by Leigh Witchel
copyright © 2010 by Leigh Witchel
- “Balanchine’s Petipa” Pacific Northwest Ballet
- “La Bayadère” American Ballet Theatre
- Pam Tanowitz Dance
- “Agon, Morgen, Chaconne” New York City Ballet
“Balanchine’s Petipa”
Pacific Northwest Ballet
Works & Process
Peter B. Lewis Theater, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
New York, NY
May 15, 2010
In a lecture-demonstration led and narrated by Doug Fullington, eight Pacific Northwest Ballet dancers came to the Guggenheim Museum to show us historical Petipa steps reconstructed from Stepanov notation (Fullington is an authority) and compare and contrast them with Balanchine’s choreography.
With so many links New York, (Artistic Director Peter Boal, former New York City Ballet dancers Carla Körbes and Seth Orza among others) any appearance by PNB is eagerly anticipated; but Works & Process shows aren’t full performances. Everything’s out of context, to think of it as a performance, we would need to imagine not just scenery and costumes, but a corps de ballet that isn’t there and can’t fit on the narrow stage. The dancers were forced to dance under themselves or otherwise adjust, and the choreography changed shape.
Limitations of the production aside, Fullington knows his history and offered several fascinating tidbits. The original “Black Swan pas de deux” male variation from the 1895 Petipa/Ivanov production of “Swan Lake” was choreographed by Alexander Gorsky, and was all beats and petit allegro. It was changed by the great dancer Pierre Vladimirov to grand allegro. This influences how we see Siegfried; who we’d mentally cast in the role. Benjamin Griffiths, a small, quick soloist danced the original variation – and that’s the sort of dancer those steps look most congenial on.
Fullington’s detective work is dogged and loving, his lecture style gently didactic. After a brief explanation of the contrasting elements of classical and Romantic style (the dance design and formal repetition of classical dance, the expressive elements of Romantic) Kaori Nakamura and Seth Orza showed the entry in the coda of the “Kingdom of the Shades pas de deux” from “La Bayadère.” There is no notation for Solor’s entry in the coda, so Fullington ferreted out descriptions by Feodor Lopukhov, who wrote down what Pavel Gerdt, who had danced it, told him.
Three variations to the same music from “Raymonda” were shown. First Petipa’s, and then a female one that Balanchine made for his ’46 staging of the full ballet, and finally the male variation from “Raymonda Variations.” The Petipa was classical; in ’46 Balanchine moved the music from Act II to the Act III wedding celebration and added Hungarian character touches. Seth Orza did his best to fit the male variation on the stage; it’s hard enough normally. It seems to be non-stops beats, except when there are air turns.
Though sometimes there was a demonstration of where Balanchine amplified something that Petipa did, Fullington wisely didn’t try and draw a straight line between the two men, as if Petipa was the ape from which the homo sapiens Balanchine evolved. Rather, he compared and showed a tissue of influences – a sense of what both men might have absorbed that formed their artistry.
Unsuprisingly, the dancers performed more in the Balanchine excerpts. Their style in Petipa seemed more the absence of a Balanchine style. James Moore is a compelling dancer; he did the first solo in “The Prodigal Son” like he might have danced “Mopey,” but they’re both portraits of troubled young men, so it worked on him.
It’s a joy, even a relief to see Körbes dance Balanchine once again. After she almost disappeared into the contemporary repertory the company brought to the Joyce early in the year, the brief excerpt of the pas de deux from “Apollo” with Orza eloquently showed the lush style that suits her so naturally.
“La Bayadère”
American Ballet Theatre
Metropolitan Opera House
New York, NY
May 18, 2010
If you need to take an Italian opera – or a soap opera – fan to their first ballet, “La Bayadère” is a good choice. The excessive passions and dueling divas in this “Dynasty” of ballets should seem familiar. “La Bayadère” was well danced at its opening night, and it was good, campy fun. One arose from the other. None of the cast let up in conviction; they don’t dance it as camp, which is what makes the high camp work.
Natalia Makarova’s full-length production is now 30 years old, and marked by a curtain speech by Kevin McKenzie, who led the tiny ballerina out for applause.
The triangle of leads was Diana Vishneva as the temple dancer Nikiya, Gillian Murphy as her aristocratic and murderous rival Gamzatti and Marcelo Gomes as Solor, the object of their rivalry. Vishneva knows this role well and gives it a trademark stance. She arched her back to give Nikiya an exotic curve; it’s Russian Orientalism – as if the entire ballet were composed of paisley arabesques. Her death scene is truncated (she doesn’t dance the bizarre allegro variation where she is oompah-ed to death) but she still squeezed everything out of it
Gomes also gave the ballet Oriental curves with extravagant backbends to close most of his variations. Opening night was only the first of three Solors he danced in a row due to Roberto Bolle having to withdraw; Gomes was heroic in his unflagging stamina as well as his commitment.
