“Tempo” To Resound with Live Music, Reflective Movement

“There’s definitely nothing like dancing to live music,” says Hannah S. Firestone ’16, co-director of the Harvard-Radcliffe Modern Dance Company. For the first time in several years, all the pieces in the company’s fall show, “Tempo,” are set to songs that will be played live by student musicians.

“Tempo,” which will run from Oct. 16 to 17 at the Harvard Dance Center, showcases a variety of musical genres and modern dance styles, including classical, jazz, and contemporary. “It’s a lot of fun to see the musicians and what they bring to it and to see how they work with the dancers,” Firestone says.

In one routine choreographed by HRMDC co-director Julia K. Cataldo ’15, around a dozen dancers glide to the uplifting yet pensive sounds of four selections from the “Pride and Prejudice” (2005) film score, performed by a single pianist. “[Julia has] been talking about what our faces look like when we dance,” says Greta A. Wong ’18, who performs in the number. “She wants us to just feel the music, and she’s saying when we feel something particularly beautiful, we should smile and just do what feels natural.”

The piece centers on connections the dancers build with each other, the music, and the stage itself. “[It’s] about the relationships between people, relationships in space, and…feeling who’s been in the space before you and who’s there with you now,” Wong says. “Dance is in the moment, and once it’s over, it’s over. That moment’s a thing that will never happen again in the same way, and I think it’s amplified with the live music.”

The entire production is designed to transition from moment to moment as audience members reflect on what they just have seen and then immerse themselves in something completely new. “There’s a lot of shifting around, and it’s exciting,” HRMDC member Lia F. Kaynor ’17 says.

Kaynor and Michael S. Gellman ’17 will be combining improvised music and improvised movement in another routine. Alternating from piano playing to dancing to moving in silence, the performers will be using two different artistic media. “[The piece is] about spatial construction and spatial destruction—what does that mean in your body, how can you translate that into a series of movements—and then tying that to sonic construction and destruction,” Kaynor says. “It’s not about having a story necessarily; it’s really about just the movement itself and then that connection to the sound itself and then how you can play with those relationships.”

Several performers, including Kaynor, act as both dancers and musicians during the show, and this fluidity highlights the crossover between the two art forms. “Tempo,” the name of the show itself, also references the links between music and dance. “There is this common vocabulary between the two art forms, and it’s…a relief to see it all come together and translated into the different modes of art,” Kaynor says.

Modern music also features in “Tempo.” During the performance, a group of student musicians will perform a medley of five contemporary songs for a piece choreographed by Firestone. Firestone first worked with the musicians on the songs—“The Moon” by Priscilla Ahn, “The Rip Tide” by Beirut, “Truth” by Alexander Ebert, “The Predatory Wasp of the Palisades is Out to Get Us!” by Sufjan Stevens, and “Fake Empire” by The National—and then taught the movements to the dancers. Now she is putting both groups together.

“I have a lot of really, really talented—very gung-ho—musicians who are willing to experiment with it and play with it and change it around,” Firestone says. “It gives totally new life and new breath to the pieces, and I think all of the dancers are excited and grateful for that new spark when they’re dancing.”

HRMDC members emphasize the value in dancing to live music, noting that many college students do not have such an opportunity. “If you’re always practicing with a recording, then you can get used to the exact way it’s going to sound every single time,” Kaynor says. “But with live music, it really opens another dimension of interactivity, and I think that’s really engaging for an audience to see as well.”