Excess, Idle, Surplus

Theresa Dickinson, Sara Rudner, Twyla Tharp, Margery Tupling, Rose Marie Wright

Excess, Idle, Surplus is a quintet in three parts – “Excess,” “Idle” and “Surplus.”

In the first, five dancers perform simultaneous solos, each containing small movement phrases lasting ten to sixty seconds which are repeated. The solos are timed by Tharp so as to create recognizable moments of counterpoint.

During “Idle” a projector’s beam provides the lighting as Hollis Frampton’s film Information is projected from stage right to left. The image of the film was only visible to the audience in its abstracted form within the beam, under which the dancers moved in profile. The rhythmic structure of a composition by Morton Feldman was used to coordinate the dancers’ parts.

For the third section, the rhythm of Claudio Monteverdi’s Sonata Sopra: Sancta Maria, ora pro nobis informs the dancers’ pace. Tharp transcribed the sonata into her own style of dance notation to record the timing of the movement.

No music is ever heard by the audience; the clacking and whirring of the projector provides the accompaniment.

Pages 20, 21, 43, and 45 of 55 from Tharp’s original choreographic notes.

This performance was a part of the Contemporary Festival of the Arts (Second Annual Notre Dame – South Bend Festival of Arts).