Twyla Tharp

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Twyla Tharp
Twyla Tharp.jpg
2004
Born (1941-07-01) July 1, 1941 (age 77)
Portland, Indiana, U.S.[1]
Occupation Choreographer, dancer
Years active 1960s–present
Awards Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Choreography, 2003 Movin' Out
Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Choreography 1985 Baryshnikov by Tharp With American Ballet Theatre
Tony Award for Best Choreography 2003 Movin' Out
Website www.TwylaTharp.org

Twyla Tharp (/ˈtwaɪlə θɑːrp/; born July 1, 1941) is an American dancer, choreographer, and author who lives and works in New York City. In 1966, she formed her own company Twyla Tharp Dance. Her work often uses classical music, jazz, and contemporary pop music.

From 1971 to 1988, Twyla Tharp Dance toured extensively around the world, performing original works. In 1973, Tharp choreographed Deuce Coupe to the music of The Beach Boys for the Joffrey Ballet. Deuce Coupe is considered to be the first crossover ballet. Later she choreographed Push Comes to Shove (1976), which featured Mikhail Baryshnikov and is now thought to be the best example of the crossover ballet.

In 1988, Twyla Tharp Dance merged with American Ballet Theatre, since which time ABT has held the world premieres of 16 of Tharp's works.

On May 24, 2018, she was awarded the Doctor of Arts degree by Harvard University.[2]

Biography[edit]

Early years[edit]

Tharp was born in 1941 on a farm in Portland, Indiana, the daughter of Lucille and William Tharp.[1] She was named for Twila Thornburg, the "Pig Princess" of the 89th Annual Muncie Fair in Indiana as related in her own book The Creative Habit: Learn It and Use It for Life (2007).

As a young child, Tharp spent a few months each year living with her Quaker grandparents on their farm in Indiana. Her mother insisted she take lessons in dance (ballet, tap, jazz, and modern), and piano, drum, viola, violin, shorthand, German, and French. In 1950, Tharp's family—younger sister Twanette, twin brothers Stanley and Stanford, and her parents—moved to Rialto, California.[3] Her parents opened a drive-in movie theater, where Tharp worked. The drive-in was on the corner of Acacia and Foothill, the major east–west artery in Rialto and the path of Route 66.[4] She attended Pacific High School in San Bernardino and studied at the Vera Lynn School of Dance, and ballet with Beatrice Collenette.[5] Tharp, a "devoted bookworm",[6] admits that her schedule left little time for a social life.[7] Tharp attended Pomona College in California but later transferred to Barnard College in New York City, where she graduated with a degree in art history in 1963. It was in New York that she studied with Richard Thomas, Martha Graham and Merce Cunningham.[8] In 1963 Tharp joined the Paul Taylor Dance Company.

Dances and ballets[edit]

In 1965, Tharp choreographed her first dance Tank Dive[9] and formed her own company, Twyla Tharp Dance.[10] Her work often utilizes classical music, jazz, and contemporary pop music. From 1971 to 1988, Twyla Tharp Dance toured extensively around the world, performing original works.

In 1973, Tharp choreographed Deuce Coupe to the music of The Beach Boys for the Joffrey Ballet. Deuce Coupe is considered to be the first crossover ballet. Later she choreographed Push Comes to Shove (1976), which featured Mikhail Baryshnikov and is now thought to be the best example of the crossover ballet.[citation needed]

In 1988, Twyla Tharp Dance merged with American Ballet Theatre, since which time ABT has held the world premieres of 16 of Tharp's works. In 2010, they had a total of 20 of her works in their repertory. Tharp has since choreographed dances for: Paris Opera Ballet, The Royal Ballet, New York City Ballet, Boston Ballet, Joffrey Ballet, Pacific Northwest Ballet, Miami City Ballet, American Ballet Theatre, Hubbard Street Dance and Martha Graham Dance Company. Tharp also created the dance roadshow Cutting Up (1991) with Mikhail Baryshnikov, which went on to tour and appeared in 28 cities over two months.[citation needed]

