SteadyTumbling

Opening tonight at BAM: Einstein on the Beach:

Einstein on the Beach, An Opera in Four Acts
Robert Wilson
Philip Glass
Lucinda Childs

“Einstein On The Beach changed my life. Everything I thought musical theater was, abruptly wasn’t. St. Paul had his road to Damascus; mine was the Brooklyn-bound No. 4 train to Atlantic Avenue.”

—Bernard Holland, The New York Times

In 1976, audiences around the globe experienced a collective dream. Time slowed, sound tumbled everywhere and nowhere, and cryptic images froze in light. It was the collaboration of the century: Robert Wilson and Philip Glass, two chief manipulators of artistic time, joined forces in the name of another time-bender, Einstein, to create a visual, kinetic, and musical work that forever revolutionized the landscape of artistic achievement. Following critically acclaimed revivals in 1984 and 1992, Einstein on the Beach returns this fall as part of BAM’s 150th anniversary celebrations.

With no story, hero, or heroine, Einstein unfolds as a hypnotic tableau, inspired by the poetic idea of a genius and propelled by Glass’ sublime score. A cosmic chorus of syllables, numbers, streams of consciousness, and enigmatic poems–punctuated by Lucinda Childs’ choreography–unfurls beneath Wilson’s spectacular set, enlivening this epic, seminal masterwork of 20th-century performance.