(Middle) Merce Cunningham in Antic Meet by Richard Rutledge (Left & Right) Rashaun Mitchell in Antic Meet by Yi-Chun Wu

Merce Cunningham Dance Company's Legacy Tour

The Merce Cunningham Dance Company presents a final, celebratory engagement in Chicago before taking a final bow in January.

November 18 & 19, 2011 * 8:00 p.m.   

a Dance Center and Harris Theater co-presentation

presented at The Harris Theater of Music and Dance in Millennium Park

205 E. Randolph, Chicago, IL

November 18th is Merce Cunningham Day in Chicago!

Program A:

Friday, November 18, 2011 * 8:00 p.m.    

Squaregame (1976)  

Quartet (1982)  

Antic Meet (1958)    

Program B:

Saturday, November 19, 2011 * 8:00 p.m.     

Roaratorio (1983)      

[of Cunningham] "One of the greatest artists of the 20th century." - The New York Times

As the Legacy Tour draws to a close, the Merce Cunningham Dance Company presents work from several decades as a celebration of Cunningham’s lifetime of artistic achievement and a testament to the choreographer’s enduring genius. Program A (November 18) includes Squaregame (1976), which was the first commission for MCDC Music Director Takehisa Kosugi and features décor by Mark Lancaster; Quartet (1982), which, despite its title, is a work for five dancers set to David Tudor’s live electronic composition Sextet for Seven, with décor by Mark Lancaster; and Antic Meet (1958), structured like a series of vaudeville scenes set to a John Cage score and with décor by Robert Rauschenberg. Program B (November 19) features Roaratorio (1983), an evening-length largescale work set to Cage’s complex 1979 composition Roaratorio, an Irish Circus on Finnegans Wake, consisting of music, text and sounds from places in Joyce’s novel.

Other Events

DanceMasters Class taught by Company Member Robert Swinston

Wednesday, November 16, 2011 * 6:00 - 8:00 p.m.    

The Dance Center Theater, 1306 South Michigan Avenue

Robert Swinston, Director of Choreography, Merce Cunningham Dance Company. His class will be based on the Merce Cunningham technique, emphasizing developing strength, clarity and precision through a center warm-up, back exercises, and moving and jumping phrases. The technique is flexible, not codified, and helps students respond to physical challenges as well as develop mental acuity. Students in the class are expected to have a strong sense of center and will learn to display clear form using the maximum range of the spine and torso.

This class is open for public observation, $5.00.

FamilyDance Matinee at The Dance Center

Merce Cunningham MinEvent

Saturday, November 19, 2011 * 3:00 p.m.    

Featuring a special showing of a Cunningham MinEvent set on Dance Center stduents, preceded by a movement workshop led by company manager Kevin Taylor at 2:15 p.m.

Pre-Performance Talks with Bonnie Brooks

Friday & Saturday, November 18 & 19, 2011 * 7:00 p.m.

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The Dance Center’s co-presentation with the Harris Theater of Merce Cunningham Dance Company is funded, in part, by lead sponsors Caroline and John Ballantine and the Elizabeth F. Cheney Foundation, with additional funding from the National Endowment for the Arts.