Dancing to the Goldberg Variations

Abstract Since William Dollar’s Air and Variations in 1937, there have been at least nineteen additional choreographed versions of Bach’s Goldberg Variations, including an iconic classic by Jerome Robbins (1971). With dance styles ranging from tap dance, to modern dance, to classical ballet, Bach’s work, which was inspired by dance, has become a regularly choreographed work. Although many choreographers have shown reverence toward the Goldberg Variations and have viewed the dance movements as visual representations of Bach’s musical architecture, since the late 1990s, there has been more openness to the deconstruction and reorganization of the piece according to the conception of the choreographer and interpreter, through narrative and conceptual interpolations, through musical deconstruction and fragmentation, and through physical movements that go against the rhythms and themes in Bach’s composition. These trends coincide with the more open approach to the work concept described in the previous chapters.