Notes Toward a Supreme Fiction (2014)

A collaboration between jazz musicians and Hope Mohr Dance rooted in studio-based dialogue about what it means to improvise. The sound aesthetic of the work draws from the pioneering electric period of Miles Davis in the 1970s. Featuring lead musician and composer Henry Hung (trumpet), with associate musicians Michael Coleman (keyboards), Noah Phillips (guitar), and Patrick Korte (drums).

Core creative questions:
How do you balance authorship with dancer agency?
How do you collide composition with improvisation?
How do jazz musicians approach improvisation, and how can that inform choreographic thinking?

"Improvisation is a word for something which can’t keep a name; if it does stick around long enough to acquire a name, it has begun to move toward fixity. Improvisation tends in that direction.”
--Steve Paxton

Collaborators
Dancers: Jeremy Bannon-Neches, Lindsey Renee Derry, James Graham, Roche Janken, David Schleiffers, Tegan Schwab
Music: Henry Hung Group
Design: David Szlasa

Performance History
Premiere: ODC Theater, April 10-13, 2014
Additional Performances: The Battery, San Francisco

Credits
Notes Toward a Supreme Fiction was made possible through support from the Zellerbach Family Foundation, the William & Flora Hewlett Foundation, commissioners Sal Gutierrez, Mary Anderson and Catherine Conway Honig, and from many other generous individuals.  Special thanks to Jim Nadel of the Stanford Jazz Workshop.

Writing About Process
unresolved questions for notes toward a supreme fiction

Press
"[T]ransparent [dances] because of the clarity and intensity that these fabulous dancers brought to their tasks. Their presence burnt itself into your retina and your soul.”
-- Rita Felciano, “Think Again: Three Provocative Premieres,” S.F. Bay Guardian, April 16, 2014

Radio Interview on Open Air with David Latulippe, originally broadcast on April 3, 2014 at 1pm. Begin listening at minute 25.
-David Latulippe, “Open Air“, April 3rd, 2014