Richard Alston Dance Company
T768614857
Contemporary dance. Richard Alston, Artistic Director of The Place, the UK's leading centre for contemporary dance, is internationally recognised as one of the most influential and inspiring choreographers in British dance.
Archive :: production:T768614857, dance or ballet:S901, venue:V886
Unfinished Business/A Ceremony of Carols/Shuffle It Right
Richard Alston's brand new
Unfinished Business is danced to the beautiful, lucid and flowing music of Mozart - the two movements of an unfinished piano sonata, Opus K533. To these, Alston has added an extraordinary arrangement of Mozart's brilliant Gigue in D by the Italian virtuoso Federico Busoni, creating a third movement which, accompanied by a live pianist, brings the work to a rousing close.
A Ceremony of Carols is another new work from Alston, choreographed to Benjamin Britten's masterpiece for boys' voices and harp. The music is of magisterial simplicity, conjuring up a rich world of rapt and devout adoration; the dance is a celebration of a sheer surge of breath, a pure stream of sound.
Shuffle It Right features private recordings made by the American songwriter Hoagy Carmichael, who himself sings, whistles and plays piano on them. The songs Alston has chosen - including Riverboat Shuffle, Ol' Man Harlem and, of course, Star Dust - scurry along with wry little licks and punched out syncopated rhythms.