World-class review of ballet and dance.
The American Ballet Theatre’s opening bill was not a hole-in-one, but the ideas behind the programming were sound: feature a new work that builds upon company traditions (Gemma Bond’s “La Boutique”), push the dancers in a different style by a hot choreographer (Kyle Abraham’s “Mercurial Son”), and show off the troupe’s prodigious technical chops in a grand manner (Harald Lander’s “É tudes”).
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During opening night of Ballet West’s performance of Val Caniparoli’s “Jekyll & Hyde,” my dad turned to me and said, “I remember you once told me that dancers are telling stories with their bodies.
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In a small white studio space, the line between performers and audience is being blurred. Choreographer Meytal Blanaru, born in Israel but now Brussels based, has devised this piece along with the dancers, and it’s multifaceted indeed, a study in hope and community spirit, with many playful detours along the way.
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Staging the biographical details of someone’s life is by no means an easy task; doing so for a figure who was complex and controversial amplifies this charge to a new level.
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I’ve been thinking about content for a while now. Without it, blogs, websites, and other social media die. But content, as an adjective, has a different meaning: to be pleased, gratified or even, complacent. It is also the root of the adjective contentious.
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Artistic director and guest curator for this year’s Tempo Dance Festival in New Zealand is proud Ngāti Tūwharetoa man, Moss Te Ururangi Patterson.
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The American Ballet Theater’s Fall Season opened at the Koch Theater with a program called “Innovation Past and Present,” which featured two world premieres and a company staple.
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When I first read Ian McEwan’s Atonement at university, my lecturer told us that, upon finishing the book, she threw it on the ground.
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Touted as a “Halloween destination for ballet and horror fans alike,” American Contemporary Ballet, now in its thirteenth season—a feat in and of itself for any dance company—is presenting, “LA’s Fatal Attraction: “Inferno” (2017), “Burlesque” (2018), and “The Rite” (2023), in repertory throughout October.
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To children or the young at heart, it’s pure magic. “Mermaid,” the beloved Hans Christian Anderson fairy tale, reworked and dazzling to behold, is a new original production from K-Ballet Tokyo.
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There are certain elements you can expect to find in any piece by Hofesh Shechter: a deafening, grungy, and distorted score composed by the choreographer himself; dim lighting and smoke enveloping the stage to create a nostalgic yet unsettling atmosphere; and a signature hunch-shouldered, gestural movement language referencing various forms of folk dance.
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A colourful, decorative rug is positioned centre stage. “It lasted pretty well,” a disembodied voice comments through the speaker system, explaining how it was chosen for its pattern, which is ideal for concealing dirt.
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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