In C, Sasha Waltz & Guests/London Sinfonietta Review 4*
London Sinfonietta and Sasha Waltz and Guests joined forces in In C, part of the Southbank Multitudes Festival
The American composer Terry Riley’s In C is made up of 53 musical phrases to be played in a system of collective improvisation. Its repetitive patterns hide an almost infinite variety of options and combinations; premiered in 1964, it’s widely considered the first piece of minimalism.
Riley, however, was less concerned with structural minimalism than with creating a work that would transport the players, so that they would almost be having “visions” as they played. Remember, this was the psychedelic 1960s.
Spool forward almost half a century and the work presented at the Queen Elizabeth Hall by Sasha Waltz & Guests could perhaps be described as the visions In C inspired in the German choreographer.
So, Waltz developed 53 movement phrases with the dancers given the freedom to decide how often and how they are performed in what Waltz calls “constructive collective thinking.” It helps to remember that the piece, which premiered in 2021, was mostly created during lockdown, when the collective was practically non existent.
It starts with a multitude pouring onto the crepuscular, red-tinged stage. In total silence the figures shuffle around forming groupings that soon dissolve into different formations, a little like musical notes seeking their proper place in a score.
Slowly the 12 musicians of the London Sinfonietta leave the collective and take their places on the margin of the stage to the left of the audience.
A glockenspiel sounds the first notes, the lights go up and 11 dancers in casual, almost scruffy costumes (Jasmine Lepore) start moving.
At first their movements are limited: a perfectly coordinated group of three downstage stretch arms forward, then rotate both arms sideways, bend knees, turn around, repeat. Elsewhere other groupings are doing their own thing, but not for long.
The sense you get is that of a well-knit whole where individual choices and improvisations in parallel with the music, but not necessarily dictated by it, never create a dissonance.
The pairings and groupings change constantly. Sometimes the individuals appear to be dancing for themselves; sometimes they connect with each other. Sometimes, too, they show their awareness of the orchestra.
In C, Sasha Waltz & Guests/London Sinfonietta. Photo: Pete Woodhead
Lighting design by Sasha Waltz and Olaf Danilsen projects colour onto a screen upstage: lime green, orange, blue, colours that subtly define sections of the performance.
At its best this combination of minimalist music and movement is truly hypnotic, an effect intensified by the dancers’ total immersion in their performance, and the London Sinfonietta’s splendid playing.
Sasha Waltz & Guests has been going since 1993 as a vehicle for the choreographer’s insatiable curiosity and willingness to experiment. Looking back over reviews of works she’s brought to London in the past decade or so, I was reminded of truly brilliant work, like her reinterpretation of The Rite of Spring, alongside really disappointing pieces like Körper.
In C falls somewhere in between – not one of her best by any stretch of the imagination, but enjoyable enough and at about 65 minutes (the duration can vary) eminently digestible.
© Teresa Guerreiro
(Banner image credit: In C, Sasha Waltz & Guests. Photo: Pete Woodhead)
In C by Sasha Waltz & Guests/London Sinfonietta was at the Queen Elizabeth Hall on 29 April 2025 as part of the Multitudes Festival (23 April – 3 May) All info about the festival here