Ruth St. Denis, Ted Shawn and their Denishawn Dancers Souvenir Program, 1926, 1925
Ruth St. Denis, Ted Shawn and their Denishawn Dancers Souvenir Program, 1926, 1925 [Cover] [Inside Cover]
Facing West From California's Shores
Facing west from California's shores,
inquiring, tireless, seeking what is yet unfound,
I, a child, very old, over waves, towards the house of maternity, the land of migrations, look afar,
Look off the shores of my Western sea, the circle almost circled;
For starting westward from Hindustan, from the vales of Kashmere,
From Asia, from the North, from the God, the sage, and the hero,
From the south, from the flowery penisulas and the spice islands,
Long having wander'd since, round the earth having wander'd.
Now I face again, very pleas'd and joyous,
(But where is what I started for so long ago?
Any why is it yet unfound?)
-From Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass
Ruth St. Denis and Ted Shawn at the Taj Mahal}
Home Again:
Ruth St. Denis, Ted Shawn and the Denishawn Dancers, after a tour of a year and a half in Japan, China, Malay Peninsula, Burma, India, Ceylon, Indo-China and the Philippine Islands, are presenting to America their first "gleanings from Buddha fields." This Company, all American-born and American-trained, are the first American Ballet to visit the Orient and they made a longer and more extensive tour than that of any dancing or other theatrical company previously in the Orient. Everywhere they were received with great enthusiasm, and the consensus of opinion was that the Denishawn Dancers presented to the rest of the world a new light on America. A nation famous for its mechanical genius and material success had sent to the Old World what the Calcutta Statesman considered was "the most artistic entertainment the West has offered to the East."
They, in turn, have drunk deep from the marvellous sources of inspiration to be had from these ancient civilizations and exotic people. The present program, while varied, colorful and of substantial artistic merit is only a small part of the material which they have secured and which in subsequent seasons will be produced.
{Ruth St. Denis, Ted Shawn and the Denishawn Dancers, Municipal Theater, Singapore}
Music Visualization:
This year's program is divided into three sections. The first section represents that contribution to the art of the dance which is most characteristically American, the visualization of classical music. The second section, Straussiana, deals with an European theme in a continental setting, and the third, and longest section, presents the dance rhythms of the Orient.
The phrase "music visualization" was evolved by Miss St. Denis some years ago to avoid thos misused and inadequate terms "interpretive" and "classic", as related to dancing. The purpose is a more careful rendering of the actual mechanical structure of the music into correlative values of movement, while at the same time preserving the emotional color; not attempting to tell a dramatic narrative nor to display technique for its own sake.The first essential is the careful and exact rendering of the composition into its visible counterpart in dance. During the month of June, 1926, this Company played a return engagement in Singapore at the beautiful Municipal Theatre there, and then took a vacation of four weeks, during which time most of the music visualization numbers of this program were created, as well as the Burmese and Chinese ballets, of the third section which had their premiere in Singapore, at the end of that time.
Straussiana:
Some very advanced thinkers claim that our leading exponents of jazz music will be considered by the coming generations with the same reverence and respect that we give the great classic composers. Certainly there are grounds for believing this to be possible when one considers the present status of Johann Strauss. Johann Strauss was the most brilliant member of a family of popular composers and is spoken of as the "Waltz King." His music was written for light operettas, for ballroom dancing, and he had in his day the same relative position as that of a "Jazz King" in America today. Yet only fifty years after the death of Johann Strauss, all the great symphony orchestras of the world are playing many of his compositions with the same serious treatment as is given to the great symphonies.
Mr. Shawn has taken as his background, Vienna at about the time of the popularity of the Brothers Strauss. It is the hour just before the theaters pour out their audiences into the night. Waitresses are seen attending to the wants of the casual customers who patrsection (sic) of Vienna life. All danced to melodies of the fam moments with gossip. The theatre crowd enters, the bourgeoisie, hussars, ladies of the evening, a prima donna, a flower girl, a ballerina and her ancient protector, are some of the many characters that flit through this cross section of Vienna life. All danced to melodies of the famous Johann, Josef and Edouard Strauss. The hussars dance a military figure to the Radetsky March, which is the best known composition of the father of these geniuses, and the curtain falls upon a happy throng dancing to the immortal strains of theBlue Danube, and one feels that they are going to dance through the night until day.
