Choreographer: Claire Cunningham
Director: Dan Watson
A spidery metal mountain of balanced crutches rises on one side of the stage. Opposite, some audience members lounge on giant beanbags. In the space between, contour lines and a blue tracery of mountain streams are projected onto the floor, mapping an imaginary journey. Disabled Glaswegian performer Claire Cunningham uses ideas of climbing and hillwalking partly as metaphors for the challenging choreography of moving through the world on crutches. Her new solo dance work, innovatively staged in the Lilian Baylis Studio at Sadler’s Wells, is called Songs of the Wayfarer. It’s a title borrowed from Mahler’s late-nineteenth-century song cycle Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen, which Cunningham sings during the show.
Matthias Herman’s immersive soundscape moves from pulsing electronica and unsettling vibrations through softer harmonies, picking out Wagnerian leitmotifs and combining seamlessly with Cunningham’s extraordinary singing. When her movements are at their most earthbound, her classically trained voice flies far above the stage.
Mahler’s old-school European Romanticism might seem at odds with the show’s pioneering inclusivity. His songs are about heading off onto the wild heath to recover from heartbreak. Love and loss, as Cunningham’s later monologues reveal, are shared human experiences. Carrying Mahler’s score in a plastic map case around her neck, she uses his music to chart an abstract path. Cunningham enacts the musical directions, which are projected as captions. She dances mit höchster Kraft (powerfully) over the stage, twists and crawls through the maze-like crutch mountain in response to the edict Zurückhaltend (holding back) and slows or pauses for Nicht eilen (don’t rush) or, finally, Zeit lassen (take your time).
Rocky and watery landscapes, evoked in music, words and video, become an allegorical adventure in what Cunningham calls “crip navigation” (reclaiming crip as part of her identity). She shuffles and rolls along the floor or moves gracefully on crutches as a “four-legged creature”, exploring her physicality. Like mountaineering trips, disabled journeys often need planning and preparation: mapping the terrain, conserving energy, taking breaks. After an energetic sequence, Cunningham sits down with a water bottle and cereal bar, inviting the audience to “check in with our bodies” and see what they need.
The staging aims to be as inclusive as possible. There are captions and elegant sign language translation, both of which are important elements of the show. The performance area has been opened up to give a choice of spaces for wheelchair users. The show’s lighting and volume levels are signposted in advance, from the opening darkness, lit by Cunningham’s head torch, to a bright auditorium as she scales the steeply tiered seats. Stopping near the “summit” to produce a thermos and Tupperware box of shortbread (“tastes of home”), she talks movingly about friends and family.
The soundscape includes a series of simple, poetic sentences that start with “I find my way” and later “We find our way”, followed by a list of many ways of navigating the world. Cunningham uses Scots words like broch and shoogle, blaw and skite. She also occasionally incorporates the lexis of disability, including the idea of spoons (rations of energy). Twice, when she stops to rest, she comments: “This is a nice view”. The work encourages us to savour our moments of observation as well as action, to question all kinds of hierarchies, to be kind to ourselves and others. Rich in compassion and invention, Cunningham’s work is gentle, poignant and thought-provoking.
Runs until 6 December 2024
