Inlets 2

Music: John Cage (Inlets, 1977)
Choreography: Merce Cunningham
Staging: Jeannie Steele
Costume Design: Mark Lancaster
Duration: 20 minutes
Premiere: October 26, 1983; Merce Cunningham Dance Company (Lille, France)
Pacific Northwest Ballet Premiere: April 17, 2007 (Celebrate Seattle Festival)

Rachel Foster and PNB Company dancers in Inlets 2.
Photo © Angela Sterling

Merce Cunningham was born in Centralia, Washington, and received his first formal dance and theater training at the Cornish School (now Cornish College of the Arts) in Seattle. He became a soloist with the Martha Graham Dance Company and presented his first New York solo concert with one-time Seattle resident John Cage in April 1944. Merce Cunningham Dance Company was formed at Black Mountain College in the summer of 1953. Since that time, Cunningham has choreographed nearly 200 works for his renowned ensemble.

Inlets 2 is a variation of the original Inlets of 1977. Cunningham and his longtime musical collaborator, the innovative composer John Cage (who attended the Cornish School of the Arts in the 1930s), teamed up with Seattle-based designer Morris Graves to produce Inlets, a dance inspired by the climate and landscape of the Northwest, choreographed for six dancers, with a seventh dancer added for Inlets 2. Cage wanted his music to link with nature, “one of Morris Graves' most important affinities.” He further explained: “I visited a friend in Long Island who had the most beautiful shells. ...Some of them were huge—around eighteen inches long. I tapped the shell with my finger and knew it belonged in water, so I went to the sink and filled it with water. When I tipped it, it made the most beautiful gurgle. The gurgle must be amplified to hear it properly. It gives an effect related to the sound you hear when you place a shell over your ear. During the course of Inlets, the players will make a predetermined number of gurgles with one shell, and then pick up another. Three players will perform simultaneously.”

Recommended Listening:
John Cage: Credo in us...: More Works for Percussion, Wergo WER66512

Recommended Reading:
Merce Cunningham: Fifty Years, By David Vaughan (Aperture, 1997)

Recommended Viewing:
Merce Cunningham - A Lifetime of Dance, (Winstar, 2001)

Notes compiled by Doug Fullington.