Bright Stars
Misty Copeland makes an observation. “I see,” she says, looking into the audience packed with attendees in formalwear, “a lot of people who care about ballet.”
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World-class review of ballet and dance.
Misty Copeland makes an observation. “I see,” she says, looking into the audience packed with attendees in formalwear, “a lot of people who care about ballet.”
Continue ReadingChamber music can be fun, too! That, at least, is the apparent message that violinist Johnny Gandelsman is trying to spread in his two-hour program, “Johnny Loves Johann.” He’s certainly not wrong.
Continue ReadingWhat makes a story stick across not just decades, but millennia? The longevity of ancient Greek drama points to an innate essentiality, but the variations of these works, too, have played a critical role in its durability.
Continue ReadingFive years ago Oakland Ballet launched its Dancing Moons Festival as a way to highlight Asian American and Pacific Islander choreographers in response to the surge of anti-AAPI hate during the height of the coronavirus pandemic.
Continue ReadingGibney Company’s season at the Joyce Theater was full of common threads, promising beginnings, and lingering energy.
Continue ReadingIt seems fitting that as the world held its collective breath over violent threats from the US White House, the Martha Graham Dance Company would perform “Chronicle,” an anti-war statement from 1936, as the centerpiece for the opening of its New York City Center season.
Continue ReadingBallet Unbound” was a diverse mixed repertory program that landed squarely in Ohio Contemporary Ballet’s sweet spot as a company presenting classical modern dance, and neo-classical and contemporary ballet works.
Continue ReadingIt is a strange time to be celebrating our nation’s milestone birthday, our semiquincentennial.
Continue ReadingIt’s hard to predict where Hubbard Street Dance Chicago will go next. Literally. Through the repertoire selections presented in the company’s two-week run at the Joyce Theater, the dancers demonstrate a particular aptitude for moving in a way that’s endlessly surprising.
Continue Reading“The Juniper Tree” is a macabre fairy tale involving three feminine archetypes: mother, stepmother, daughter.
Continue ReadingLa Scala Theatre’s ballet season featured a programme offering a snapshot of European choreography from 25 years ago.
Continue ReadingThe Mark Morris Dance Group, now celebrating its 45th anniversary, visited the Brooklyn Academy of Music for a quick late-March run with two topical dances that were new to New York: one heavy and one light.
Continue ReadingWatching Matthew Bourne's reworked version of the “star-cross'd lovers,” I was briefly reminded of Veronica, played by Winona Ryder, in the dark 1988 comedy by Daniel Waters and Michael Lehmann, Heathers, and her line, “my teen angst bullshit has a body count.” Yes, this is the darker side of Bourne's repertoire,...
Continue ReadingThe choreographer Alexei Ratmansky reflects on the war in Ukraine, the connection between geopolitics and ballet, and joining the house of Balanchine.
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Beneath blue California skies, manicured trees, and the occasional hum of an overhead airplane, Tamara Rojo took the Frost Amphitheater stage at Stanford University to introduce herself as the new artistic director of San Francisco Ballet.
Continue ReadingAfter a week of the well-balanced meal that is “Jewels”—the nutritive, potentially tedious, leafy greens of “Emeralds,” the gamy, carnivorous “Rubies,” and the decadent, shiny white mountains of meringue in “Diamonds”—the New York City Ballet continued its 75th Anniversary All-Balanchine Fall Season with rather more dyspeptic fare.
Continue ReadingAn “Ajiaco” is a type of soup common to Colombia, Cuba, and Peru that combines a variety of different vegetables, spices, and meats.
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