The choreography by Ted Shawn, who dances the part of a Captain of the Hussars, Miss St. Denis is the temperamental but beautiful prima donna, Miss Humphrey, the ballerina. The music has been arranged by Clifford Vaughan from compositions of Johann, Josef and Edouard Strauss. The scenes are by the Robert Law Studios, New York. The uniforms by Russell Uniform Company, New York, and the shoes by Barney, New York. Costumes of Miss St. Denis and the ladies by Miss Pearl Wheeler. {Ruth St. Denis and Ted Shawn] { Anne Douglas, Ted Shawn, Ernestine Day.}
Momiji Gari
{Ted Shawn as both Demon and Lad Sarashina: Photo by Hirano-Tokio}
Japan has the most highly organized theatres in the Orient. The theatres of Tokyo and other big cities of Japan are colossal institutions, rivaling even the greatest of our own country, and have phases of organization which we would do well to copy. The dance art of Japan is also on as high a level as that of any other country of the Orient and is infinitely more varied. There was such a wealth of material from which to choose that it became difficult to concentrate upon one thing for this immediate tour.
Choice finally fell upon Momiji Gari which was written fifty odd years ago when the greatest actor of all Japanese history, Danjuro Ichikawa, the Ninth, was living. It was being performed at one of the other leading theatres in Tokyo during the entire month of the Denishawn engagement at the Imperial Theatre, and the present star of Momiji Gari in Japan is Koshiro Matsumoto, who himself is a disciple of the great Danjuro and holds first place among the great actor-dancers of Japan. Mr. Koshiro also heads the greatest of the five guilds of dance in Japan, and he and his assistant teachers were engaged to instruct the Denishawn Dancers in the art of Japanese dancing for a four hour morning period every day for thirty-six days. Mr. Shawn visited the theatre where Momiji Gari was playing each night, as that dance drama came early enough to allow him to still get back to the Imperial Theatre in time to make up for his own performance.
The original version of Momiji Gari lasts nearly fifty minutes and is accompanied by three kinds of orchestras, who sing as well as play, and in the Japanese production, the dancers speak as well as dance. During the thirteen months intervening between the first Denishawn season in Japan and their return Mr. Shawn planned his adaptation of Momiji Gari, and cabled back his decision to present a Denishawn version of Momiji Gari to America, to the Imperial Theatre. Upon his return to Japan, the costumes, wigs and properties had been prepared for him and he rehearsed daily under the personal supervision of Koshiro Matsumoto, who expressed his most hearty approval of the new and condensed varsion (sic).
The Story is as follows:
Koremochi, a general, going to a famous spot in the mountains to view the maple leaves in autumn, finds a picnic in progress, and after invitations joins the party. He is entertained by the dancing of the Lady Sarashina and her attendents, and plied with drugged wine, falls asleep. In a dream the Mountain God warns him that what has appeared to be a beautiful court lady is really a foul demon in disguise bent upon destroying him-and he rouses just in time to do battle with the demon undisguised. Mr. Shawn plays the role of the court Lady-Demon; Mr. Steares the General, Mr. Weidman, the Mountain God.
White Jade {Ruth St. Denis in "White Jade"}
Abstract themes have always interested Ruth St. Denis and her dances are never created so happily as when taken from some religious source. Many remember with delight her Kuan Yin, the Chinese Goddess of Mercy, and even in China itself this exquisite plastique evoked the deepest appreciation. The leading editorial of the North China Daily News of October 4, 1926, included the following paragraph:
"The finest example of the thought in a dance and perhaps the greatest artistic triumph of Miss St. Denis is the Kuan Yin which she performed during her opening in Shanghai. Here is an interplay of motion and repose, of color and shadows, of the exaltation of posture. Like a jewel of fire, a glance and one carries away the full story of Asia, the introspection of the oriental, the search not for action, but for peace and quiet. The goddess moves a finger, a slight gesture of the back of the hand, the peaceful posture of everlasting repose-all the arts are combined in reproducing the fairylike line of a delicate piece of porcelain."
During her stay in China, both in 1925 and 1926, Miss St. Denis continued her study of the sculptured Boddhisattvas and has evolved this new Chinoiserie, for which Mr. Vaughn has composed authentic music of fragile charm.
