new video loaded: Dancing With Gus Solomons Jr.
transcript
Dancing With Gus Solomons Jr.
"I am playing the instrument as hard as it can be played, given the instrument."
When I look at myself, I think, Wow, he’s an old man. He’s still doing that. But people seem to respond to it. And I think it’s because I am playing the instrument as hard as it can be played, given the instrument. Oh, [laughs], yes, my body is my friend and my body is my enemy. I had spinal fusion in 2012. So, my spine now, instead of having 24 movable joints, has 12. Despite injury, I just keep doing it. And I think that’s because of what Merce gave us, the idea that there were infinite possibilities. So, if you couldn’t do this, you could do that. Like singing — all singing isn’t grand opera and all dancing isn’t ballet. And the range of movement that is available to us is absolutely infinite. As I got older, being on stage was more intimidating when the stage was empty, because the thing that you lose is the ability to devour space, when you lose the physical strength to move quickly through it. I just enjoy the idea of performing, the sensation of performing, the ability to become — to transform myself physically and/or emotionally into someone else or something else. That still excites me.
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