Deceptively Simple

“At last, to make a long story short, I did play on that miserable, Wretched Pianoforte. And what really galled me was that Madame and her gentlemen never interrupted their drawing for one moment, they just continued, and I had to play for the chairs, tables, and walls. Given these miserable conditions, I finally lost my patience—I had begun to play the Fischer Variations and I had played about half of them when I stood up. They immediately showered me with compliments; but I said what had to be said, namely that I could not do myself justice on this Clavier, and I would be happy if Madame would choose another day when a better Clavier would be available. But she wouldn’t hear of my leaving and I was obliged to wait another half hour until her husband came. He, however, sat down next to me and listened to me very attentively, and I—I forgot the cold and the headache, and played in spite of the Wretched clavier—the way I play when I am in the best of spirits. Give me the best Clavier in Europe, but an audience that either doesn’t understand, or doesn’t want to understand, people who do not connect with me and my playing, and I will lose all joy in performing.”—Mozart, in a letter to his father dated May 1, 1778, translated and edited by Robert Spaethling.

These need no set-up. Thanks to the impressive HM for the impish, vaguely revolutionary, second video.

The Nederlands Dans Theater came to Chicago for two shows last week at the Auditorium Theater, on Tuesday and Wednesday, and it was the second I got to. Each night featured the same slate of three works, though, so this wasn’t such a great impediment, but with dancing on this level of expressive nuance and intricate storytelling, two performances probably isn’t enough to take it all in, let alone absorb everything that’s happening on stage. But what you are able to see and are able to grasp is deeply moving and almost tragic, and the dancers’ considerable technique fades from view and you - or at least, I - let my mind wander to the metaphysics the choreographers seem to be aiming for, and the dancers are delivering.

Beginning with Lightfoot León’s (Paul Lightfoot, Sol León) Shoot the Moon and ending with Crystal Pite’s The Second Person, the program moved from a narrative-driven choreography to a more abstract vocabulary. The five dancers in Shoot the Moon inhabit a set of rooms set on a turntable, on which the walls rotate so that we only ever see a couple, or a soloists. Videos projected above the dancers occasionally focus in on the action who are (were) out of sight. We see one couple fighting, another not fighting, and another room usually with just a male soloist in it.

At one point, the walls spin such that we can see the action in each room in quick succession, and it becomes bleakly clear that none of these people are able to interact at any deep level with anyone else, and that they never will. (At least, that’s how it seemed to me. They say that criticism always says more about the critic than about the work of art…and lord knows I don’t have the vocabulary to describe the actual physical movements.) The music was from Philip Glass’s Tirol Concerto for piano and orchestra, and the choreography mapped its ebbs and swells perfectly.

This is as good a point as any to praise the NDL’s website, which puts Flash videos of their dances at the top of every page. You don’t have to Click Here! to see their dancing; you don’t have to take some reviewer’s word that the company is awesome; you don’t have to register for some sort of update; it’s just there and the music and dancing start as soon as you arrive and you see the beautiful dancers immediately. Bravo. The dances danced in Chicago can be viewed here.)

Next was Jirí Kylián’s Wings of Wax, which takes off from Breughel’s Landscape with the Fall of Icarus. As Breughel shifts our attention from the fall of Icarus to that of the commonplace action of the townsfolk, who are oblivious to Icarus’s recent flight and fall, Kilián moves his eight dancers in and out of view on a dark stage such that it’s a continual game to keep your eyes on the dancers. A giant tree hangs above the stage with a searchlight moving in an orbit around it. At one point, the four women come upstage and begin taking simple steps, forward and back, and as beguiling as their movements are, you can’t help but wonder if the men aren’t the actual focal point, and you’re being fooled.

As Kilián incorporated music by Heinrich Biber, John Cage, Glass, and Bach, he used that to cleanly delineate each of the passing moments. The fluid patterns during Biber’s Baroque opening stopped dead when one of Cage’s prepared-piano pieces began, and took a fittingly more mechanized turn.

