Aleatoric Duet No. 2 (2014)

Ensemble Works

Aug 24

I have been supremely fortunate to have had the dancers Andrea Nann and Sean Ling bring their artistry as performers to many works in my repertoire. For this third dance in my aleatoric series, each of them began as usual by calling up phrases, episodes and moments from past works. I collaborated with them one at a time to reimagine and rearrange the movement material as two extended solos, each situated within a square of 24’ X 24’. Once each solo was complete, I brought Andrea and Sean into the space together to explore and develop the possibilities offered by their many intersections.

Improvising musician John Kameel Farah read the dance like a score, composing and performing in real time with an elaborate array of electronic equipment. Caroline O’Brien dressed the dancers in simple black pieces – Andrea in a narrow shift and pants and Sean in wide legged trousers. Marc Parent’s stunningly beautiful lighting (honoured with a Dora Award) broke the white floor (which floated like an island on black ground) into a series of rectangles or smaller squares and climaxed in a bright yellow square, dead centre, in which the seated dancers reached into the negative space around one another’s bodies in an elaborate series of gestures before finally turning away from each other while the sound reached a peak of density and volume.

In 2021, Sean performed his part alone, with John improvising remotely from Berlin and projected onto the upstage scrim, for a beautifully filmed live-streamed pandemic performance from Vernon, British Columbia, using the title Aleatoric Solo No. 3. - PB

“The moody work – part of a series in which dancers mine Baker’s rich legacy of movement vocabulary, then make it their own – introduces the evening’s defining elements: the stark solemnity of the performance space (impeccably enhanced by the work of lighting designer Marc Parent), onstage musicianship (… composer John Kameel Farah improvising from a perch high on the back wall of the stage overlooking the dancers), Baker’s alternately introspective and expansive movement vocabulary and, most of all, rigour and attention to detail.” Kathleen Smith, NOW Magazine

credits

choreography:
Peggy Baker

improvised music:
John Kameel Farah

lighting:
Marc Parent

costumes:
Caroline O’Brien

dancers:
Sean Ling, Andrea Nann

awards

Dora Mavor Moore Award for Outstanding Lighting Design, Dance Division:
Marc Parent

premiere
Toronto
March 28 - April 6, 2014
Betty Oliphant Theatre
concert title: he:she

subsequent presentation
Toronto
January 22 - 31, 2016
Betty Oliphant Theatre
PhaseSpace

media links

See 2014 in the media and awards archive