The Beggar's Table (2005) ­ piano and stereophonic tape for dance

: Now appearing in the Gallery :

Premiered by Mary Carbonara Dances at ODC Theater, San Francisco, June 8-11, 2005
Also performed:
- San Francisco Conservatory of Dance Benefit Concert, July, 2005
- The Monterey Dance Festival, August 6, 2005

The Beggar’s Table explores the fine line between having enough to get by and not having enough to get off the street. Choreographed by Mary Carbonara, The Beggar’s Table is a work for the seven dancers with an original score by composer Peter V. Swendsen, lighting design by José María Francos and costumes by Heidi Schweiker. Carbonara explains that the idea for The Beggar’s Table came more from a discomfort than an inspiration. “I’m both troubled and curious about the dividing line between people who manage to make ends meet—thrive even—and those who don’t, sometimes ending up living on the street,” she says. “What keeps some people on one side of that line and the rest on the other and what happens when that line is crossed?” With homelessness a familiar fact of Bay Area living, the question remains: what leaves some of us on the street and affords the rest of us the ability to walk by?

The score for The Beggar’s Table is for CD playback and live piano. It is often rhythmic and driving, complimenting the energetic and, at times, violent interactions of the dancers. In contrast, it can become textural and introspective, drawing on sampled urban soundscapes that have been combined with piano recordings, giving them a pitch and timbral motion that is both familiar and indefinable. The live piano part employs both traditional and extended playing techniques, making use of multiple E-bows and string preparations.