In 1985, the ballet "Invisible
Cities" was realized as a collaboration between myself,
choreographer Brenda Way and the ODC/San Francisco Dance Company, and designer/engineer
Gayle
Curtis. Although most of the music is computer synthesis,
there are also two live instrumental/ electronic performers including
myself. This was a personal challenge, since I had been away from
performing for a while. It was also an opportunity to try to raise
the technical standards of music in dance performance, which I
saw as too often neglected. The music was funded by a grant from
the NEA, and produced at the Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics,
at Stanford University.
Italo Calvino's novel "Invisible Cities" inspired us
with its beauty, original and concise structure, and dream-like
imagery. It is an allegorical account of a meeting between the
Venetian explorer Marco Polo and the Tatarian Emperor Kublai Khan.
Sensing the decline of his empire, the aged Kublai Khan summons
the young foreigner Marco Polo to his garden to reassure him of
the greatness of his realm. Marco Polo diverts the great Khan
with tales of cities he has seen within the empire. As the barrier
of their different languages is overcome, the images of the cities
become increasingly vivid. Kublai Khan searches for a pattern
among them, concluding finally that each description is of the
same place and all are within him.
The music contains both subtle and explicit stylistic elements
of various popular and classical world musics, sections of pure
musical fantasy, and various musical and digitally-processed environmental
sounds. In this way it conveys feelings and moods similar to those
created by Calvino's weaving of hyper-realistic description and
veiled, dream-like fantasy. Conversely, the literary symbolism,
characters and narrative of the book provided much of the inspiration
for the choreographer and designers. However, rather than follow
the book explicitly, we chose to adopt something of its form,
but invent our own "invisible cities" for each of the
five major movements.
At the time, Gayle Curtis was participating in work being
done in machine choreography at the Veterans Administration Robotic
Aid project, and wanted to see the concept carried further. For
"Invisible Cities", he directed the addition of a large
robot arm as a visiting member of the ODC dance company. The powerful
robot, transformed by the choreography of Way, Margo Apostolos,
and Curtis, performed the role of Kublai Khan. I further enhanced
its persona by amplifying the sounds of its motors and digitally
processing them into musical material during the performance.
We deliberately treated the robotics as a proven rather than experimental
medium, in order to avoid making any cliched statements on "art
vs technology". Interestingly, though, the presence of the
robot garnered us world-wide publicity, often at the expense of
the artistic message.
See a photograph and program from the premier
International: Wergo Schallplatten, GmbH, Postfach 3640, D-55026 Mainz, Germany. Order from the Schott-Musik online CD store.
U.S. distributor: Harmonia Mundi USA, Los Angeles, CA. Contact their Mail Order Sales at 310.478.1311, extension 115, or order at www.harmoniamundi.com
Retail:
- CDeMusic.org
- Keyboard Wizards
- Direct from Michael McNabb
- Also often found at larger classical record stores under McNabb or Electronic categories.