Gluck — Orfeo ed Eurydice, Act II, Scene 1, Dance of the Furies

Suite: Orfeo ed Eurydice
Music: Gluck — Orfeo ed Eurydice, Act II, Scene 1, Dance of the Furies
- First entrance: m. 33-98; Group entrance: m. 284-367, cut m. 368-397, resume at m. 398-478.
Original choreography by: Isadora Duncan (1911)
Premiered: January 18, 1811, at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris
Categories: heroic dances

Reconstructed by Julia Levien.

Notes

Barbara Kane

Furies-Eumenides-Eriynes are Ancient Greek mythological creatures – often just 3 women who were created literarily to frighten the patriarchal forming societies of the danger of male dominance. This dance uses the floor and movement that varies very differently from Duncan’s previously mainly lyrical dances. Snake like hand gestures, use of contraction and what must have seemed to the audience of 1911 something just horrendously ugly and yet it had a deep impact because, as always, beauty (the music of Orpheus/Gluck) overcame their distrust of Orpheus and they let him pass on his search for Eurydice.

Nadia Chilkovsky Nahumck

Reference: Nahumck, Nadia Chilkovsky. Isadora Duncan: The Dances. Washington DC: The National Museum of Women in the Arts, 1994.

Duncan and Gluck were both impatient with "needless ornamentation." The Furies are portrayed as raw souls condemned often to useless labor, like Sisyphus lifting heavy stones only to have them "thunder impetuous down." They refuse Orpheus permission to enter the Gates of Hell in search of Eurydice, and terrify him with their bodily contortions, clawing hands, twisted arms and writhing torsos as they savagely pound fists against unyielding, invisible barriers. Finally, cowering together, they restrain their savagery, succumb to the pleading of Orpheus and allow him to pass. The figure ot Orpheus is not represented in this dance.

According to Greek mythology, the Furies were female deities assigned to administer vengeance and punishment upon earthly transgressors. In the Duncan choreography, they are condemned souls. The accompanying operatic text refers to them as, "howling hell hounds with foam-dripping fangs."

Cynthia Splatt

Reference: Duncan, Dorée; Carol Pratl and Cynthia Splatt (eds.) Life Into Art. Isadora Duncan and Her World. Foreword by Agnes de Mille. Text by Cynthia Splatt. W. W. Norton & Company, 1993. ISBN 0-393-03507-7

The dances for Gluck's Orpheus were remarkable in their scope. Isadora played one of the Blessed Spirits in the Elysian Fields but also the Furies in Hades. Her portrayal of the damned and demonic Furies was unlike any dance seen on stage before. Sweeping the stage with her hair, clawing the air with contorted fingers, mouthing unutterable screams, vainly writhing in hideously reptilian postures, she was repulsive to behold, the personification of impotent evil. This was dance at its ugliest—a terrifying portrayal of the dark side of soul. This was Modern Dance, unafraid of the reality. Even the once uncertain American audiences appreciated her work.

Videos

Title	Date	Dancers	Full Dance?	Notes
Furies	2017-04	Jennifer Sprowl	Yes
Lori Belilove & The Isadora Duncan Dance Company 2013-2014 Season Highlights	2014		No
Isadora and the American Jewish Intelligentsia	2000	Cathleen Deutscher, Beth Jucovy, Adrienne Ramm	No	Part II
Dances by Isadora: Furies	1997	Kelli Edwards, Sandra Zarotney-Keldsen	Yes
Duncan Dance Continuum	1994-06-03		Yes	Including the aria between Parts I and II
DDD Performance at Mountain View, CA	1994-03-25	Melinda McGee, Ensemble joins at 33:30	Yes
Dionysian Duncan Dancers Julia Morgan	1993-09	Ensemble	Yes
'Dance of the Furies' and 'Mussette' by Gluck, S.F. Duncan Dancers	1989-04-23	Ann Cogley, Mary Sano, Janice Blaisdell, Michelle Swanson	Yes
Isadora Duncan's 110th Birthday Celebration	1987	Lori Belilove	Yes	Only Part I
Dionysian Duncan Dancers, Margaret Jenkins Performance Space	1982-01	Melinda McGee, Ensemble	Yes
Tribute to Isadora Duncan, Hortense Kooluris and Dancers at the World Trade Center	09/14/1987	Lori Belilove, Beth Jucovy, Marilyn Klaus, Judith Ann Landon, Mark Trider, Deborah Monlux and Alexis MacPherson	Yes
The Furies	03/92	Gemze de Lappe	Yes	Restaged by Gemze de Lappe
A View of Isadora Duncan with Julia Levien			No	Excerpt of Part II from a class taught by Julia Levien
Isadora Duncan Repertory Dance Company performs Dance of the Furies			Yes
Gemze, Sylvia, and Julia perform Dance of the Furies		Sylvia Gold, Julia Levien, Gemze de Lappe	Yes
Dances by Isadora: Furies		Catherine Gallant	Yes
Excerpts from Lori Belilove & The Isadora Duncan Dancers			No
Excerpts from Movement from the Soul		Lori Belilove	No
A View of Isadora Duncan with Julia Levien			Yes	Staged by Julia Levien