ABSTRACT
In a New York Times review, dance critic Alastair Macaulay writes of the 70-year relationship, both professional and personal, between composer John Cage and choreographer Merce Cunningham (Macaulay 2012). The performances he saw included two works by Cunningham to which he had added music written by Cage, who died in 1992. Macaulay notes that, during the period when Cunningham composed these dances, he created others having “characteristic ambiguity” and that took up “aspects of death, transcendence, [and] different realms of existence.” Cunningham died in 2009 and his company closed at the end of 2011. The show Macaulay writes about, early in 2012, included eight dancers from that company. He notes the many ghosts he felt that night, both on and beyond the stage, although he does not use that word.
