Queen Elizabeth Hall, Southbank Centre, London
April 29, 2025
In 1989, Roger Copeland and Marshall Cohen published a collection of writing under the title What Is Dance? It’s a valid question that will no doubt forever be debated across multiple disciplines and amongst those who may have an interest. However, once dance is placed in front of a paying audience, all involved are surely obliged to ask ‘What is (this) dance for?’
Like the Rethian BBC, it should at least inform, entertain and educate. dare one even suggest, be beautiful at times? Like so much recent work, I found In C by Sasha Waltz & Guests with music played by the London Sinfonietta doing very little of that.
Photo Pete Woodhead
The piece is a sort of improvisational choreographic and musical exercise within a set structure. Terry Riley’s score consists of 53 musical phrases in a specific order to be played with clear rules. Each musician may repeat or omit phrases but may not return to previously played ones.
Sasha Waltz and her dancers created a similar choreographic interpretation that follows the same rules. In C is thus quite deliberately not a fixed work. Each performance is different, including in length. The number of dancers and musicians can be varied too.
Riley’s score may have been viewed as radical when written in 1964, but it does nothing for me. It’s 53 phrases are repeated and repeated with each of the representatives of the London Sinfonietta effectively turned into a percussionist as they counted multiple empty bars or negotiated the seemingly endless repetitions. At one point, the clarinetist’s phrase reminded one of Charles Ives’ clashing marching bands as it rambled through the ostinati just doing its own thing.
It may put me in a minority but I found the choreography similarly uninspiring despite the bright costumes and, for once, decent lighting. What I saw was an ensemble of undoubtedly fine dancers twitching, hopping, sometimes rolling around, occasionally balancing in attitude, in motifs that were repeated, and repeated. The thing about being an individual within a group as the publicity suggests the performers are, is that it is alienating, not in a Brechtian, enlightening way, but in a turning off way.
Of course, it is possible to impose an interpretation on the patterns observed on stage, when many people may feel lonely even in a crowd or are determined to impose their individualism within a collective setting. Maybe it’s just me, but with In C, I couldn’t do it.
For an alternative take on In C, read David Mead’s review of a livestreamed performance from 2021.