In the summer of 2000, Twyla Tharp Dance regrouped with entirely new dancers. This Tharp dance company also performed around the world. It was with this company that Tharp developed the material that would go on to become Movin' Out, an award-winning Broadway musical featuring the songs of Billy Joel and starring many of the dancers who were in the dance company.[citation needed]

In 2012, Tharp created the full-length ballet The Princess and the Goblin.[11] The ballet is based on George MacDonald's story The Princess and the Goblin and is Tharp's first to include children. The narrative ballet was co-commissioned by Atlanta Ballet and Royal Winnipeg Ballet and performed by both companies.

Tharp was the first Artist in Residency (A.I.R.) at Pacific Northwest Ballet in Seattle. During this time she created and premiered Waiting At The Station, a new work with music by R&B artist Allen Toussaint and sets & costumes by long-time collaborator Santo Loquasto.

Broadway[edit]

Tharp in 1981

In 1980, Tharp's work first appeared on Broadway with Twyla Tharp Dance performing When We Were Very Young, followed in 1981 by The Catherine Wheel, her collaboration with David Byrne at the Winter Garden. Wheel was broadcast on PBS, and had its soundtrack released on LP.

In 1985, her staging of Singin' in the Rain played at the Gershwin for 367 performances.[12]

Tharp premiered her dance musical Movin' Out, set to the music and lyrics of Billy Joel in Chicago in 2001.[13] The show opened on Broadway in 2002.[14] Movin' Out ran for 1,331 performances on Broadway. A national tour opened in January 2004. Movin' Out received 10 Tony nominations and Tharp was named Best Choreographer.[15]

Tharp opened a new show titled The Times They Are a-Changin', to the music of Bob Dylan in 2005 at The Old Globe Theatre in San Diego. The Times They are A-Changin' set the records for the highest grossing show and highest ticket sales as of the date of closing (March 2006).[16] It was also the first time a show received a second extension before the first preview. After this record setting run in California, the New York show ran for 35 previews and 28 performances.

In 2009, Tharp worked with the songs of Frank Sinatra to mount Come Fly with Me, which ran at the Alliance Theater in Atlanta and was the best selling four-week run as of the date of closing in 2009.[17] Renamed Come Fly Away, the show opened on Broadway in 2010 at the Marquis Theatre in New York and ran for 26 previews and 188 performances. Come Fly Away, was retooled and opened under the title Sinatra: Dance with Me at The Wynn Las Vegas in 2011. Come Fly Away National Tour opened in Atlanta, Georgia, in August 2011.

Film, television and print[edit]

Tharp collaborated with film directors Miloš Forman on Hair (1978), Ragtime (1980) and Amadeus (1983); Taylor Hackford on White Nights (1985); and James Brooks on I'll Do Anything (1994).

Television credits include choreographing Sue's Leg (1976) for the inaugural episode of the PBS program Dance in America,; co-producing and directing Making Television Dance (1977), which won the Chicago International Film Festival Award; and directing The Catherine Wheel (1983) for BBC Television. Tharp co-directed the award-winning television special "Baryshnikov by Tharp" in 1984.

Tharp has written three books: an early autobiography, Push Comes to Shove (1992; Bantam Books); The Creative Habit: Learn It and Use It for Life (2003, Simon & Schuster), translated into Spanish, Chinese, Russian, Korean, Thai and Japanese; The Collaborative Habit (2009, Simon & Schuster), also translated into Thai, Chinese and Korean. As an interesting point, Ms. Tharp indicated that The Creative Habit is about cybernetics, especially in the several Greek-themed creative exercises, such as the Coin Drop; the Coin Drop, as an exercise in extracting ordered meaning from chaos, is derived from the astrological muse, Urania, in that random coins falling onto a flat surface can be used to develop pattern analysis skills. The astrological theme is, in fact, an etymological underpinning of cybernetics' tradition of "guiding a boat" by sighting stellar references in a dynamic and synthetic way according to ancient Greek navigation.

