Three Quartets, 2025

Drawn to the music by James Tenney, “Three Drum Quartets” Nancy began her research at the Exploratorium in San Francisco. There, in 1974-75, the first of the quartets, “Wake for Charles Ives,” became a collaboration with sculptor Stephan von Huene whose magnificent mechanical drum played the score. (According to Peter Richards, now an Exploratorium emeritus artist, the piece created quite a stir.) The drum film, courtesy of the Estate of Stephan von Huene, is a prologue to the live performance. Tenney then expanded the score to include three drum quartets for live musicians: ”Wake for Charles Ives”; “Hocket for Henry Cowell”; and “Crystal Canon for Edgar Varese.”

Notes from Nancy: “Inspiration for the work arose during an Emily Harvey Foundation artist residency in March 2025 in Venice, Italy, where I spent my days observing the changing light and shifting water patterns in the canals. That experience informs the leggero movement quality throughout, while each quartet structure shifts. I borrowed the music’s title to signal dialogue between the differing constructs of each piece. “Wake” is designed as a series of pure movement phrases that retrograde, reverse, repeat, invert, and extend as the dancers alternate between movement in unison and in canon. “Hocket” begins with two dancers in quiet stillness that rapidly bursts into full motion as the pair expands to a quartet to perform interlocking phrases. “Crystal Canon” is filled with cascading movement as spatial patterns weave across the stage. Long phrases are broken up, re-sequenced, and layered by the dancers. “

Podcast: Nancy Karp was featured on the Other Minds Podcast!

Listen to “37. Nancy Karp, Choreographing in Silence” by Other Minds Podcast 
https://creators.spotify.com/pod/profile/other-minds/episodes/37–Nancy-Karp–Choreographing-in-Silence-e38ioa5/a-ac607rn

To learn more about Other Minds Festival: https://www.otherminds.org/other-minds-festival-29/

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