Tao and Teicher come together for COUNTERPOINT at Vilar Center

The Vail Valley Foundation recently issued the following press release on the Vilar Performing Arts Center and Vail Dance Festival co-presenting the duo of pianist Conrad Tao and tap dancer Caleb Teicher in COUNTERPOINT on Sunday, February 16, 2025:

The Vail Valley Foundation’s Vilar Performing Arts Center and Vail Dance Festival are thrilled to co-present the amazing duo of pianist Conrad Tao and tap dancer Caleb Teicher in COUNTERPOINT on Sunday, February 16, 2025 as part of the Therese M. Grojean Classical Series and the Vilar Winter Dance Series. This unique pairing between the two critically acclaimed artists explores the dichotomy of their different perspectives and artistic practices, expanding their individual expressive capacity while taking the collaborative performance between dancer and musician to the next level. The 7 p.m. performance will be a harmonic, rhythmic, and theatrical counterpoint between the two artists as they map out constellations between their disparate traditions, drive the imagination and open the heart.  

“Conrad Tao and Caleb Teicher are extraordinary artists individually, and together they will bring a thrilling alchemy to the winter Vilar Dance Series with COUNTERPOINT. I can’t wait to share their brilliance with our audiences in the Vail Valley with this not to be missed performance,” notes Damian Woetzel, Artistic Director of the Vail Dance Festival. 

The evening will include a range of stylistically diverse music including selections from Ravel, Bach, Schoenberg, Mozart, Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue, as well as contemporary compositions, interpretations, and selections by Tao and Teicher including More Forever, a Bessie Award-winning, New York Times “Critic’s Pick” which was lauded for “constantly extending the sonic aspects of dance.” Attendees can also look forward to improvisation and artmaking between artists and audience. “The performance is ultimately a conversation between the different art forms of music and dance, our different instruments of piano and tap dance, and the different traditions that are attached to that,” notes Tao. Visit the COUNTERPOINT show page at vilarpac.org for full programming details, audio and video samples, and to purchase tickets.  

About the Artists 
 

Conrad Tao has appeared worldwide as a pianist and composer and has been dubbed “the kind of musician who is shaping the future of classical music” by New York Magazine, and an artist of “probing intellect and open-hearted vision” by The New York Times. Tao has performed as soloist with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony, Cleveland Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, and Boston Symphony. In recent years he has also been the subject of a special focus with the Finnish Radio Symphony and the Swedish Radio Symphony, both of whom have presented him over multiple concerts, while he has also appeared with the Orchestra Nazionale di Santa Cecillia under Orozco-Estrada and also under Antonio Pappano. As a composer, his work has been performed by orchestras throughout the world; his first large scale orchestral work, Everything Must Go, received its world premiere with the New York Philharmonic, and its European premiere with the Antwerp Symphony, and he was the recipient of a New York Dance and Performance “Bessie” Award, for Outstanding Sound Design / Music Composition, for his work on More Forever, in collaboration with dancer and choreographer Caleb Teicher. He is also the recipient of the prestigious Avery Fisher Career Grant and was named a Gilmore Young Artist—an honor awarded every two years highlighting the most promising American pianists of the new generation. 

Caleb Teicher is a New York City-based dancer, choreographer, and director regarded widely in the performing arts as a leading voice in interdisciplinary collaboration. Teicher began their career as a founding member of Michelle Dorrance’s critically acclaimed tap dance company, Dorrance Dance, while also freelancing as a contemporary dancer, musical theater performer, and swing dancer. In 2015, Caleb shifted their creative focus towards concert dance work through Caleb Teicher & Company which led to commissions and presentations at some of America’s most esteemed performing arts venues including Lincoln Center, The Joyce Theater, New York City Center, Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, and countless others. 

This special presentation of COUNTERPOINT is a part of the Therese M. Grojean Classical Series and is also included in a full lineup of exciting performances at the Vilar Performing Arts Center this winter including Ballet Hispánico (January 21), Violinist Daniel Hope (March 2), Hubbard Street Dance Chicago (March 8), and many more. For more information about the season schedule and to purchase tickets, visit vilarpac.org or call 970-845-8497.