Mark Ronson is the latest in a growing line of musicians to wander over to the high culture side of the playing field. The DJ/producer, known for his work with Amy Winehouse, Lily Allen and Ghostface Killah, is collaborating with Andrew Wyatt of Miike Snow (who, by the way, did this great thing recently) and fashion designer Gareth Pugh on a dance piece for the Royal Ballet in London, the BBC reports.
The piece, which is currently untitled, will include nine songs from Ronson and co., and "focus on the Jungian theme of anima/animus and the theory of collective masculine and feminine unconscious," making it as vague as possible for us to visualize. But based on our limited understanding of anima/animus -- which refer to the suppressed inner woman in males and inner men in females -- we're hoping this involves some gender role reversals.
Wayne McGregor, the Royal Ballet's resident choreographer ("Chroma," "Infra"), will be conceptualizing the dance. Aside from his more high brow work, McGregor's sharp, yet fluid style has been viewed at least 15 million times on YouTube in Radiohead's "Lotus Flower" video, in which Thom Yorke dances to his choreography.
Other musicians who've recently made the crossover to classical music include Rufus Wainwright (somewhat relevant sidenote: Wainwright's forthcoming album, Out of the Game was produced by Ronson), whose first opera, "Prima Donna," premiered this week at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in New York. Last July, Damon Albarn's (Blur, Gorillaz) opera "Doctor Dee" premiered in Manchester, and Karen O's (Yeah Yeah Yeahs) "psycho opera," titled "Stop the Virgens" ran at St. Ann's Warehouse in Brooklyn last October.
The pop/classical music convergence hasn't proven to be as interesting a union as it sounds, with the results often viewed as middling (see Wainwright, Karen O, Albarn). But since the problems seem to start when the musician has creative control over the bulk of the piece, Ronson has less to worry about here than Paul McCartney did.