Ruth St. Denis, Ted Shawn and the Denishawn Dancers in the Orient From August 7th, 1925 to November 26th, 1926 {Imperial Theatre, Tokio, with Koshiro Matsumoto. Japan's Greatest Actor Dancer} {Peking-With Mei-Lan-Fang, First Artist of the Theatre in China, and Mary Ferguson} {Rangoon, Burma, on the Royal Lakes}{Rangoon: With U Po Sein, Famous Dancer}{Ruth St. Denis, Imani Bari Mosque, Lucknon, India}{The Denishawn Dancers at a Hindu Temple, Near Jubbulpore, India}{Ted Shawn with Sinhalese Devil Dancers at Kandy, Ceylon}{Ruth St. Denis at the Barbudon Temple, near Djoika Karta, Java} {Ruth St. Denis and Ted Shawn Watching Igout Dancing, Baguio, P.I.}
General Wu's Farewell to his Wife
In Peking Miss St. Denis and Mr. Shawn were honored by a special performance of Mei Lan Fang, the greatest actor-dancer of China. This was arranged by the Peking Society of Fine Arts, of which Miss Mary Ferguson is president. This performance was given on the stage of the theatre in which the Denishawn Dancers were appearing, after their performance, at midnight, for an invited audience.
Upon this occasion Mei Lan Fang performed a drama with his entire Company which lasted nearly an hour. General Wu's Farewell to his Wife, is not the original name of the opus, but is the name given to the ten-minute adaptation and condensation which Miss St. Denis has made from this theme. The costume which Miss Douglas wears was a present to Miss St. Denis from Mr. Mei.
The story is as follows: The General suffers overwhelming defeat in battle. He returns to his home, and his wife, who has been rowing on the lake and in the garden gathering flowers, tries to comfort him. She tries to divert him with the dancing of her handmaids. Finally he tells her that, surrounded on all sides death is certain, and saying goodbye, attempts to leave. The wife seizes his sword, with which she dances and commits suicide rather than outlive him one moment.
Characters: The General . . . Charles Weidman
His Wife . . . Anne Douglas
His Mother . . . Ernestine Day
The Property Man . . . George Steares
Dancers . . . Misses Lawrence, Graham, Howry and Garret
The music is especially composed by Clifford Vaughan. The conventions of the Chinese theatre are somewhat followed in that the property man is accepted as invisible by a convention of long standing and the change of scene is suggested by a rearrangement of furniture. {Anne Douglas}
A Javanese Court Dancer
The art of dance in Java, while not so varied as that of Japan, and without the background of an organized theatre, is on an equally high level. Miss St. Denis and Mr. Shawn with eleven of their dancers, were invited to the court of the Sultan of Djockjakarta, where they witnessed a "Wayong Wong," or native dance drama, accompanied by the gamelan orchestra, which lasted from early morning until midnight.
The daughters of the Sultan are all trained from early childhood to be accomplished dancers and during their years of performing, before their king and father, they are called by the name "Serimpi." Other young ladies of the Sultan's household, but not of royal birth, also have a long and arduous training as dancers, and these are called "bedjojo." The serimpi dance always four together, and the bedjojo alway a group of nine.
Miss St. Denis is giving her impression of the movement quality of these court dancers of Java, to music composed by Mr. Clifford Vaughan, which has preserved in the Western orchestration a remarkable amount of the color and atmosphere of the native orchestra which is made almost entirely of gongs. {Charles Weidman as a living Buddha, Ted Shawn as a Buddhist Monk at Borobudin, Java.}
A Burmese Yein Pwe
In Burma the popular form of entertainment is a combination of native orchestra, dancers and clowns, who grace any festive occasion from a dinner party to a religious holiday at the Shwe Dagon Pagoda. They are tireless and inexhaustible with their dancing, singing, improvised dialogue and risque jokes, with now and then a virtuoso performance on the part of some member of the native orchestra.
The almost acrobatic quality of the dancing was a distinct surprise to Miss St. Denis and Mr. Shawn, as the costume of the Burmese dancer as seen in pictures would lead one to believe that it was impossible to move the lower part of the body. However, some of the native dancers achieve truly startling and sensational feats in spite of the hampering, long and very tight skirts. The dancers have great charm, their rhythms are varied and never maintained long enough to be monotonous, and the postures are unique.
Danciing is so popular in Burma that the Denishawn Dancers saw innumerable Pwes, and eventually received training from the greatest dancer of Burma, U Po Sein.
The costumes were all made in Ragoon by the same dressmakers who make the costumes of the native dancers, and of the same materials. The instruments of a native orchestra ere purchased complete. Miss St. Denis produced this ballet in Singapore with the assistance of Miss Doris Humphrey who aided her in rehearsals and created her own solo. The music is by Mr. Clifford Vaughan. {Doris Humphrey}
The Cosmic Dance of Siva
Siva is the active or creative principle of the Hindu trinity,-Brahma, Vishnu, Siva, and is often represented in bronze figures at "Nataraja," which means, "Lord of the Dance." Dr. Ananda Coomarawamy in his book of essays entitled "The Dance of Siva" says, "The dance, in fact represents His five activities (Tancakritya), viz: Srishti (overlooking, creation, evolution), Hthiti (preservation, support), Samhara (destruction, evolution), Tirobhava (veiling, embodiment, illusion, and also, giving rest), Anugraha (release, salvation, grace). These, separately considered are the activities of the deities Brahma, Vishnu, Rudra, Mahesvara, and Sadasiva."