I wish they had an image for this dance with the tree. Alas

Last up was the evening’s tour de force for the entire company, The Second Person by Crystal Pite. Working with composer Owen Belton’s electronic score, with samples of spoken words and massive industrial clankings, she fashioned a gritty, machine-like world that ultimately turned poignantly beautiful. She was aided in this by three Bunraku puppets, two doll-sized and the other life-size, and it’s no exaggeration to say that the breathtaking use of these dolls makes their appearance in Petrouschka look downright sophomoric. The dance’s conclusion (which is on the NDL website) in which one female dancer appears to have turned into a puppet, is one of those heartbreaking moments that isn’t soon forgotten.

And in the local relationships to this company, it’s fun to see that Hubbard Street Dance Company’s Jim Vincent is leaving Chicago become artistic director of Netherlands Dans Theater, while a former leader of NDL 1 named Glenn Edgerton is coming in to lead Hubbard Street. I’ll bring the Kleenex if last week’s NDL performances is anything like what Edgerton can bring to Hubbard Street.

In case you hadn’t already heard, Google salutes the birthday of Igor Stravinsky on its homepage today. There’s a clear Firebird depiction there, and I think the garland of flowers is left over from the sacrificial virgin’s dance in The Rite of Spring…best interpretation I can come up with. Happy 127th, Mr. Stravinsky. Your music has given me more great nights in the concert hall than you can know.

Photo: Arnold Newman

My own tastes run to the complex, I will admit. I gravitate to music that I need to hear a couple times before I can feel like I understand what’s going on, and if I get it after one listen, I’m generally bored after that first listen and don’t come back for more.

Which is why Josh Haden’s song “Spiritual” hit me like the proverbial ton of bricks on its first listen, in 1997, and why I keep going back to that first hearing. Haden leads the band Spain and wrote the simple, direct waltz for them, but my first exposure to it was through a cover his bass-playing dad Charlie made with Pat Metheny on their 1997 duo album Beyond the Missouri Sky (Short Stories).  In their version, Metheny’s multi-tracked on guitar and drums, with loops of his own playing providing some rhythmic framework for his own guitar solos, and Haden lays down some eye-wateringly lyrical playing of his own.

Their 8-minute version is the best $0.99 cents you’ll spend this year, so make the investment.

Now, besides this cover, there’s Johnny Cash’s from the 1996 Unchained. The gentle, expansive cornfield melancholy of Haden/Metheny has turned darker, more reflective. That distinctive baritone still had a lot of its firmness and color in 1996; hearing its gravelly decline through the later American series brought a lump to the throat.

To see and hear how Josh Haden himself sings his song, check out this video from last November, from David Letterman’s show. Quicker tempo, a little statelier delivery than Haden/Metheny or Cash. It’s cooler and less of an existential crisis, yet there’s a bleak undercurrent that isn’t going away. Strangely, despite using more traditional instruments, Haden’s version sounds somehow less “country” than Cash’s. (Note also Petra Haden sitting in on violin, Rachel Haden on cello, with Charlie Haden on bass.)

Still, Josh Haden’s approach changes from night to night, as can be heard on this looser live recording from 1999.

Friends of mine going through a rough patch have been known to have Beyond the Missouri Sky handed to them to speed the healing process. That’s mainly because of this last track, which focused my attention in ways that few songs or pieces have before or since. I just had to put everything aside, put my head in my hands and listen.

Here are the lyrics.

“Jesus, I don’t want to die alone
Jesus, oh Jesus, I don’t want to die alone
My love wasn’t true
Now all I have is you
Jesus, oh Jesus, I don’t want to die alone

Jesus if you hear my last breath
Don’t leave me here
Left to die a lonely death
I know I have sinned
But Lord I’m suffering
Jesus, oh Jesus, if you hear
My last breath.

All my troubles
All my pain
Will leave me
Once again
Once again”