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Philly Fringe
REVIEWS | By Merilyn Jackson

Philly Fringe

Two back-to-back shows in Philadelphia’s 2018 Fringe Festival had me thinking in compare and contrast mode. One, full of lusty life and joy, reached out to the audience to join in the fun and total experience, and the other devoid of anything but interior dialogues, often inaudible, blanked the audience out.

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DANCEworks
REVIEWS | By Penelope Ford

Something Wonderful

DANCEworks, a month-long residency at the Lobero Theatre in Santa Barbara, has been attracting big-name choreographers for the past decade. It's easy to see why—where else can you create in a uniquely supportive environment, in a fully-equipped theatre, by the sea? The residency culminates with a performance of the work-in-progress, and many of these works have gone on tour across the U.S. and internationally. This year marks DANCEworks' tenth anniversary, and artistic director Dianne Vapnek has every reason to celebrate.

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Natalia Osipova
REVIEWS | By Sara Veale

Breaking out of the box

The last programme Natalia Osipova commissioned at Sadler’s Wells was tenacious but shaky, the Royal Ballet superstar storming the stage with then-boyfriend Sergei Polunin and a trio of hit-and-miss contemporary numbers. This time around, the commissions are stronger and the performances steadier. The six works of “Pure Dance” mix classical variations alongside brand-new solos and duets, with choreography from established dancemakers and emerging artists alike. It’s a lot of faces to try on in one night, but Osipova moves between the disparate routines like a chameleon, demonstrating the expansive versatility of her talent and how eager she is to branch...

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Bangarra Dark Emu
REVIEWS | By Gracia Haby

The Emu in the Sky

Up in the sky there is a giant emu. They have been there all along, in the calendar in the sky. Above our heads, a creator spirit,[note]The title of Bruce Pascoe’s book, Dark Emu, on which Bangarra Dance Theatre’s “Dark Emu” is inspired by, “refers to the shape of the ‘Dark Emu’ in the night sky which represents Baiame, one of the spirit creator figures of Aboriginal Australia. The emu is also a grain feeding bird, and a plains bird, so the reference is to the creator spirit and to Aboriginal food production”. Bruce Pascoe, in interview, “The Book,” Bangarra...

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Giselle
REVIEWS | By Gracia Haby

Ethereal Giselle

Light and dark, day and night, youth and maturity, a flirtation and redemption, naturalistic and ethereal: “Giselle” spins a conjuror’s trick all the wilier for its very familiarity, its everlasting allurement. An autumnal village presented in Act I flips to reveal the ballet blanc of Act II: two halves of a whole. We know this, we anticipate this, we lap it up. Fermented in honey before interval, raising a flagon of mead to love, and even love’s folly, and unpinned madness, we heed the warnings spun to the villagers. The flipside to a light-hearted Peasant pas de deux is heartache...

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Sydney Eisteddfod
REVIEWS | By Claudia Lawson

Showtime

With cash prizes totalling $36,000, the Sydney Eisteddfod Ballet Scholarship is the biggest cash prize for rising ballet stars in the southern hemisphere. Now in its 44th year, the scholarship is open to dancers aged 16-19 all of whom are teetering on the edge of securing a place in a world class ballet school, or for the lucky few, a company contract. For an art form reliant on funds to enable careers, the scholarship presents a serious opportunity.

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Michelle Manzanales
REVIEWS | By Rebecca Ritzel

With Open Arms

Of all the touring modern dance companies based New York, none has consistently introduced talented new choreographers (or new-to-me choreographers) like Ballet Hispánico.

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szalt
REVIEWS | By Victoria Looseleaf

Moondance

While the full moon was never actually visible—at least from this reviewer’s seat—during the world premiere of Stephanie Zaletel’s “moon&”—there was still an incandescent quality to the dancer/choreographer’s fifth evening-length work. Especially when Zaletel took center stage at the outdoor amphitheater, a sylvan venue nestled in Hollywood’s Cahuenga Pass, where she led her six-person, all-female szalt (dance co.), a collaborative founded in 2015, in a work that veered from meditative stillness and surrender to frenzied states of prolonged rapture and the accompanying struggles—gravitational and otherwise—of what it means to live on this earth.

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Akram Khan Xenos
REVIEWS | By Lorna Irvine

Drag Me To Hell

At once of the earth, and completely otherworldly, Akram Khan's apocalyptic last-ever solo piece as a performer (or so he has stated) grips from the outset, and never lets go. From the minute he is spat out onto the stage, tied to a rope which renders him as vulnerable as a newborn tied to the umbilical cord, or prisoner yearning to break free, this piece of choreography is a snarling beast. It is a nightmarish vision of a state of being in limbo, inspired by Prometheus. “Xenos,” which translates as 'foreigner' or 'stranger,' stands for anyone ostracised, othered, or incarcerated...

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Split
REVIEWS | By Claudia Lawson

Split

Lucy Guerin is known for her left of field works, and “Split” is no different. The scene of the performance is the Sydney Opera House’s Studio. As far as the Sydney Opera House goes, it is not a common setting for a dance performance. Rather than a large performance space, it is an intimate theatre space; dimly lit, roughly the size of a community hall. The stage is just an open space in the middle of the seats—no curtains, no props, but cordoned off with masking tape to mark the boundaries. Our bags have been security checked and we've been...

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Ballet Sun Valley
REVIEWS | By Penelope Ford

Stars in Sun Valley

Sun Valley, ski-resort and playground for the rich and famous, is nestled by the picturesque Sawtooth mountains, Idaho. The (Western) history of Sun Valley begins in 1936 when Union Pacific Railroad chairman Averell Harriman decided to build America's first destination ski-resort. Count Felix Schaffgotsch went in search of the perfect locale, and three days after his arrival in Sun Valley, he wired Harriman: “Among the many attractive spots I have visited, this combines the more delightful features of any place I have seen in the United States, Switzerland, or Austria for a winter ski resort.”

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BalletX Summer Series
REVIEWS | By Merilyn Jackson

Summertime

BalletX’s Summer Series 2018 programmed three easygoing world premieres at the Wilma Theater last week. With comic moves here and there to classical music, and gestures at more serious themes, except for Penny Saunders' “Rock-a-Bye,” there was not much to overheat the packed audience during these sultry dog days.

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