Editor’s Note
by Claudia La RoccoDance
I can’t remember when I fell in love with the Merce Cunningham Dance Company.
Merce Notes
by Christian WolffDance
The first piece I dedicated to Merce was "Burdocks", which, after he heard it, he used for "Borst Park" (1972).
Correspondence
by Carolyn BrownDance
Dear Mom and Dad, We're in this crazy-looking old hotel in Russel Square - which John found for us our first night in London, because the original "hotel" arranged by the travel agent was awful, and was miles away from the theatre.
Material Man
by Lise FriedmanDance
While Merce always determined where he was going, he was simultaneously alert and responsive to the material at hand: a freighter gliding by on the Hudson, a headline he’d glanced at in that morning’s New York Times, a dancer stretching her leg up the wall.
SIDEBAR FROM BAM: The Complete Works MERCE CUNNINGHAM
by Nancy DalvaDance
Cunningham stripped his choreographic process of all but the essential element of movement, excluding decor, narrative, music—anything decorative or extrinsic.
Nine Goodbyes
by Siobhan BurkeDance
What’s really extraordinary about Merce is that if you look at a list of people who say they’ve been influenced or affected by him, there aren’t any two choreographers that are anything like each other . . .
Walking the Line
by Robert Swinston, as told to Claudia La RoccoDance
I had friends in the Cunningham Company long before I joined in 1980. In the 1970s I went to the concerts, year after year—I was perplexed, to say the least, but I was also curious, and, in general, became more interested by what was going on.
Cold Storage and New Brightness:The Merce Cunningham Acquisition at the Walker Art Center
by Abigail SebalyDance
Given Merce Cunningham’s lifelong capacity for reinvention, it is no surprise that he is posthumously pushing the Walker Art Center to rethink how and what it collects.
Fond Farewells
by David VaughanDance
As I write, the Merce Cunningham Dance Company is coming to the end of a month-long domestic segment of its Legacy Tour, in Chicago. The Mayor, Rahm Emanuel, issued a proclamation declaring November 18 Merce Cunningham Day in his city.
SILAS RIENER and RASHAUN MITCHELL with Claudia La Rocco
by Claudia La RoccoDance
While back in New York in between tour stops, Merce Cunningham Dance Company members Rashaun Mitchell and Silas Riener sat down with Claudia La Rocco in Riener’s Manhattan apartment to talk about life with and after Cunningham—and his company.