Works chronology[edit]

Dances / ballets / theatre[edit]

  • Tank Dive 4/29/65
  • Stage Show 7/7/65
  • Stride 8/9/65
  • Cede Blue Lake 12/1/65
  • Unprocessed 12/1/65
  • Re-Moves 10/18/66
  • Twelve Foot Change 10/18/66
  • One, Two, Three 2/2/67
  • Jam 2/4/67
  • Disperse 4/27/67
  • Yancey Dance 7/1/67
  • Three Page Sonata 7/6/67
  • Forevermore 2/9/68
  • Generation 2/9/68
  • One Way 2/9/68
  • Excess, Idle, Surplus 4/25/68
  • Group Activities 1/13/69
  • After Suite 2/2/69
  • Medley 7/19/69
  • Dancing In The Streets 11/11/69
  • Sowing Of Seeds 6/7/70
  • The Willie Smith Series 7/10/70
  • Rose's Cross Country 8/1/70
  • Fugue, The 8/1/70
  • The One Hundreds 8/1/70
  • 11-Minute Abstract, Repertory 1965-70 11/16/70
  • The History of Up and Down, I and II 1/22/71
  • Sunrise, Noon, Sundown 5/28/71
  • Mozart Sonata K.545 8/1/71
  • Eight Jelly Rolls 9/16/71
  • Torelli 11/2/71
  • Piano Rolls 11/7/71
  • The Bix Pieces 4/14/71
  • The Raggedy Dances 10/26/72
  • Deuce Coupe (ballet) 2/8/73
  • As Time Goes By 10/10/73
  • In the Beginnings 1/26/74
  • All About Eggs 2/1/74
  • The Fugue on London Weekend Television 4/22/74
  • Twyla Tharp and Eight Jelly Rolls 5/12/74
  • Bach Duet 9/5/74
  • Deuce Coupe II 2/1/75
  • Sue's Leg 2/21/75
  • The Double Cross 2/21/75
  • Ocean's Motion 6/22/75
  • Rags Suite Duet 9/10/75
  • Push Comes To Shove 1/9/76
  • Sue's Leg, Remembering the Thirties 3/24/76
  • Give and Take 3/25/76
  • Once More Frank 7/12/76
  • Country Dances 9/4/76
  • Happily Ever After 11/3/76
  • After All 11/15/76
  • Cacklin' Hen 2/14/77
  • Fifty Ways To Leave Your Lover 5/12/77
  • Mud 5/12/77
  • Simon Medley 5/12/77
  • The Hodge Podge 5/12/77
  • 1903 2/2/79
  • Chapters and Verses 2/2/79
  • Baker's Dozen 2/15/79
  • Three Dances From The Film "Hair" 2/15/79
  • Three Fanfares 3/14/79
  • Brahms Paganini 2/8/80
  • Deuce Coupe III 2/8/80
  • Assorted Quartets 7/29/80
  • Third Suite 8/26/80
  • Short Stories 8/27/80
  • Uncle Edgar Dyed His Hair Red 2/28/81
  • The Catherine Wheel 9/22/81 (music by David Byrne)
  • Nine Sinatra Songs 10/15/82
  • Bad Smells 10/15/82
  • The Little Ballet 4/1/84
  • Telemann 11/4/83
  • Fait Accompli 11/8/83 (music by David Van Tieghem)
