World-class review of ballet and dance.
Though the New York City Ballet’s Spring Gala featured two premieres, the real buzz of the season belonged to the revival of Balanchine’s “Tzigane”—now titled the more politically correct “Errante”—after a 30-year absence.
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An enduring image from Jody Oberfelder’s new site-specific dance “And Then, Now,” is of the lithe, 70-year-old choreographer perched up on a tall hill at Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn, framed by enormous trees and an expansive blue sky.
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Jukebox musicals tend to come in two packages. The first centers a celebrity musician or musical group and uses the subject's body of work to tell a biographical narrative (“Carole King,” “The Temptations,” “The Four Seasons”).
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I may never know what it is like to be an octopus, but I can begin to imagine what it might be like if I was an octopus.[1] Equally, I may never know what it is like to be a dancer, and someone who communicates with their body, but, thanks to a special in-house showing of Prue Lang’s work-in-progress, “Poesis,” as part of her Australian Ballet’s residency program,[2] I can imagine what it might be like if I were. And so it was, that I found myself once more, in the late afternoon, in the van Praagh studio, of the Primrose...
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It was a tri-polar night—but in a good way—last weekend, with a trio of high-energy, beautifully crafted works performed by the spectacular members of L.A. Dance Project.
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On a mild spring night, the New York City Ballet held a similarly temperate Gala performance. The flower arrangements were lovely, the speeches were okay, the two premieres weren’t bad, and the Balanchine excerpt was sturdy. In almost every way, it was an enjoyable—if not overly momentous—night at the ballet.
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San Francisco Ballet artistic director Tamara Rojo may have taken on more drama than she bargained for programming a star-studded “Swan Lake” encore for the finale of her first season here.
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There are few dance companies as versatile as Ballet Hispánico. The company, which is the largest Latine/x/Hispanic cultural organization in the United States, prides itself on its far-reaching celebration of the Latinx diaspora with a school that offers training in flamenco, salsa, and Afro-Caribbean, in addition to ballet, jazz, and more.
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It was a lovefest at the David H. Koch Theater last Thursday for the Youth America Grand Prix's 25th Anniversary Gala performance. As galas go, the night was awash in pageantry.
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According to artistic director Peter Boal’s welcome letter for Pacific Northwest Ballet’s fifth season program, the most popular mixed rep slates at PNB feature works by Crystal Pite or Twyla Tharp.
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Lassoing is a surprising through-line for a Martha Graham Dance Company performance. The theme steps generally tend towards the child-birthing variety: contractions and deep squats.
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As a dance viewer, it’s easy to get swept up in the grand movements in a piece, glossing over the finer details.
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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