New Dance Series Conceived and Curated by Richard Colton
Produced by Churchtown Dairy
Cage & Cunningham @ Churchtown Dairy
This music and dance program features a MinEvent comprising solos and duets from Suite for Two, Signals, XOVER and other works by Merce Cunningham performed by a select group of professional dancers who regularly participate in Merce Cunningham Trust activities and projects. The MinEvent, arranged by MCT co-director Patricia Lent, will be performed with music by John Cage curated by Jeffrey Lependorf, executive director of the John Cage Trust. The program will also include excerpts from Cunningham’s Beach Birds taught in a community workshop, additional music by Cage performed by Lependorf and students from Bard College Conservatory, along with a music & dance realization of Cage’s iconic 4’33”.
*Suggested Donation at Door ($25 General Admission, $15 Senior and Under Eighteen)
Beach Birds Community Workshop:
Patricia Lent, Co-Director of the Merce Cunningham Trust, will conduct a two-day workshop teaching phrase material from Cunningham’s 1991 dance Beach Birds. The workshop, which will take place in the Round Barn at Churchtown Dairy, is free to the public and is open to intermediate and advanced level dancers. The workshop will culminate in a public showing as part of a program of music & dance at the Round Barn. Participation in the showing is optional.
Schedule:
Thursday, September 18. 12:00-4:00
Friday, September 19. 10:00-1:00
For those choosing to participate in the showing:
Saturday, September 20
10:00-1:00 warm-up and rehearsal
3:00 program begins
** To register for the workshop portion, please email: rcolton5678@gmail.com
Patricia Lent was a member of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company from 1984 to 1993, dancing in over forty complete works, including Pictures, Fabrications, August Pace, and CRWDSPCR. As a member of Mikhail Baryshnikov’s White Oak Dance Project (1994-1996) she performed work by Hanya Holm, Mark Morris, Tere O’Connor, and others. After earning a masters degree from Bank Street College of Education, she taught second and third grade at P.S. 234 in Lower Manhattan (1998-2007). In 2009, Lent was named a trustee of the Merce Cunningham Trust, and currently serves as the Trust’s Co-Director, in which capacity she initiates and supervises staging projects for professional companies, museums, conservatories, schools, and arts organizations worldwide. Lent began teaching technique and repertory workshops at the Merce Cunningham Studio in the late 1980s. She has staged Cunningham’s work for numerous schools and companies, including Fabrications for MCDC and Ballet de Lorraine, Scramble for Repertory Dance Theater, Duets for American Ballet Theatre, Channels/Inserts and Exchange for Lyon Opera Ballet, Beach Birds and Change of Address for North Carolina School of the Arts, and Roaratorio for MCDC’s Legacy Tour. Lent was the principal stager for Night of 100 Solos: A Centennial Event, presented at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in April 2019 in celebration of the 100th anniversary of Merce Cunningham’s birth. In the summer of 2023, she collaborated on an arrangement of Beach Birds performed on the shoreline of Rockaway Beach. Lent has done extensive research into Cunningham’s notes and choreographic methods, and welcomes opportunities to share her discoveries with dancers, dancemakers, artists, and other inquiring minds.
Jeffrey Lependorf is a composer, musician, and visual artist, as well as a certified master of the shakuhachi, a traditional Japanese bamboo flute. His music has been performed around the globe—literally, in fact: a recording of his Night Pond for solo shakuhachi was launched into space when the shuttle Atlantis took off on May 15, 1997 and remained for a year aboard the Russian space station Mir. His “Masterpieces of Western Music” audio-course is available through Barnes & Noble’s “Portable Professor” series, as well as for download through audible.com. Music recordings can be found on Ayler, Albany, Sachimay, and other labels. A nationally recognized arts leader, he currently serves as Executive Director of the John Cage Trust, following serving as Executive Director of The Flow Chart Foundation (devoted to the legacy of John Ashbery), and also directs the Art Omi: Music international musicians residency program, a collaborative music-making residency he created.