World-class review of ballet and dance.
Last week I caught up with choreographer Pam Tanowitz and Opera Philadelphia’s current general director and president, countertenor Anthony Roth Costanzo to talk about “The Seasons,” the company’s latest production premiering at the Kimmel Center’s 600-plus seat Perelman Theater on December 19.
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If Notre-Dame remains one of the enduring symbols of Paris, standing at the city’s heart in all its beauty, much of the credit belongs to Victor Hugo.
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When dancer and choreographer Marla Phelan was a kid, she wanted to be an astronaut. “I always loved science and astronomy,” Phelan said.
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Sans tutu or pointe shoes, New York Ballet principal Sara Mearns delivered a knock-out punch in her 20-minute solo, “Zebra.”
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Japan Society’s Yukio Mishima centennial series culminated with “Mishima’s Muse – Noh Theater,” which was actually three programs of traditional noh works that Japanese author Yukio Mishima adapted into modern plays.
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Throughout the year, our critics attend hundreds of dance performances, whether onsite, outdoors, or on the proscenium stage, around the world.
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On December 11th, the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater presented two premieres and two dances that had premiered just a week prior.
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The “Contrastes” evening is one of the Paris Opéra Ballet’s increasingly frequent ventures into non-classical choreographic territory.
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I’m in the audience of the Pit to watch Kaori Ito’s solo performance, “Robot, l'amour éternel.” It’s in the blackbox performing space at the New National Theatre Tokyo, intimate and close. The stage is an open, raised platform, gauzy white fabric covering the floor.
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Architects often use scale, along with other design principles such as light, rhythm, and form, to subtly guide a person's eye and body through a space—to take the gaze at street level to the highest point of a building, or to the horizon and beyond.
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An enchanted forest, a love gone wrong, and a swarm of women in long white tutus—when a formula works, it really works. Such is the case of “La Sylphide,” the nearly 200-year-old Romantic ballet which first premiered in 1832.
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In 1954, George Balanchine created a “Nutcracker” that was based on the classical Mariinsky production he danced in his childhood, utilizing the neoclassical style he honed in NYC. His version has become so renowned that in 1993, his name and the trademark symbol have been added to the title (even on the merch).
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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