MARK MORRIS, born on this date, is an American dancer, choreographer and director whose work is acclaimed for its craftsmanship, ingenuity, humor, and at times eclectic musical accompaniments. Morris is popular among dance aficionados, the music world, as well as mainstream audiences.
Morris grew up in Seattle, Washington, in a family that appreciated music and dance and nurtured his budding talents; his father Joe taught him to read music and his mother Maxine introduced him to flamenco and ballet. Joe was a high school teacher while Maxine cared for the children at home. Morris had two older sisters, Marianne and Maureen. Everyone in his family were performers, playing instruments, singing in chorus, and dancing. In grade school Morris’s neighborhood population changed, with many Black and Asian families moving in, and many white families moving out, with exceptions such as the Morrises. This led to flourishing art from many different cultures, including a Japanese Bon Odori festival, as well as a Samoan dance ensemble at Morris’s high school, influencing Morris’s later interest in dance cultures outside of Western dance. He began Spanish dance training with Verla Flowers at age eight. Flowers also introduced Morris to ballet, which was considered an effeminate art form even then. He also participated in a folk dance group, the Koleda Folk Ensemble, for many years of his childhood, which is said to have had a profound effect on his later choreography.
Throughout Morris’s childhood he experienced discrimination for appearing effeminate, which contributed to much of his later choreography. Koleda had a variety of sexual identities and orientations, which is why it was so important to him. By age 14 he had choreographed his first modern piece, and by 15 his first ballet piece.
In November 1980, Morris got together a group of his friends and put on a performance of his own choreography and called them the Mark Morris Dance Group. For the first several years, the company gave just two annual performances—at On the Boards in Seattle, Washington, and at Dance Theater Workshop in New York. In 1984 he was invited to The American Dance Festival as part of the young choreographers and composers program. In 1986, the company was featured on the nationally televised Great Performances – Dance in America series on PBS.
In 1988, Morris was approached by Gerard Mortier, then the head of the Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie in Brussels. Mortier needed a replacement when Maurice Béjart, who had held the position of Director of Dance for over 20 years, suddenly left and took his company with him. After seeing the Mark Morris Dance Group give one performance, Mortier offered Morris the position. His company, from 1988 to 1991, became the Monnaie Dance Group Mark Morris, the resident company at la Monnaie where Morris was given well-equipped offices and studios; full health insurance for him, his staff and dancers; an orchestra and chorus at his disposal; and one of the great stages of Europe on which to dance.
In 1990, Morris and Mikhail Baryshnikov established the White Oak Dance Project. He continued to create works for this company until 1995.
Morris is also an acclaimed ballet choreographer, most notably with the San Francisco Ballet, for which he has created eight works. He has also received commissions from such companies as American Ballet Theatre, Boston Ballet, and the Paris Opera Ballet. He has worked extensively in opera, directing and choreographing productions for the Metropolitan Opera, the New York City Opera, English National Opera, and the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, among others. He directed and choreographed King Arthur for English National Opera in June 2006, and in May 2007 he directed and choreographed Orfeo ed Euridice for the Metropolitan Opera.
He is the recipient of 11 honorary doctorates.
Notable works by Morris include Gloria, set to Vivaldi; Championship Wrestling, based on an essay by Roland Barthes; L’Allegro, il Penseroso ed il Moderato; Dido and Æneas; The Hard Nut, his version of The Nutcracker set in the 1970s; Grand Duo; The Office; Greek to Me; a dance version of the Virgil Thomson–Gertrude Stein opera Four Saints in Three Acts; the ballet A Garden; V, and All Fours. In 2006, he premiered his Mozart Dances, commissioned by the New Crowned Hope Festival and Mostly Mozart Festival in conjunction with the 250th anniversary of the birth of Mozart; and in 2008, his controversial Romeo & Juliet, On Motifs of Shakespeare, set to Prokofiev’s recently discovered, original scenario and score, had its premiere. In 2011, he premiered the 150th work of his professional career, Festival Dance, to critical acclaim during sold-out performances at his dance center in Brooklyn.
Morris and his Dance Group collaborated with cellist Yo-Yo Ma in Falling Down Stairs, a film by Barbara Willis Sweete available on volume 2 of Ma’s Emmy-winning Inspired by Bach series. There, Morris choreographed a dance based on Bach’s Third Suite for Unaccompanied Cello, which Ma performs. Sweete’s film depicts the performance as well as the evolution of the dance. Morris has also collaborated with visual artists such as Isaac Mizrahi, Howard Hodgkin, Charles Burns and Stephen Hendee.
In 2001 his company moved into its first permanent headquarters in the United States, the Mark Morris Dance Center, in Brooklyn, at 3 Lafayette Avenue in the Fort Greene neighborhood. 2001 also marked the establishment of the School at the Mark Morris Dance Center. In addition the Mark Morris Dance Group, the center houses rehearsal space for the dance community, outreach programs for local children and persons with Parkinson’s disease, and a school offering dance classes to students of all ages.