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"Giselle" — Vividly and Happily Alive

"Giselle"
Ballet Arizona
Phoenix Symphony Hall
Phoenix, Arizona
November 3, 2007 (matinee and evening)

by Helene Kaplan
copyright 2007 by Helene Kaplan

At the end of the Gluck's "Iphigenia in Tauris," an opera that has had a renaissance in Europe and North America these past few seasons, Iphigenia must choose between revenge and forgiveness.  At the beginning of Act II, Giselle, who like Iphigenia cannot change the events leading up  to the decision point, faces an afterlife of vengeance and has a similar choice to make that's rooted in a timeless question of classical literature: justice or mercy?  Key to any interpretation of one of the greatest female roles of the classical canon is how Giselle makes this choice.

Two camps

“Pichet Klunchun and Myself”
Jerome Bel
Dance Theater Workshop
New York, NY
November 8, 2007

by Leigh Witchel
copyright © 2007 by Leigh Witchel

Are you more interested in who we are or who we could be?  In 105 minutes on a bare stage with only an iBook for a prop, French post-modern artist Jerome Bel and Thai classical dancer Pichet Klunchun never directly ask the question, but it hovered over their performance.  Bel studied contemporary dance in Angers and danced for several companies.  Now 43, he is a nebbishy balding geek with a computer and looks like he never danced a step in his life.  Klunchun is 35, powerful and sleek with a body as finely tuned as an instrument.  The contrast starts there.

A Quarter of a Century Young

“Irregular Pearl” and “Rasa”
Alonzo King’s Lines Ballet
Yerba Buena Center for the Arts
San Francisco, CA
November 2, 2007

by Rita Felciano
copyright © 2007 by Rita Felciano

The dressed to the hilt crowd at the opening night of Alonzo King’s twenty-fifth anniversary season came to cheer, and cheer they did. From the moment King, in elegant black with his trademark cap and long shawl, stepped in front of the curtain to tell the audience that a quarter of a century had passed like a second or like an eternity, “which is the way I like it,” he had the crowd in his hands. Fortunately, there was plenty to cheer about in the two world premieres, “Irregular Pearl and “Rasa.” The first was performed to selections from Baroque music; the second to a new score by tabla and world musician Zakir Hussain. Live music was what gave these works their breath, their life.

November 4 - Sunday Section

Dale Brauner has posted What's On This Week (New York)

Michael Popkin has a new piece on Christopher Wheeldon's Morphoses:

Son of City Ballet 

Lisa Traiger has a new piece about modern dance -- and concert dance in general:

What's Wrong with Modern Dance?

Tharp's Divine Playground

“Baker’s Dozen,” “Sinatra Suite,” “C. to C.,” “Fancy Free”
American Ballet Theater
City Center
New York, NY
October 30, 2007

By Susan Reiter
copyright© 2007 by Susan Reiter

ABT’s unofficial survey of the 1970s continued with the premiere of its latest Twyla Tharp acquisition, “Baker’s Dozen.” This brilliantly organized, entrancingly musical ensemble work, was the final, glorious creation, of Tharp’s breakthrough decade. During the 1970s, she evolved from a highly regarded innovator, known to the dance cognoscenti, into one of the world’s elite choreographers, whose consistently smart, original works for both her own company and major ballet troupes garnered great acclaim. She made a typically brainy, original foray into TV (“Making Television Dance”), and soon Hollywood came calling. It was in the aftermath of working in that milieu, on the 1979 film version of “Hair,” that she created “Baker’s Dozen.”