Mark Morris Dance Group - Moon Tickets

“With gorgeously impressionist lighting… intriguing outer space projections… elegant costumes… and little toy spacemen scattered about, [Morris’] MOON became a luxuriant dreamlike escape…. Most important of all, his company [has] never been better, and the dancers themselves provided the real fantasy. Otherworldly movement somehow matched the different music in ways that seem rational but not needing to make sense. Movement, itself, was adventure.… The genius of MOON, however, is to remind us that wonder can be around the least expected corners.” —Los Angeles Times

It’s hard to predict the next source of inspiration for the dizzyingly prolific and singularly creative choreographer Mark Morris—will it be an iconic Beatles album, a Baroque masterpiece, a biblical story?

This time, Morris looks upward—at the Moon!—to explore our fascination with our constant celestial companion. A multimedia extravaganza danced before a backdrop featuring video, animation, and photo stills of the Moon, this new piece for nine dancers is set to live and recorded music that includes popular American songbook tunes, as well as excerpts from NASA’s Golden Record—a gold-plated copper phonograph record that was launched into space on the Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 spacecrafts in 1977, carrying sounds and images of Earth as a message to any potential extraterrestrial life. The live music features selections from Marcel Dupré’s 24 Inventions, Op. 50 and György Ligeti’s Musica ricercata, performed on piano, organ, and double bass.

“MOON is classic Morris; full of whimsy and also weirdness.…The dancers responded with genuine joy…beautifully, harmoniously gliding by—and sometimes into—each other like the movement of celestial bodies (Broadway World).