  • "The Golden Section" 11/8/83 (music by David Byrne) (also filmed for PBS)
  • Sinatra Suite 12/6/83
  • Bach Partita 12/9/83
  • Brahms/Handel (ballet), choreography by Tharp and Jerome Robbins 6/7/84
  • Sorrow Floats 7/5/84
  • Singin' in the Rain - Broadway 7/2/85
  • In The Upper Room 8/28/86 (music by Philip Glass)
  • Ballare 8/30/86
  • The Catherine Wheel III 2/2/87
  • Quartet 2/4/89
  • Bum's Rush 2/8/89
  • Rules of the Game 2/17/89
  • Everlast 2/21/89
  • Brief Fling 2/28/90
  • Grand Pas: Rhythm of the Saints 10/1/91 (music by Paul Simon)
  • Men's Piece 10/4/91
  • Octet 10/4/91
  • Sextet 1/30/92
  • Cutting Up: A Dance Roadshow 11/27/93
  • Bare Bones 11/27/93
  • Pergolesi 6/4/93
  • Demeter & Persephone 10/5/93
  • Waterbaby Bagatelles 4/30/94
  • "New Works" Twyla Tharp in Washington: Red, White & Blues" 9/13/94
  • How Near Heaven 3/3/95
  • Americans We 5/1/95
  • Jump Start 5/1/95
  • I Remember Clifford 8/9/95
  • Mr. Worldly Wise 12/9/95
  • The Elements 5/3/96
  • Sweet Fields 9/20/96
  • "66" 9/20/96
  • Heroes 9/20/96
  • Roy's Joys 8/18/97
  • Story Teller, The 10/29/97
  • Noir 1/30/98
  • Yemaya 3/13/98
  • Known By Heart Duet 8/6/98
  • Diabelli 10/22/98
  • Known By Heart 11/3/98
  • Grosse Sonate 7/1/98
  • Beethoven Seventh 1/22/00
  • The Brahms/Haydn Variations aka: Variations on a Theme by Haydn 3/21/00
  • Mozart Clarinet Quintet K. 581 7/6/00
  • Surfer At The River Styx 7/6/00
  • Westerly Round 6/23/01
  • Movin' Out - Chicago 6/25/02
  • Movin' Out - New York 10/24/02
  • Even The King 1/11/03
  • Movin' Out - US Tour 1/27/04
  • The Times They Are A-Changin' - California 2/9/06
  • Catherine Wheel Suite 5/11/06
  • The Times They Are A-Changin' - New York 10/26/06
  • NIGHTSPOT 3/28/08
  • Rabbit and Rogue 6/3/08
  • Opus 111 9/25/08
  • Afternoon Ball 9/25/08
  • Come Fly With Me 9/23/09
  • Come Fly Away 3/25/10
  • Sinatra: Dance With Me - 12/11/10
  • Armenia 4/23/11
  • Come Fly Away Tour 8/3/11
  • Scarlatti 10/13/11
  • The Princess and The Goblin - Atlanta 2/10/12
  • The Princess and the Goblin - Winnipeg 10/17/12
  • Treefrog in Stonehenge 07/26/13
  • Waiting at the Station 09/27/13
  • Come Fly Away (Ballet) 09/28/13
  • Beethoven Opus 130 2016

