World-class review of ballet and dance.
Dance, at its best, captures nuance particularly well, allowing us to feel deeply and purely. In its wordlessness, it places a primal reliance on movement and embodied knowledge as communication all its own. It can speak directly from the body to the heart, bypassing the brain’s drive to “make sense of.”
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“Racines”—meaning roots—stands as the counterbalance to “Giselle,” the two ballets opening the Paris Opera Ballet’s season this year.
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“Giselle” is a ballet cut in two: day and night, the earth of peasants and vine workers set against the pale netherworld of the Wilis, spirits of young women betrayed in love. Between these two realms opens a tragic dramatic fracture—the spectacular and disheartening death of Giselle.
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Michele Wiles’ Park City home is nestled in the back of a wooded neighborhood, hidden from the road by pines and deciduous trees that are currently in the midst of their autumn transformations.
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I joined choreographer and artistic director Cathy Marston over a video call at the end of another day of rehearsals.
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Times are hard for ballet. With national funding that favours the new and the bold, ticket prices rising, and accusations of elitism, only a fool would start a company focused on works of the past.
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It was a grand night of show and—well, show more—as eight members of L.A. Dance Project strutted their gorgeous, technically brilliant stuff in the US premiere of “Gems.”
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Before founding the Seoul International Dance Festival, Lee Jong-Ho began his career as a journalist.
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During the summer, two Chinese dance productions came to Koch Theater at New York’s Lincoln Center: “Lady White Snake” from Shanghai Grand Theater in July and “Butterfly Lovers” from Hong Kong Ballet in August.
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When Amy Watson took the reins at the Royal Danish Ballet one year ago, she entered stormy waters.
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I walk into Roulette, a rough-around-the-edges world music venue, a couple of blocks from the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM). I am attending “Dambudzo,” presented as part of BAM’s Next Wave Festival, brought to the neighborhood by the bold imagination and creative enterprise of Zimbabwe performing artist Nora Chipaumire.
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A rehabilitated 117-year-old power plant situated on the Gowanus Canal in Brooklyn, once a toxic waste site, now houses an amazing new contemporary arts hub—Powerhouse Arts.
Continue ReadingLong before the dancers take the stage, Dance Theatre of Harlem’s season at New York City Center feels like one of the most energizing cultural events of the spring.
Continue ReadingIt is rare for George Balanchine’s grand, bedazzled “Symphony in C” to open a program. Its champagne-popping finale for 52 dancers tends to be a nightcap.
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The Spring is Blooming festival, by Dance Reflections by Van Cleef & Arpels, now in its fifth year, has become a highlight of the spring dance circuit.
Continue ReadingAs the audience come to their feet at the end of this ballet there is a noted difference to be seen on stage. Three women stand with joined hands, taking their call as the romantic leads of a loud and proud lesbian ballet.
Continue ReadingOne of San Francisco Ballet’s greatest assets is its home venue, the Beaux-Arts style War Memorial Opera House, with four rings of seating that require performers to project their energies practically to the exosphere.
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