Mark Morris
All writing students: please right now watch the documentary with Yo-Yo Ma and Mark Morris. Please, right now. Homework. Yo Yo Ma: Inspired by Bach, Volume 2. The Six Suites for Unaccompanied Cello have always been among my favorite pieces of music of all time. But oh my gosh, Ma and Morris? You have to watch this video. Ma collaborates with artists from other disciplines (landscape painter, filmmaker, choreographer) and they make new pieces. The one you have to see, without question, is the Mark Morris. We talk so often about fresh gestures, avoiding cliché gesture. Here is a virtuoso showcase of a million fresh human physical movements. You will not see anything you have ever seen before and yet you know will know each and every physical beat-the way the dancers move-as truth. It’s exactly what we are trying to do with our words on the page. Why is it so great? It’s completely fresh, unseen, and yet you know deeply you’ve seen it, somehow, before. Hearing Ma and Morris talk about their collaborative process is transcendent. Ma: “Why do you dedicate everything to Maxine and God?” Morris: “Maxine is my mother. That needs no explanation. And God?”
I want to collaborate with Stephen Iannacone again. Again, I want to go to artist residencies, where musicians and painters and choreographers move forward. I want to see Mark Morris’s new work in NYC this summer.
I love this piece so much. I can’t tell you how good this DVD is.
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Thanks for this, Heather. It got me curious so I dug around and found a couple ’samples’ of it on youtube that gave me a nice taste. Now I want to get it and see/hear it all. thanks again!