Collaborative work[edit]

Film[edit]

Video[edit]

  • Scrapbook Tape 10/25/82
  • The Catherine Wheel 3/1/83
  • Baryshnikov by Tharp / Push Comes to Shove 10/5/84
  • Twyla Tharp: Oppositions 4/24/96

Television[edit]

  • The Bix Pieces (series of productions) 1973
  • Making Television Dance 10/4/77
  • Dance Is A Man's Sport Too 1980
  • Confessions of a Cornermaker 10/13/81
  • Catherine Wheel, PBS 3/1/83
  • "The Golden Section" from Dance in America: Miami City Ballet 10/28/11

Books[edit]

Honors and awards[edit]

Twyla Tharp received two Emmy Awards, 19 honorary doctorates, the Vietnam Veterans of America President's Award, the 2004 National Medal of the Arts, and numerous grants including the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Fellowship. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and an Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

At the 1982 Barnard College commencement ceremonies, Tharp's alma mater awarded her its highest honor, the Barnard Medal of Distinction.

She received the Tony Award for Best Choreography and the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Choreography for the 2002 musical Movin' Out. She received a Drama Desk nomination for Outstanding Choreography for the musical Singin' in the Rain.

She was named a Kennedy Center Honoree for 2008.[18]

Tharp was inducted into the Academy of Achievement in 1993.[19]

From 2013 to 2014, the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery featured Tharp in the critically acclaimed "Dancing the Dream" exhibition as a pioneer of American modern dance.[20]

On May 24, 2018, she was awarded the Doctor of Arts degree by Harvard University.[2]

Awards by year[edit]

Personal life[edit]

Tharp has a son and a grandson.[21]

Bibliography[edit]

  • Tharp, Twyla (1992), Push Comes to Shove, Bantam Books, ISBN 0553073060
  • Tharp, Twyla (2006), The Creative Habit: Learn it and use it for life, Simon & Schuster, ISBN 0743235274
  • Tharp, Twyla (2013), The Collaborative Habit: Learn it and use it for life, Simon & Schuster, ISBN 1416576517

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b "Twyla Tharp". Encyclopædia Britannica. December 31, 2015. Retrieved Dec 23, 2016. 
  2. ^ a b https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2018/05/harvard-awards-seven-honorary-degrees/
  3. ^ James Hebert (January 29, 2006). "Twyla Tharp found a kindred spirit to inspire "The Times They Are A-Changin'" at Old Globe". The San Diego Union-Tribune. Retrieved February 16, 2009. 
  4. ^ Adams, John Anthony (2004). Rialto. Images Of America. Arcadia Publishing. p. 85. ISBN 0-7385-2892-7. Retrieved July 23, 2008. 
  5. ^ James Robert Parish, Twyla Tharp (Infobase Publishing 2009): 14-15. ISBN 9781438112114
  6. ^ "Tharp Is Back Where the Air Is Rarefied", by Gia Kourlas, The New York Times, March 5, 2010 (March 7, 2010 p. AR1 NY ed.). Retrieved 2010-03-07.
  7. ^ "Interview: Twyla Tharp Dancer and Choreographer". Academy of Achievement. 2007. p. 3. Archived from the original on August 8, 2008. Retrieved August 13, 2008. 
  8. ^ Craine, Debra and Judith Mackrell. (2010). The Oxford Dictionary of Dance, p. 450.
  9. ^ Kourlas, Gia (4 April 2015). "Twyla Tharp's 50 Years of Forward Movement". The New York Times. Retrieved 6 April 2015. 
  10. ^ "Twyla Tharp". Britannica Academic. Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 13 December 2016. 
  11. ^ Seibert, Brian (12 February 2012). "Toe Shoes That Carry a Princess to Victory". The New York Times. Retrieved 3 March 2012. 
  12. ^ Rich, Frank (1985-07-03). "THE STAGE: 'SINGIN' IN THE RAIN' OPENS". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2017-09-29. 
  13. ^ Segal, Lewis (2004-09-20). "'Movin' Out' as fast as they can". Los Angeles Times. ISSN 0458-3035. Retrieved 2017-09-29. 
  14. ^ "Billy Joel | American musician". Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved 2017-09-29. 
  15. ^ "THEATER/THE TONY AWARDS; How Twyla Tharp Learned to Tell a Tale". The New York Times. 2003-06-01. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2017-09-29. 
  16. ^ Marketing Statement from The Old Globe Theatre in San Diego
  17. ^ Marketing Statement from Alliance Theater
  18. ^ Andrew Gans (9 September 2008). "Streisand, Freeman, Tharp, Jones, Townshend and Daltrey Are 2008 Kennedy Center Honorees". Playbill. Archived from the original on 19 March 2009. Retrieved February 16, 2009. 
  19. ^ "Twyla Tharp Biography". Academy of Achievement. 2007. Archived from the original on September 17, 2008. Retrieved September 30, 2008. 
  20. ^ Macaulay, Alastair (March 6, 2014). "A Nation's Soul, Tapping and Twirling A Century of American Wonders, in 'Dancing the Dream'". New York Times. Retrieved 14 June 2015. 
  21. ^ Kourlas, Gia (3 February 2012). "Tharp's New Tale, Woven In Dance". The New York Times. Retrieved 3 March 2012. 

Sources[edit]

  • Siegel, Marcia B. Howling Near Heaven. New York: St. Martin's Press, 2006.

External links[edit]

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