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What Ballet Star Justin Peck, Sufjan’s Go-To Choreographer, Is Listening To Right Now

Photo by Erin Baiano, treatment by Martine Ehrhart

Not many ballet greats can say Sufjan Stevens and the National's Bryce Dessner performed at their wedding. But Justin Peck, the 31-year-old resident choreographer of the New York City Ballet, is so tight with the two indie favorites (not to mention others), they didn't think twice about covering Bob Marley's "Is This Love" at the intimate ceremony earlier this month. The tradition-bending Tony winner has collaborated with Dessner, M83, Dan Deacon, and more on immersive piece set to original scores, but it is Peck's connection with Stevens that has been the most fruitful.

The duo has been hard at work on its fourth collaboration, Principia, which premieres at NYCB this week (January 31) and runs through the winter season. Named after Sir Isaac Newton's 1687 book of foundational scientific principles, the ballet was conceptualized by the space-obsessed Sufjan, who took notice of sketches detailing an imaginary cenotaph for Newton. Equal parts mystical and mathematical, this hollow, 500-foot sphere was conceived as an architectural representation of the universe, but it never came to fruition. Principia unfolds from that seed of fascination into a large-scale ballet involving 24 dancers and a 65-piece orchestra. “This is the most sophisticated orchestration Sufjan's done yet,” Peck says.

Peck first saw Stevens’ “innate ability to write fully orchestrated music for dance” while listening to the songwriter's 2005 LP, Illinois, as a teenager. “I was taken by the polyphony found in that album," Peck says. "There's multiple voicings. There's use of many of different kinds of instruments. There's use of challenging time signature. There's a lot of stuff you don't typically hear in pop music, yet it still had very strong and original melodies. The combination was magical to me."

After Peck initially approached Stevens, the two eased into working together with 2012's Year of the Rabbit, a ballet set to an orchestration of Stevens' 2001 electronic album, Enjoy Your Rabbit. Since then, Stevens has “fallen in love” with ballet, and the two have already started developing their next piece together, a yet-to-be-titled work that will premiere at the Houston Ballet this March. “I think it's a lot of fun for [Sufjan] to get to work on that scale, something that's a contrast to his album-making and touring—what he calls his ‘day job,’” Peck says.

When listening in his free time, Peck remains drawn to music with the same intricate, layered arrangements that struck him when first hearing Illinois. In between rehearsals for Principia, he spoke with Pitchfork about his favorite songs and albums of the moment, meditating on works that are suited for dance.

Punch Brothers: All Ashore



I really like that they don't typically follow the traditional pop song structure. They seem to be really interested in finding a blend between classicism and a kind of Americana, almost bluegrass sound. Plus the individuality that band members bring to all that. It's a great mixing of influences.

I'm drawn to move by the Punch Brothers and Chris Thile [when I make tap freestyle videos for social media] because of the acoustic arrangements that all those songs incorporate. There's never any real percussion in those songs. For me, when I do those little sketches, it's about working with music that I can add something to. The sound of the tap almost becomes the drum backbone to the song.

Buena Vista Social Club: “Pueblo Nuevo”

My first dance with my wife [dancer Patricia Delgado] was to this track. We really got into it when we went on a trip to Cuba couple of years ago. She had never been—she was born in the States, but her parents are from Cuba. So it was a pretty emotional trip to go back there, to experience the culture and the people—and obviously dance is a big part of Cuban culture.

[At the wedding] it was actually hilarious. I choreographed a little version where her sister and her sister's husband and her mom and dad joined in with us at various moments in the music. It turned into this whole Cuban jam party.

Caroline Shaw: “Partita for 8 Voices”

Caroline is a composer I've admired for a long time. I got to work with her in a very small way last summer, at the Vail Dance Festival. The first thing of hers I ever heard was "Partita." It's one of the most astounding pieces of music I've ever come across. One day I hope to choreograph to it, once I can figure it out. It's so complex in how it's arranged and performed—like an advanced math equation—that I almost feel like I'm not quite there yet. It's eight voices and a lot of tricky meters. It requires a lot of range, both in the vocal range and also the range of sound. A lot of times, I think of choreography as a great halfway point between math and art. It's that very specific, yet very open and artistic form. That kind of balance is golden.