Watching a dance can sometimes leave me wondering why the choreographer created it. Often it’s during a “pure dance” work that doesn’t offer anything new, even if the technique is solid and the dancers are skilled (as is nearly always the case in New York City). Sometimes, form is enough, sometimes not. But two programs [...]

It just seems wrong that this February is the month of a memorial celebration here in New York for Odetta, who died in December. By rights, it should have been the month after her participation in the inauguration of President Obama, an event that would have marked a fitting and joyous high point in her [...]

Remember the sad time when MoMA closed its headquarters for renovation, forcing legions to cross the god-forsaken East River to Queens, where it shattered the space/time continuum in a hangar-like aluminum shed? It’s not exactly the same, but some masterpieces from MoMA have transplanted themselves, via giant plastic decals, into the Hades-like Atlantic/Pacific transit complex [...]

Mark Morris has proven how deft he is with opera, particularly when it includes his wonderful dancers. His productions of Romeo & Juliet: On Motifs of Shakespeare, Orfeo ed Euridice, Platée, King Arthur—and the sublime L’Allegro ed il Penseroso ed il Moderato and Dido and Aeneas for his own company—all integrated his astute sensitivity with [...]

The Third Mind: American Artists Contemplate Asia 1860-1989, at the Guggenheim, derives its title from a mixed-media work by William Burroughs and Brion Gysin in which disparate elements combine to make a new form. The show, on view through April 19, in the works years before the current economic tailspin, coincides with the moment’s need [...]

A make-out mix, on NPR, for Valentine’s Day. This week a pink candy heart image with the words “The Make Out Mix” on it arrived in my e-mail in-box. Yes, NPR has packaged 104 “love songs” compiled by public radio station hosts around the country, and is streaming them at its site. Hmmm … Certainly [...]

Firefall, John Jesurun’s new work that recently ran at Dance Theater Workshop (with an emphasis on theater), does not lack for either verbal or visual content. In fact there is so much information flying through the air in the work’s 55-minute length that it feels twice that long—at times too dense for normal, somewhat fatigued [...]

One of Japan’s buzz-worthy young theater companies, chelfitsch, is in town this week at the Japan Society on Feb 5-7. The troupe’s name is a baby-talk twist on the word selfish. This makes perfect sense given the context of the play, Five Days in March, written and directed by the group’s artistic director Toshiki Okada. [...]

While women are still poorly represented as playwrights or composers on Broadway (they fare slightly better Off and Off Off), it doesn’t mean they aren’t actively involved. It’s just that as is so often the case, they’re busting a gut behind the scenes, ensuring that the show looks as nice as possible as it goes [...]

If you haven’t been to the Morgan Library & Museum lately, then you might be under the impression that it’s a musty, gilded mansion stuck in the olden days, albeit laden with treasured works on paper. But one of the current shows, On the Money, shows that the Morgan has a sense of humor and [...]