ari, and Tim dancing like the young gods they are. The women enter on a diagonal; Ms. O'Donnell's brief solo evolves into a dance for the chorus (both men and women) that becomes energetic. The principal couple join in what feels like a finale, with a big musical build-up and climactic pose. But the music subsides in a lulling coda, and the ballet ends almost on a question mark.
The excellence of the dancing made the strongest possible case for this re-born masterpiece; kudos to Ms. Eilber and her vision of keeping DARK MEADOW a place of mystery and allure: thanks to her, the ballet will hold a vital place in the current repertory.
Photos by Brigid Pierce from this studio showing:
Lorenzo Pagano
Dancers from the chorus
From the Sarabande
Anne O'Donnell & Lorenzo Pagano
As the applause rolled on, Ms. Eilber asked the dancers to introduce themselves and mention where they're from: fantastic international response...wishing Ying and Abdiel had been there to represent China and the Côte d’Ivoire!
Loved running into Tadej Brdnik, Denise Vale, and Blakeley White-McGuire, and meeting photographer Brigid Pierce. And many thanks, yet again, to the publicist Janet Stapleton.
I will add a note that the Graham space on Bethune Street continues to evolve: a roof-top court has now been created, looking out on the Hudson River and a gorgeous New York sunset.
A wonderful evening, in every regard.