"The essential significance of Siva's Dance is threefold: first it is the image of his Rhythmic Play as the Source of all Movement within the Cosmos, which is Represented by the Arch; Secondly, the Purpose of his Dance is to Release the Countless souls of men from the Snare of Ilusion; Thirdly, the Place of the Dance,Chidambaram, the Center of the Universe, is within the Heart."
"In the night of Brahma, Nature is inert, and cannot dance till Siva wills it: He rises from His rapture and dancing sends through inert matter pulsing waves of awakening sound., and lo! matter also dances appearing as a glory round about Him. Dancing, He sustains its manifold phenomena. In the fulness of time, still dancing, he destroys all forms and names by fire and gives new rest. This is poetry; but nonetheless, science.
Mr. Shawn hs made study of the Nataraja, and the deep significance which lies behind this image. The music was written fro Mr. Shawn by Lily Strickland Anderson, the American composer who has lived for the last six years in India. {Ted Shawn at the Siva Temple Mahabalipuram, India}
India
In "The Soul of India, an interpretation," Miss St. Denis first shows us India poor, deseased (sic), aged and dying, that aspect of India which first meets the eye of the traveler and which is so appalling. But India's riches lie in her spiritual power and it takes the vision of the Yogi to see reality.
The Denishawn Dancers traveled in India for five months from the Bay of Bengal to the Arabian Sea, from the mountain passes of Baluchistan and the Himalayas on the north to the island of Ceylon, which lies below the southernmost tip, and were fascinated by the endless pageant of colorful typses of peoples and their costumes. The Bunnia Bazaar is one of the bazaars of Bombay to which come Pathans and Punjabis from the north and the Tamils from the south; Hindus and Mohammedans, women street sweepers and veiled "Purdah" ladies, Marwari, Bengali, Madrasi, all come to the Bunnia Bazaar to buy shawls from Cashmere, brass from Benares, jewels from Rajputana, gold cloth saris and chuddars from Delhi. The music for this Bazaar scene was arranged by Mr. Clifford Vaughan, from the compositions of Lily Strickland Anderson. The draperies and costumes are all from India and the choreography is by Ruth St. Denis. {Sinhalese Devil Dance}{ A Delhi Nautch}
Back Inside Cover {Chanchal Banerjea of the Indian School of Oriental Art (Tagore or Modern Bengali Shool (sic) made this sketch of Ruth St. Denis' Nautch Danceduring the Denishawn season at the Empire Theatre in Calcutta}
"His form is everywhere; all-pervading in His Siva-Sakti:
Chidambaram is everywhere, everywhere His dance:
As Siva is all and omnipresent,
Everywhere is Siva's gracious dance made manifest.
His five-fold dances are temporal and timeless,
His five-fold dances are His Five Activities.
By His grace He performs the five acts,
This is the sacred dance of Uma-Sahaya!
He dances with Water, Fire, Wind and Ether,
Thus our Lord dances ever in the court.
Visible to those who pass over Maya and Mahamaya
(illusion and super-illusion)
Our Lord dances His eternal dance.
The form of the Sakti is all delight-
This united delight is Uma's body:
This form of Sakti arising in time
And uniting the twain is the dance,
His body is Akas, the dark cloud therein is Muyalaka,
The eight quarters are His eight arms,
The three lights are His three eyes,
Thus becoming, He dances in our body as the congregation."
This is His dance. Its deepest significance is felt when it is realized that it takes place with the heart and the self. Everywhere is God: that Everywhere is the heart. Thus also we find another verse:
"The dancing foot, the sound of the tinkling bells,
The songs that are sung and the carying (sic) steps,
The songs that are sung and the varying steps,
Find out these within yourself, then shall your fetters fall away."
To this end, all else but the thought of God must be cast out of the heart, that He alone may abide and dance therein."
-From "The Dance of Siva" by Anada Coomaraswamy
Back Cover {Wm. Knabe & Co. Established 1836 Acknowledged the World's Best Piano The Knabe Piano used exclusively by Denishawn Dancers Ampico Recordings Wm. Knabe & Co., Incorporated, New York Baltimore}