Jazz Life

There is dance that amplifies music, and there is music designed to amplify dance. With Mark Morris, the dance is the music. Watching Mark Morris Dance Group perform is like looking at the measures of a score, each dancer representing a note. The company celebrates its 45^th anniversary over two weeks, with two programs of lush and witty chamber works, including two highly anticipated premieres, all with live music.

Performance

Mark Morris Dance Group: Program A

Place

The Joyce Theater, New York, NY, July 15, 2025

Words

Karen Hildebrand

Mark Morris Dance Group in “You've Got to be Modernistic.” Photograph by Danica Paulos

It's a treat to see these very human scaled works performed in the intimate space of the Joyce. A sense of whimsy belies the deep technical mastery of Morris’ work. In this selection, he gives crisp ballet steps a peppery effervescence and taut phrasing to keep stride with the music’s quick pace. A cheeky “The Muir” (2010) opens Program A with three men and three women dancing to Irish and Scottish Folk songs arranged by Beethoven. Live vocalists and a trio of violin, cello and piano perform a libretto that regales the follies of courtship. (You can get the drift from the titles: “Cease Your Funning”; “Sally in Our Alley”; “What Shall I do to Shew How Much I Love Her?”; “The Lovely Lass of Inverness.”) Quirky gestures pop up throughout: a dancer pauses with arms overhead, fingers bent into a painful claw; a modest lift leaves a woman’s feet fluttering in the air like beating wings of a moth. In one section, a man waves his hand and the gesture lands as a caress on the cheeks of three women who square off at a distance. The dancers repeatedly tuck a bent elbow behind their backs as if hiding something. More than once, Mica Bernas exits the stage in quick steps that exactly match a musical trill. During a striking trio, the men hop with arms outstretched in an ecstatic manner, chin up, head tipped back. Kneeling in a line, they topple over, one after the other.

Mark Morris Dance Group in “The Muir.” Photograph by Danica Paulos

The premiere of “You’ve Got to Be Modernistic,” takes a leap in time to the Jazz Age of the 1920s with ragtime music of James P. Johnson, arranged with characteristic musical sophistication by Ethan Iverson, a long time Morris collaborator. Featuring an ensemble of three women and four men, it begins with dancers slinging flapper-like long strands of beads around their necks. There’s some congratulatory fist waving. Courtney Lopes trots downstage, slapping her hips. A couple faces each other in a closed partner dance position, with stiff torsos and one arm held straight along the side—a stillness that floats above the buoyant back and forth of their footwork.

The Charleston influence is evident, and Morris develops that theme into surprising patterns and gestures. Into the mix of shoulder shimmies, knee crosses, and jazz hands, he throws cartwheels, lots of them. Dancers squat on one knee and pound a fist on the other; they hitch up one twitching shoulder. In a fabulous section, dancers cartwheel, while others stand in place and swirl their hips.

Elizabeth Kurtzman dresses the cast in shiny wide leg pants that emphasize swinging legs. The vibe reflects the giddy sentiment of the period following WWI that led to the stock market crash of 1929. It was also the time of Prohibition, which gave rise to the speakeasy environment and bootleg alcohol. A recurring move of raising an imaginary spyglass to the eye suggests a need to look for a stable landing.

Mark Morris Dance Group in “Mosaic and United.” Photograph by Danica Paulos

After intermission Aaron Loux and Christina Sahaida share a single set of pyjamas in “Silhouettes” (1999), she the top, he the bottoms. Like the pjs, the two as partners are split, dancing alongside each other but never quite coming together. A constricted wrapping of the arms pretzel like around the head and one shoulder counters springy legwork. Loux spirals a loopy wiggle from his ankles all the way up to his eyes in a fluid wave. The music is comprised of five short pieces for piano, played live by Colin Fowler, which Morris brings to life with precise little balletic hops, skips, and turns. In the fourth, a minor chord is introduced which shifts the tone emotionally. Here, a section of movement phrases repeated from earlier seems completely different. The piece ends with the dancers collapsing and going back to sleep, as if the dance has all taken place inside a cartoon bubble of dream over their heads.

The finale of “Mosaic and United,” a tour de force from 1993 costumed by Isaac Mizrahi, feels one number too many. I understand the inclination to end the evening with gravitas, but I felt let down after the joyous high point of “You’ve Got to Be Modernistic.” Comprised of two separate music works performed by a string quartet, “Mosaic” has a driving energy, and “United,” is eerily haunting. An Egyptian motif recurs in angular elbows and flexed wrists, as well as a folk dance grapevine featuring high stepping, hands behind the back, dancers in lines that cross in and out. There’s an occasional funny tap on the top of the head. Repeatedly, the dancers lie on the floor, their bodies vibrating like violin strings. Joslin Vezeau is full starch to the softer men in this piece. Karlie Budge and Dallas McMurray draw my eye whenever they’re onstage.

Overall, this program underscores the enduring nature of Morris’ virtuosity—demonstrating the value of supporting an artist and their collaborators over a creative lifetime, a model currently as precarious as the Roaring Twenties.

Karen Hildebrand

Karen Hildebrand is former editorial director for Dance Magazine and served as editor in chief for Dance Teacher for a decade. An advocate for dance education, she was honored with the Dance Teacher Award in 2020. She follows in the tradition of dance writers who are also poets (Edwin Denby, Jack Anderson), with poetry published in many literary journals and in her book, Crossing Pleasure Avenue (Indolent Books). She holds an MFA from the Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College. Originally from Colorado, she lives in Brooklyn.

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