Ballade Revival

The New York City Ballet’s fall season opened with a nicely varied all-Balanchine program. The man had range. The peasant campiness of “Donizetti Variations” led right into the romantic tremolos of “Ballade,” and his abridged version of the dramatic juggernaut “Swan Lake” followed the lone intermission. The excitement of the night was the revival of the middle ballet, which is seldom aired and had not run since 2003. (Though I was in the company at that time, I never saw it from the front. To experience any “new” Balanchine at this point is thrilling!) “Ballade” is one of Balanchine’s end-stage dances, made in 1980 for Merrill Ashley and Ib Andersen. I’m guessing it has hibernated for so long because it seems hard to cast. The lead roles are wanton yet technical, and those are generally opposing attributes in dancers. Mira Nadon, however, can straddle those poles in her sleep, and her interpretation made a strong case for “Ballade’s” continued circulation.

Performance

New York City Ballet: Fall Season

Place

David H. Koch Theater, Lincoln Center, New York, NY, September 2025

Words

Faye Arthurs

Mira Nadon and Peter Walker in George Balanchine’s “Ballade.” Photograph by Erin Baiano

The fluid structure and watercolor costuming (by Ben Benson) of “Ballade” evoke “Ballo della Regina,” the ballet Balanchine had made for Ashley just two years prior (and which was also designed Benson). Naturally, many critics have compared the two works. In Following Balanchine Robert Garis wrote: “When [Balanchine] made “Ballo della Regina” for [Ashley] in 1978 it was the coronation of a princess . . . In “Ballade” in 1980 she and Balanchine worked well to enrich and refine her lyrical dancing and they made a lovely piece, but in the end it failed to generate enough power in the theater—this time the choice of Fauré’s music was not as successful as it had been in “Emeralds.”’

I agree with Garis (and everyone else) that “Ballo” is a better ballet, though that does not make “Ballade” a bad one. Does the fault lie with the Fauré? Could be. “Ballo” is set to Verdi opera music, and Balanchine told biographer Bernard Taper: “[f]rom Verdi’s way of dealing with the chorus, I have learned how to handle the corps de ballet, the ensemble, the soloists, how to make the soloists stand out against the corps, and when to give them a rest.” Fauré’s “Ballade for piano and orchestra Op. 19” is a completely different animal. A shimmering piece of music, it was the inspiration for Proust’s fictional “Vinteuil Sonata” in Swann’s Way. The narrator of In Search of Lost Time describes it very well when he explains how the bourgeoise Charles Swann conflated one of its motifs with his passion for the courtesan Odette de Crécy: “since he sought in the little phrase for a meaning to which his intelligence could not descend, with what a strange frenzy of intoxication did he strip bare his innermost soul of the whole armour of reason and make it pass unattended through the dark filter of sound!” (trans. Moncrieff/Kilmartin).

In contrast to Verdi’s bouncy, danceable melodies, Faure’s “Ballade” can best be summed up as inchoate rapture. The challenge Balanchine faced was how to sustain that for fourteen minutes straight, and this time he hardly built in any rest for his leads. Where “Ballo” is a structured dance with a clear build to the finish line, “Ballade” is a feverish mix of windswept longing and technical hurdles from start to finish. Nadon blew onto the stage with urgent bourrées, then ran and hurdled like a woodland nymph, making a few surprising backwards jumps. Peter Walker wafted in shortly after from the opposite side, and the pair found each other fatefully in the middle. They danced yearningly together and then yearningly apart, and I wondered how a large corps of women was going to be incorporated, as that threatened to break their intimate spell. The group’s entry midway through the piece was indeed somewhat odd, but the corps was necessary for amplitude, as the couple was already operating at the highest register of leaping and longing.

Mira Nadon and New York City Ballet dancers in George Balanchine’s “Ballade.” Photograph by Erin Baiano

The “Ballo” corps buttresses the technical themes of the lead pair and establishes a courtly hierarchy, but the coterie in “Ballade” are purely textural, adding volume to the stage through ripples of motion and chiffon. “Ballade” is really a pas de deux with living scenery. But the quirkiness and difficulty of the steps, as well as the fact that it has nearly as much petit allegro as partnering, linked it surely to “Ballo.” Nadon and Walker performed funky slicing moves, like the “Rubies” pas de deux drop lunge over a ginched foot. There were abrupt catches at the waist, some flexed wrist grips, and a few daring hands-off moments between supported positions. A partnered developpé à la seconde fell backwards and around—a risky, unusual transition. (Balanchine clearly liked it, he used it twice in a row and then once at the close of the piece.)

