Diversion of Angels

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Diversion of Angels, initially titled Wilderness Stair, is a Martha Graham ballet performed to an original score by Norman Dello Joio. The premiere on August 13, 1948, at the Palmer Auditorium in New London, Connecticut, included a set designed by Isamu Noguchi. It was eliminated at the second performance. [1] Diversion of Angels is in the Martha Graham Dance Company repertoire and that of American Ballet Theatre (since 1999). [2]

Martha Graham American dancer and choreographer

Martha Graham was an American modern dancer and choreographer. Her style, the Graham technique, reshaped American dance and is still taught worldwide.

Norman Dello Joio American musician

Norman Dello Joio was an American composer whose output spanned over half a century, and who won a Pulitzer Prize in 1957.

New London, Connecticut City in Connecticut, United States

New London is a seaport city and a port of entry on the northeast coast of the United States, located at the mouth of the Thames River in New London County, Connecticut. It was one of the world's three busiest whaling ports for several decades beginning in the early 19th century, along with Nantucket and New Bedford, Massachusetts. The wealth that whaling brought into the city furnished the capital to fund much of the city's present architecture. The city subsequently became home to other shipping and manufacturing industries, but it has gradually lost most of its industrial heart.

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Premieres and reception

Following the 1948 premiere, reviewer Frances Herridge described Wilderness Stair as a far cry from a significant addition to the Graham repertoire, being "without story or discernible comment" and lacking a performance by Graham. However, as an ensemble piece for the troupe, she thought it "superb." [3]

On March 20, 1949, the dance was reintroduced with the title Diversion of Angels at the Eighth Street Theatre in Chicago. The New York premiere took place later on January 22, 1950 at the 46th Street Theater. For this performance, Yuriko replaced May O’Donnell. [4]

Chicago city and county seat of Cook County, Illinois, United States

Chicago, officially the City of Chicago, is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and the third most populous city in the United States. With an estimated population of 2,705,994 (2018), it is also the most populous city in the Midwestern United States. Chicago is the county seat of Cook County, the second most populous county in the US, with a small portion of the northwest side of the city extending into DuPage County near O'Hare Airport. Chicago is the principal city of the Chicago metropolitan area, often referred to as Chicagoland. At nearly 10 million people, the metropolitan area is the third most populous in the nation.

New York City Largest city in the United States

The City of New York, usually referred to as either New York City (NYC) or simply New York (NY), is the most populous city in the United States. With an estimated 2018 population of 8,398,748 distributed over a land area of about 302.6 square miles (784 km2), New York is also the most densely populated major city in the United States. Located at the southern tip of the state of New York, the city is the center of the New York metropolitan area, the largest metropolitan area in the world by urban landmass and one of the world's most populous megacities, with an estimated 19,979,477 people in its 2018 Metropolitan Statistical Area and 22,679,948 residents in its Combined Statistical Area. A global power city, New York City has been described as the cultural, financial, and media capital of the world, and exerts a significant impact upon commerce, entertainment, research, technology, education, politics, tourism, art, fashion, and sports. The city's fast pace has inspired the term New York minute. Home to the headquarters of the United Nations, New York is an important center for international diplomacy.

Yuriko Kikuchi, known to audiences by her stage name Yuriko, is an American dancer and choreographer. She is best known for her work with the Martha Graham Dance Company.

Theme and structure

Although the dance is story-less, Graham described it as a representation of three aspects of love. [4] It may also be interpreted as three facets of one woman's character. Some Graham scholars claim the paintings of Wassily Kandinsky influenced the work. [5]

Wassily Kandinsky Russian painter and art theorist

Wassily Wassilyevich Kandinsky was a Russian painter and art theorist.

The piece is staged for three couples and a corps de ballet. The women are costumed in yellow, red or white; the men, and corps members, are dressed in beige. The original performers were Helen McGehee and Stuart Hodes as Adolescent Love (yellow), Pearl Lang and Robert Cohan as Romantic Love (red) and Natanya Neumann and Mark Ryder as Mature Love (white). Dorothea Douglas, Joan Skinner, Dorothy Berea, Erick Hawkins, May O’Donnell and Dale Sehnert completed the cast. Romantic Love was renamed Erotic Love during the 1980s. [6]

<i>Corps de ballet</i> group of dancers who are not soloists

In ballet, the corps de ballet is the group of dancers who are not soloists. They are a permanent part of the ballet company and often work as a backdrop for the principal dancers.

Stuart Hodes American dancer, choreographer, dance teacher, dance administrator and author

Stuart Hodes is an American dancer, choreographer, dance teacher, dance administrator and author. He was Martha Graham’s partner, danced on Broadway, in TV, film, in recitals, and with his own troupe. His choreography has appeared on the Boston Ballet, Dallas Ballet, Harkness Ballet, Joffrey Ballet, San Francisco Ballet and other troupes. He taught at the Martha Graham School, Neighborhood Playhouse, NYC High School of Performing Arts, headed dance at NYU School of the Arts and Borough of Manhattan Community College. He was Dance Associate for the NY State Council on the Arts, dance panelist for the National Endowment for the Arts, president of the National Association of Schools of Dance, and a member of the First American Dance Study Team to China in 1980, returning in 1992 to teach the Guangzhou modern dance troupe.

