River of Light

Featuring stunning lighting effects that create geometric patterns onstage, River of Light is an exploration in partnering, at times angular and other moments lyrical, for three interchanging couples.

Throughout his career, Peter Martins was a champion of contemporary American music, and choreographed to the music of Charles Wuorinen, the Pulitzer Prize-winning American composer, on four occasions. In 1998 Martins created the ballet River of Light as a 60th birthday tribute to Wuorinen, with the composer conducting the New York City Ballet orchestra for the work’s premiere performance. The score for the ballet is set to the final section of Wuorinen’s "Dante Trilogy", which consists of three modernist scores — "The Mission of Virgil" (1993), "The Great Procession "(1995), and "The River of Light" (1996) — which correspond to the three sections — Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso — of Dante’s epic poem The Divine Comedy.

19 minutes