“Ballade” had far more romantic gestures (caresses, hand holds, faces nearly pressed together), however. There was also an interesting moment when Nadon stood on flat with parallel feet and Walker knelt and hugged her thighs. The couple’s mercurial solo passages also interspersed the emotive with the tricky. Nadon did a drag step while miming weeping with her hands, but she also muscled through awkward attitude sautés en tournant. Most impressively, she sailed through difficult chaîné sequences into en dedans fouetté arabesque turns without coming off pointe in preparation. She was sensational throughout, carefree and lush during even the biggest technical obstacles.

Walker’s vocabulary was also freewheeling yet hard. Many pirouette sequences started in upright passé and then swooned into off-balance attitudes. And just when I decided that his steps were more generally bravura, he did a slow developpé to a b-minus while the corps surged around him. These vacillations were intense and destabilizing, rather echoing the experience of Proust’s Swann in love. “Ballade” may be a challenge for dancers and audiences alike, but Nadon and Walker carried it off well and it is a beautiful tempest. I hope it blows through more often.

Isabella LaFreniere and Chun Wai Chan in George Balanchine’s “Swan Lake.” Photograph by Erin Baiano

“Swan Lake,” which closed, is also a passionate piece, but Tchaikovsky built numerous peaks and valleys into his score. And though Balanchine’s one act treatment has a greatest-hits vibe, it is still well paced (I’ll never understand why he omitted the four little swans though!). “Swan Lake’s” elaborate staging also made for a nice programming contrast. Where “Ballade” had no sets other than its sea of bodies, Alain Vaes’s “Swan Lake” scenery is maximal, with frosted caverns and dry ice and plastic swans on a conveyer belt, which garnered huge applause when the curtain rose. I love that the old school stagecraft is still effective, but I admit this processional always makes me chuckle for its resemblance to carnival duck shooting games.

It was wonderful to see Isabella LaFreniere back onstage and looking strong after an injury absence. She soared in her entry saut de chat and landed calmly. Her natural reserve served the Act II plot well. She also has a gorgeous line in attitude the whole way from her back to her toe—which is half the battle in “Swan Lake.” It’s a nitpicky dancer thing, but many people have lovely high attitudes with a heel that sticks out jaggedly—even sometimes those with good turnout and good feet. It’s pure mechanical luck of the draw, and LaFreniere won. As she gets her stage legs back, there’s room for her to grow in assertiveness. Her partner Chun Wai Chan was a natural, elegant Siegfried. His ease of movement works beautifully in the classics, as when he recovered calmly with expansive port de bras in attitude croisé relevé after jump passages.

Joseph Gordon and Megan Fairchild in George Balanchine’s “Donizetti Variations.” Photograph by Erin Baiano

At the other end of the program and the spectrum was “Donizetti.” No romance or drama, just wry humor and Bournonville-inspired petit allegro. The corps casting was fabulous, with India Bradley standing out for her sassy confidence as the ringleader of the second trio. Similarly, Joseph Gordon’s coiffure had extra body in it and so did his legs. He dazzled in his turns and tricks and even made a cheeky deal out of chugs upstage with his hands on his hips.

It was fitting to have senior ballerina Megan Fairchild kick off the fall season in her last year with the company. She was in her element: sprightly and droll. Some dancers, like Nadon, start wildly free and build up strength to back up their spontaneous choices as they mature. Others, like Fairchild, take the opposite path. Fairchild has been a technically secure phenom since her SAB days, and for a long time her onstage focus seemed to be precision and control. As she’s aged, and especially in the last couple of years, she appears to check fewer boxes and dance for the sheer joy of it. Her shows have gotten less flawless (though still technically superior) and infinitely more interesting. She seems to be truly enjoying her farewell tour, and I’m enjoying it too.

Faye Arthurs

Faye Arthurs is a former ballet dancer with New York City Ballet. She chronicled her time as a professional dancer in her blog Thoughts from the Paint. She graduated summa cum laude with a B.A. in English from Fordham University. She lives in Brooklyn with her partner and their sons.

comments

Lisa Mehigan 9月 28, 2025

I love your reviews! They make me laugh, but they also make me see what the dancing looks like. Thanks for giving me so much enjoyment.

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