Review: NICO MUHLY: MARKING TIME, Sadler’s Wells
Photo credit: Foteini Christofilopoulou
Marking Time is a thrilling example of what happens when music becomes not merely a support or provocateur for movement, but a present force for physicality to interact with. The night carried a wonderful hum of anticipation as Nico Muhly, a fascinating, shape-shifting visionary whose work slips effortlessly between classical roots and experimental edges, with moments of echoing space that can be suddenly swallowed by overwhelming cacophonies or unexpected shifts, became the anchor for three choreographers to respond to in exactly that way. Each choreographer - Jules Cunningham, Maud le Pladec and Mihael Keegan-Dolan - work independently, yet as something of a happy accident, a shared language emerges almost subconsciously. Like three different dreams connected by one composer, Muhly’s score gives them a commonality that gives weight to a wonderful night.
The opening work, Slant, choreographed by Jules Cunningham, is set to Drones, an experimental piece reshaped for this triple bill and performed live by the Britten Sinfonia. Danced by Cunningham and four performers from Julie Cunningham & Company, it begins in a typical Cunningham-esque style: bodies already onstage, the environment established before the audience even sat down. The design and movement unfolded as a patchwork, stitched tenderly together. The cast stretching across age ranges from children to older adults, create a living tapestry of vulnerability and presence.
Technically, the dance responds almost literally to Muhly’s shifting sonic landscape, but never in a simplistic way. Instead, it is precise, articulate, and deeply connected, offering hidden complexities. There is an elegant play between balance, suspension, and control, each dancer receiving movement as though passing a secret from body to body. In its quietness, it becomes profound.
Veins of Water, choreographed by Maud le Pladec creeps up on us like a siren’s call, the kind where you think you’re resisting it until you realise you’ve already surrendered. At first, we aren’t sure where we stand with it. And then, somewhere along the way, it tricks us, pulls us under, and we find ourselves completely absorbed. The three dancers of the work move with a strange and compelling mix of gymnastic sharpness and an almost sensual, otherworldly creature-like lure. The title’s poetic promise ripples through the choreography: continuous movement, technically relentless, flowing with such a pressure and control that when the piece finally releases, the audience releases with it. A hypnotic work, unsettling, seductive, and beautifully sustained.
The final piece, The Only Tune, directed and choreographed by Mihael Keegan-Dolan, hits with an unexpected and deeply emotional force. The Only Tune is one of Muhly’s most haunting works, a murder ballad originally adapted for American folk singer Sam Amidon, who joins the company live onstage. His raw, folk timbre at times gentle, at times rasping with pain merges with squeaking chairs, body percussion, and ghostly screams woven into the score by the performers. The effect is intimate and enormous at once.
Keegan-Dolan wisely avoids retelling the story literally embedded in the ballad. Instead, he gives us dancing skeletons, strange, cartoonish creatures that somehow felt more human than most humans. Bouffonesque, mocking, funny, and devastating. This simple physical theatre, rich in irony and dark humour, becomes overwhelmingly moving. The staging is bold and challenging, confronting the audience with Amidon standing in a noose as the final work of the triptych begins. It gives the piece an air of danger, of the uncanny, of folklore bleeding into flesh. It’s rare to feel a piece that both laughs at us and mourns with us, but this one does. A special, unforgettable work.
Overall, the evening unfolds like a journey through Muhly’s musical psyche, to surrender to visceral humanity. The Britten Sinfonia are magnificent, giving the music a pulse that feels alive in the room. Marking Time stands easily as one of the most affecting and audacious bills at Sadler’s Wells this year.
***** Five stars
Reviewed by: Stephanie Osztreicher
