Agile Masculinity

The men are already on stage when the audience filters into the theater. Some stand stretching at the ballet barres, aligned in neat rows, and others move around, jumping, swinging their legs, lunging. Daniil Simkin—the mind behind this evening’s performance—is among them, wearing a bandana to keep his hair off of his face.

Performance

“Sons of Echo” co-produced by Studio Simkin and the Joyce Theater Foundation

Place

The Joyce Theater, New York, NY, January 14, 2025

Words

Rebecca Decynski

Osiel Gouneo, Alban Lendorf in “Notes” by Lucinda Childs. Photograph by Steven Pisano

“Sons of Echo,” is a production composed of four works of contemporary ballet, two of which are world premieres. All are by female choreographers: Lucinda Childs, Tiler Peck, Anne Plamondon, and Drew Jacoby. The the cast is made up of five male principals: Jeffrey Cirio of Boston Ballet, Osiel Gouneo of Bayeriches Staatsballett, Siphesihle November of the National Ballet of Canada, Alban Lendorf, formerly of the Royal Danish Ballet and American Ballet Theater, and, of course, Simkin formerly of ABT and Staatsballet Berlin.

Before any of these performances begin, though, the dancers need to warm up—which is why they’re all on the stage wearing their practice clothes. Once the audience is fully settled, ballet master Tomas Karlborg enters, and introduces each dancer. Then, class begins: an abbreviated course of adagio, tendus, turns, petit allegro, and a final coda. The ballerina Maria Kochetkova, a surprise guest, pops onstage to join. It’s entirely playful: Karlborg is demanding yet goofy, singing his own instrumentalization as he demonstrates combinations. By the end, there’s also a sense of playful one-upmanship among the dancers as they spiral through different variations of turns à la seconde. Gouneo, in particular, stands out for his impossibly fast pirouettes and liquid grace.

With class over, Childs’s “Notes”—an abbreviated, all-male version of her 2025 piece “Notes on Longing”—starts the real show. Set to a score by the neoclassical pianist Matteo Myderwyk (which is played exceptionally by accompanist Vladimir Rumyantsev), the piece is quietly poetic. The men, dressed in flowing white pants, weave through one another in almost mathematical configurations reminiscent of her “Three Dances (for performed piano).” But where that work is staccato and leans closer to intentional rigidity, “Notes” has a far softer quality. Cirio, Gouneo, Lendorf, and November are airy in their petit allegro and seem to float through pivots and pirouettes. As partners, Gouneo and Lendorf are particularly regal yet tender. Simply put: it’s lovely.

Alban Lendorf in “Real Truth” by Tiler Peck. Photograph by Steven Pisano

“Real Truth,” a new work by New York City Ballet principal (and increasingly productive choreographer) Tiler Peck, opens the second act of the program, first to a spoken-word introduction by the jazz singer Gregory Porter and then his soulful “Real Truth.”

Gouneo, Lendorf, and Simkin make a particularly agile cast. They hurl themselves through impressive leaps and turns in a way that suggests that the bravado is the whole point. Peck shines as a choreographer in creating interesting relational passages with dancers—such as an instance when the three dancers create a U-shape, with two unfurling a leg parallel to the other—but “Real Truth” is far more focused on athletic solos, interspaced with moments of unison.

I found myself wanting to see more contrast between the dancers, or at least a touch more variation in the constant grand allegro; it’s hard to sustain that high for six-plus minutes. Despite some satisfactory choreographic passages—such as when two dancers whirl into simultaneous double saut de basques—“Real Truth” more often than not feels formulaic and designed for competition.

“Will You Catch My Fall,” another world premiere, this one by choreographer Anne Plamondon, is a standout of the evening, through which November and Cirio give an articulate and mesmerizing performance. Set to an original score by the electronic musician Ouri, the piece opens with each dancer occupying their own slice of light on a dark stage.

They dance in slithering, yet sharp movements—independently of one another, yet together. They contract and pop their torsos, eventually moving into supportive postures, holding one another, and falling into positions that require much control. The drama of the repetitive score and the overwhelmingly dark stage does add to the piece’s cinematic effect, but there’s also much to admire about November and Cirio’s command of the nuanced choreography.

Jeffrey Cirio, Osiel Gouneo, Alban Lendorf, Daniil Simkin in “Jack” by Drew Jacoby. Photograph by Steven Pisano

The close of the night is perfectly eclectic, with Drew Jacoby’s “Jack,” a four-dancer piece (Cirio, Gouneo, Lendorf, and Simkin) with Hans Van Manen-esque quirks. Wearing skin-tight, neon shirts, and each appearing under a low-hanging light, the cast starts off looking like a futuristic sports team. Throughout, the dancers alternate between true balletic passages—a beautiful turn in attitude, for instance—and more clownish articulations, flapping their wings, moving their shoulders in a strut, and taking on Cabaret-style personas.

They’re putting on a show, and they’re not afraid to do something a bit silly, like fall into a forward roll or make a gargouillade about 40 percent floppier than it should be. The hijinks, admittedly, start to wear thin after a bit, but, as is true for the whole evening, the dancers make the dance.

“Sons of Echo” is ostensibly a production that looks to interrogate, or at least meditate on, masculinity in dance, though it remains unclear what the message is by the end of the night. There’s plenty of stereotypically masculine bravado throughout the program, and while the final two numbers stretch into more unconventional styles of movement, they don’t exactly break with tradition. Childs’s piece, with its soft lyricism, may come the closest to suggesting some kind of alternative masculinity. In any case, it’s easy enough to forgive an unsupported theme with a cast this good.

Rebecca Deczynski

Rebecca Deczynski is a New York City-based writer and editor publishes the newsletter Mezzanine Society. Her work has appeared in publications including Inc., Domino, NYLON, and InStyle. She graduated from Barnard College cum laude with a degree in English and a minor in dance.

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