Pearl Lang American dancer

Pearl Lang was an American dancer, choreographer and teacher renowned as an interpreter and propagator of the choreography style of Martha Graham, and also for her own longtime dance company, the Pearl Lang Dance Theater.

At the ballet's premiere, the program notes contained a Ben Belitt poem referencing the action, “It is the place of the Rock and Ladder, the raven, the blessing, the tempter, the rose. It is the wish of the single-hearted, the undivided; play after the spirit’s labor; games, flights, fancies, configurations of the lover’s intention; the believed Possibility, at once strenuous and tender; humors of innocence, garlands, evangels, Joy on the wilderness stair; diversion of angels.” [4]

Ben Belitt was an American poet and translator. Besides writing poetry, he also translated several books of poetry by Pablo Neruda and Federico García Lorca from Spanish to English.

In comparison to much of Graham's oeuvre, the ballet is joyful, exuberant and lyrical. [7]

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Richard Move choreographer, performer, director, filmmaker

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<i>Every Soul is a Circus</i> ballet

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<i>Heretic</i> (ballet) ballet

Heretic is a modern dance work by Martha Graham performed to Tetus Breton, an old folk tune from Brittany. Louis Horst, Graham's musical director, recommended the song, part of the collection Chansons de la Fleur de Lys as arranged by Charles De Sivry. The dance premiered with the title Heretic at New York's Booth Theatre on April 14, 1929. In a previous program announcement, the work was called A Faith. Graham presented the piece with her company; the performance marked the debut of her concert ensemble. Heretic is staged for 13 female performers, 12 dressed in black tube-like garments and one in a long white dress. Dancers for the premiere were: Graham, as the woman in white, Kitty Reese, Louise Creston, Irene Emery, Ethel Rudy, Lillian Ray, Hortense Bunsick, Sylvia Wasserstrom, Mary Rivoire, Ruth White, Lillian Shapero, Virginia Briton, Sylvia Rosenstein, Evelyn Sabin, Betty Macdonald and Rosina Savelli.

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Night Journey is a Martha Graham ballet performed to music by William Schuman with costumes designed by Graham and a set by Isamu Noguchi. Commissioned by the Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge Foundation of the Library of Congress, the work premiered on May 3, 1947, at Cambridge High School in Boston, Massachusetts. Night Journey is the third of Graham's dances derived from Greek mythology, following Cave of the Heart and Errand into the Maze.

Chronicle is a modern dance work choreographed by Martha Graham to music by Wallingford Riegger. It premiered on December 20, 1936, at the Guild Theatre in New York City. The set was designed by Isamu Noguchi. Riegger's music was scored for piano, wind instruments and percussion; Noguchi's set was made up primarily of curtains, platforms and stairs. The original production was danced by Martha Graham and Group, the forerunner of the Martha Graham Dance Company. According to the program notes, the dance is based upon "the advent and consequences of war" and concerned itself with the "contemporary situation", referring to the impending conflict in Europe.

Course was a modern dance work choreographed by Martha Graham to music by George Antheil. The piece sometimes appeared on programs as Course: One in Red; Three in Green; Two in Blue; Two in Red. It premiered on February 10, 1935, at the Guild Theatre in New York City. The ballet was performed by Martha Graham and Group, the forerunner to the Martha Graham Dance Company.

Blakeley White-McGuire

Blakeley White-McGuire born in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, is an award-winning dancer, choreographer, répétiteur, and educator. She is a Principal Guest Artist and former Principal Dancer of Martha Graham Dance Company. Described by Gia Kourlas of the New York Times in 2007 as having a "powerful technique and dramatic instinct with an appealing modern spunk", White-McGuire has received widespread critical acclaim as a Graham dancer.

Mariya "Masha" Dashkina Maddux is a Ukrainian modern dancer and dance teacher. She is a former principal dancer with the Martha Graham Dance Company and is the founder and director of the Wake Forest Dance Festival.

References

  1. ↑ Diversion of Angels (Ballet choreographed by Martha Graham), Performing Arts Encyclopedia, The Library of Congress
  2. ↑ Catton, Pia. "A Deluge of New Dance Ideas". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 17 March 2016.
  3. ↑ Herridge, Frances (17 August 1948). "Graham Work Needs Graham". memory.loc.gov. Retrieved 17 March 2016.
  4. 1 2 3 "DIVERSION OF ANGELS". www.abt.org. Retrieved 17 March 2016.
  5. ↑ "Martha Graham & Modern Dance". www.angelfire.com. Retrieved 17 March 2016.
  6. ↑ Stuart Hodes, Part Real, Part Dream: Dancing with Martha Graham, Concord ePress, 3rd edition, August 2011, location 1495
  7. ↑ Kisselgoff, Anna (26 October 1999). "DANCE REVIEW; A Classical Approach To the Graham Karma". The New York Times. Retrieved 17 March 2016.
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