World-class review of ballet and dance.
The “Nutcracker” has a way of feeling magical year after year. But something new is always welcome—especially as the ballet has long perpetuated cultural stereotypes. In “The Gift,” Boston Ballet drastically reinterprets the “Nutcracker,” and in doing so, proves that the ballet’s holiday magic extends beyond just its storyline and costumes.
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Most farewell pièces d’occasion are filler. They come about when a retiring dancer calls in a favor from a big-name choreographer to demonstrate their clout, and to have something to perform that is tailored to their end-of-career skill set. Every once in a blue moon, however, a goodbye bauble becomes the meat of the show. The last instance of this was probably Christopher Wheeldon’s “After the Rain” for Jock Soto in 2005. (Though that was slightly different, as it was a repeating work—with a group cast—created for Soto’s last season; it wasn’t just a one-off.) It is rarer still for...
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Gerald Casel wears a green-grey tie-dyed t-shirt and moves his hands and feet in precise flicks to TLC’s pop hit “Waterfalls.” The text projected on the wall behind speaks in the first-person, telling us that he is performing phrases from Trisha Brown’s 1971 dance “Accumulation,” and that the song “Waterfalls” came out in 1994, the same year Casel saw Neil Greenberg’s “Not-About-AIDS-Dance”—a dance famous for, among other things, innovating the combination of text projections and dance Casel is now using.
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Beginning in the light of the moon, a remembering. Beginning with a much-loved (and most-performed) “Serenade” by George Balanchine in the State Theatre, the Australian Ballet’s “Celebration Gala” was a surprise foretoken to the 2022 season, and, as the name evokes, a celebration. A celebration to say welcome back to the theatre. A means for me, sat in the audience, to say ‘thank-you’ and feel what I’ve missed, the goosebumps of a live performance. Beginning at the close of the year, something unexpected: the gift of a new era.
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Upon entering the small blackbox theater of Dixon Place on Thursday, December 9, 2021, the all-white papered stage of Laura Peterson Choreography’s “Interglacial” was pristinely set with four large crumpled up balls of paper and a thin line of light, nodding to minimalist artist Dan Flavin and bisecting the upstage wall. I am both old enough to remember when Dixon Place performances were in an actual New York City living room and familiar enough with Peterson’s work to know of her obsession with Flavin (for instance: her 2007 work “I Love Dan Flavin”). I was delighted to be among familiar...
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For half its 50-year life, I’ve been reviewing Philadanco! concerts. It’s the premiere mixed-race company in the country. Founded in Philadelphia by African American dancer Joan Myers Brown, who turns 90 on Christmas day, Ms. Brown turned entrepreneur with her decades old dance school. Then teacher and auntie to countless neighborhood children who’ve gone on to remarkable careers in dance or other professions. And of course, artistic director of Philadanco! all these years, stepping aside for Kim Y. Bears Bailey, only in the last year. Primarily a company of Black dancers, Ms. Brown (now Founder/Artistic Advisor) hasn’t hesitated to hire...
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The New York City Ballet’s “Nutcracker” returned this season after its first year off since its inception in 1954. In the scope of bizarre Covid ramifications, the necessity of casting vaccinated children over the age of 12 in this year’s production must be high on the list. In normal years, the age range of the children in the performance is 8-12, with the occasional diminutive 13 year-old. For this strange year, the children were between the ages of 12 and 16. New costumes had to be made for the tall tweens and teens, and the roster went from 126 kids...
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A dark and passionate night two years in the making. Queensland Ballet’s “Dracula” finally premiered after it had, like many other productions, fallen victim to the inevitable pandemic rescheduling. It was, however, well worth the wait. Choreographed by Krzysztof Pastor—former Director of the Polish National Ballet and Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet Theatre—the ballet presents the gothic tale of forbidden passion in the most sumptuous manner possible.
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Twyla Tharp is 80-years old this year, and even with an epic, half-century dance career behind her, the legendary choreographer is just as busy as ever. Throughout the pandemic, Tharp has been hard at work experimenting over zoom; recently, she stepped back into the studio to work with lead dancers from American Ballet Theatre, New York City Ballet, and Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre, as well as a group of young dancers she hand-picked, to create “Twyla NOW,” a program that matched two world premieres with two older pieces from the choreographer's vast repertoire in celebration of her birthday.
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It may seem strange for all of the supposed progress being made in understanding medical matters that there is still a societal stigma in how we lean into issues around mental health in 2021. Creating an effective discourse around it, in order to normalise it, is incredibly important. Art is a great platform for tackling big issues, such as depression and anxiety. Dance, then, can express with bodies something that can be hard to say out loud, for fear of othering, rejection, or being cast aside, either from friends, loved ones, or employers in a working environment.
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It was a first for the Los Angeles Philharmonic, but hopefully not the last: Under the artistic direction of flamenco artist and dancer extraordinaire, María Bermúdez, the Fiesta de la Bulería Jerez, one of the most prestigious events in all of Spain, came Stateside, its performers scorching the stage of Walt Disney Concert Hall. And throughout the nearly three-hour love-fest, the dozen artists collectively known as Sonidos Gitanos (Gypsy Sounds), raised the temperature from hot to blistering, the sold-out crowd continually jumping to its feet as if possessed.
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For the first time since February, the Sydney Dance Company is performing live in Sydney with “New Breed 2021.” One year ago, I wrote the same sentence about the premiere of “New Breed 2020.” The performing arts had just endured what we thought would be their hardest year to date. But Covid-19 had other plans, and here we are again. This time we’re back, more weathered, masks firmly fitted, vaccination certificates at the ready. The crowd moves differently, everyone keeps just slightly more to themselves, eyes lower if shoulders accidentally brush on the way to seats. There is a sense...
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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