February 20, 2024

20,000 vinyl LPs 355: Jean Erdman ~ The Coach with the Six Insides

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vinyl LP back cover detail
 back cover photo by Deborah Berman
photo of album cover by Styrous®


Today is the birthday of American dancer and choreographer of modern dance as well as an avant-garde theater director, Jean Erdman who was born on February 20, 1916, in Honolulu, Hawaii, to John Piney Erdman, a doctor of divinity and missionary from New England, who settled in Honolulu as a minister at the non-denominational Protestant Church of the Crossroads where he preached, in both English and Japanese, to a multi-ethnic congregation. Her mother, Marion Dillingham Erdman, was a member of one of the founding industrialist families of Hawaii.        
 
Erdman's earliest dance experience was the hula. She attended the Punahou School in Honolulu where she learned, as a form of physical education, Isadora Duncan interpretive dance. Reflecting on her early dance training, Erdman said these two influences taught her that "dancing is an expression of something meaningful to the dancer, not a mere series of lively steps".        
 
 
vinyl LP front cover
photo of album cover by Styrous®
 
 
Erdman worked with the greats of Avant-Guard and experimental musicians and performers; John Cage, Martha Graham, Louis Horst, Merce Cunningham, Lou Harrison, Alan Hovhaness and many others.   
  

vinyl LP back cover
 back cover photo by Deborah Berman
photo of album cover by Styrous®
 
 
The Coach with the Six Insides is an adaptation of the James Joyce book, Finnegans Wake. While Joyce's story is told from the perspective of the male barkeeper Humphrey Chimpden Earwicker, Erdman's work a combination of dance, mime, and Joycean stream of consciousness language focuses on the female psyche, as seen through the many incarnations of the main female character Anna Livia Plurabelle. Erdman danced all the aspects of Anna Livia from young woman, to old crone, to the rain itself that becomes the River Liffey flowing through the heart of Dublin. Teiji Ito was the musical director and composed the musical score on a vast array of instruments from around the world including among others, Japanese bass drums, Tibetan cymbals, a violin and an accordion.         
 
The Coach with the Six Insides premiered at the Village South Theatre in Greenwich Village on November 26, 1962. It ran for 114 performances and received the Obie and Vernon Rice Awards for Outstanding Achievement in theater. She choreographed a few Broadway musicals, one was Two Gentlemen of Verona, a delightful send up of the Shakespeare comedy.                 
 
The Coach with the Six Insides was performed on CBS  anthology series "Camera Three" in December of 1964 and there is a video of that performance on YouTube (link below).                

In 1943, Erdman choreographed Creature On a Journey with, Counterdance in the Spring, composed by Lou Harrison. There is an excellent video of it performed by movement artist, Stephanie Liapis, with a documentary about the costumes, artists and music. The work  demonstrates the influence hula and Duncan movement was incorporated into Erdman's work.       
 
In 1945 she choreographed Daughters of the Lonesome Isle with a commissioned solo prepared piano score by John Cage; it premiered in Bronxville, New York, on  February 27, 1946 (link below).       
 
In the mid-thirties, Erdman met Joseph Campbell and Martha Graham: both would be immensely influential in her life.


date & photographer unknown

 
In 1972 Erdman collaborated with Campbell, they had married by that time, to form the Theater of the Open Eye performance group.        
 
 
Theater of the Open Eye
 date & photographer unknown

 
The album included a libretto.             
            
 

libretto cover (below)
 libretto photo by Deborah Berman
photo of libretto by Styrous®
 
 
 
 
There are cover variations as well as label variations in the pressings: The German pressing has text on the labels. 
 

 German label pressing, side 2 & side 1
 
 
This version, the US pressing, does not have any text, just artwork printed on the labels.          
 

vinyl LP record label, side 1
photo of record label by Styrous®
 
 

vinyl LP record label, side 2
photo of record label by Styrous®
 
`   
Tracklist:
       
Side 1:
        
A1 - Act I Scene 2
A2 - Act I Scene 6
A3 - Act II Scene 5
A4 - Act II Scene 6
       
Side 2:
       
B1 - Act II Scene 7
B2 - Act III Scene 1, 3 & 4
B3 - Act III Scene 5
       
Companies, etc.
       
    Copyright © – ESP-Disk' Ltd.
       
Credits:
       
    Art Direction – Stephen I. Levitt
    Composed By, Performer – Teiji Ito
    Cover – Howard Bernstein
    Directed By, Choreography – Miss Erdman*
    Lacquer Cut By – DBH*
    Performer – Genji Ito, Peter Berry
    Photography By [Back Cover] – Deborah Berman
    Voice Actor [Anna Livia Plurabelle], Written-By – Jean Erdman
    Voice Actor [Daughter Iseult] – Sheila Roy
    Voice Actor [Shaun, The Older Twin] – Leonard Frey
    Voice Actor [Shem, The Younger Twin] – Van Dexter
    Voice Actor [Wife And Chairwoman] – Anita Dangler
       
Notes:
       
Label variation: This version does not have any text printed on the labels,
just artwork.

Includes an eight page booklet with original lines of the play.
which was Inspired by James Joyce's "Finnegans Wake".
       
Barcode and Other Identifiers
        
    Matrix / Runout (Side A runout): ESPS 1019 A ORT-2 DBH
    Matrix / Runout (Side B runout): ESPS 1019 B ORT-2 DBH

Jean Erdman – The Coach With The Six Insides (Original Cast Album)
Label: ESP Disk – ESP 1019
Format:    Vinyl, LP, Album
Country: US
Released: 1966
Genre: Non-Music, Stage & Screen
Style: Soundtrack, Musical, Avantgarde, Poetry, Experimental

         
Viewfinder links:        
         
John Cage          
Joseph Campbell          
Merce Cunningham                    
Isadora Duncan         
Martha Graham      
Lou Harrison      
Louis Horst     
Alan Hovhaness        
James Joyce         
        
Net links:        
         
Stephanie Liapis        
NY Times ~ Jean Erdman, a Dancer Moved by Myth           
Northwestern University ~ Cage and Contemporary Choreographers 
        
         
University of Washington ~ Creature on a Journey        
        
YouTube links:        
        
Creature on a Journey (56 mins., 52 secs.)       
Daughters of the Lonesome Isle             
Hamadryad         
Ophelia         
        
        
         
 
       
       
        
Styrous® ~ Tuesday, February 20, 2024   
       
 
 
















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