Murphy looked comfortable as Gamzatti; the role takes some of her tics and uses them to advantage. Her habit of leading with her chin registered as Gamzatti’s haughtiness. The part also suits Murphy’s strengths; her insertion of triple fouettes worked better than during her “Don Quixote” pas de deux at the gala. They were cleaner and straighter, so seemed less egregious.
In the Kingdom of the Shades, the corps showed good training and rehearsal. Vishneva and Gomes danced a handsome but understated pas de deux; she knows what she wants from this role down cold. Gomes did beautiful turns on a perfect axis but a strange manège of en dedans sauts de basque that looked as if he was figuring them out as he was doing them. Vishneva capped it all off by tearing through piqué turns at breakneck speed. She’s always been the liveliest of Shades.
“The Wanderer Fantasy (Dances 1 and 2)”
Pam Tanowitz Dance
Danspace Project
New York, NY
May 20, 2010
Pam Tanowitz credits Cunningham stalwart Viola Farber as her great influence. Tanowitz seems influenced by Cunningham as well, but in a way that travels back towards ballet, rather than away from it.
She’s fascinated by music and seems to utterly believe in the idea of choreographing to it. Her two dances, both to different versions of Schubert’s “Wanderer Fantasy” show both her musicality and a sensibility that’s both objective and pastoral.
The first dance, set to a recording of Liszt’s orchestration of the Schubert, was set on a large cast of dance students from SUNY Purchase, with Daniel Madoff from the Cunningham company mixed in. The scenery, cardboard boxes with broad strokes of green, represented a forest, and looked in a disarming manner like something out of a school play. It felt appropriate; this is a diligently structured teaching piece – both for the dancers and Tanowitz. She used the opportunity to move large groups around – something much harder to do with independent resources.
The students worked diligently; Matthew Perez couldn’t help but stand out; he moved his long lines in his own way, with jittery isolation.
Three solos came next. Short and pungent; they flirted mysteriously with strange happenings. A few of the columns of painted cardboard boxes were carefully moved to reveal a lurid, silver sparkle curtain lurking behind them. It was funny in its own way; Tanowitz seemed to refuse to allow the dancers to make An Entrance through it – how hard it must have been to resist.
Anne Lentz entered with a large potted plant that she set down at the side – a piece of real greenery to augment the cardboard. Dylan Crossman’s solo ended with something that seemed close to the beginning of an embrace as the lights went out.
“The Wanderer” returned again, this time in Schubert’s original piano version, played live with great spirit by Alan Feinberg and danced by a smaller professional cast. The work was so cleanly mathematical in vocabulary and structure that when Crossman laid his head in someone else’s lap it came as a near shock.
Tanowitz’ work holds emotion at arms length: everything seems experimental as if testing and gauging human reaction. It’s sculptural, deconstructed, unromantic Romanticism. Her clean, calm work doesn’t make for a thrilling or moving evening – instead, it’s a bracing one.
“Agon,” “Morgen,” “Chaconne”
New York City Ballet
David H. Koch Theater
New York, NY
May 23, 2010
The Sunday matinee “Agon” contained a pinch-hit play. Albert Evans went offstage after the opening and Sébastien Marcovici entered with Wendy Whelan for the pas de deux. Evans sustained a mild back injury, and Marcovici, scheduled to dance “Chaconne,” came to the rescue.
The orchestra sounded at sixes and sevens. It opened with a very fast tempo, making everyone race to catch up. Not so bad, but then mauling the female duet in the first pas de trois and the final coda of the ballet made the dancers look unmusical, and it was not their fault.
“Morgen,” made in 2001, is one of Martins’ less-frequent adagio ballets. He can make an adagio with facility, but seems more engaged with allegro work. Still, “Morgen” is handsome with fluid partnering and Alain Vaes’ beautiful set of pillars in the blue-gray light before dawn. Why these people are up dancing at 5 a.m. is never made perfectly clear.
There are three men and three women in the cast, and everyone does a duet with each member of the opposite sex. Darci Kistler made a countdown appearance to her retirement at the season’s close; her husband and daughter were in the audience watching.
“Morgen” is kind to Kistler; she can still look coltish in the way she’s most comfortable.
Keeping it all in the family her step-son Nilas Martins danced. Even when he’s out of shape he usually can partner; this time it couldn’t even be said that he partnered well.
On the other hand, both Jenifer Ringer and Charles Askegard are having an Indian summer. If Ringer plays her cards right, her career could end (when it ends) at a peak rather than a painful decline.
The ballet’s continuous partner swapping is still confusing. If it didn’t have hints of a plot it wouldn’t matter, but in a non-abstract ballet the switching looks like shorthand for multiple assignations in a single night.
Maria Kowroski seems also in the midst of an Indian summer. The opening duet of “Chaconne” was the best she’s looked in a while. Even with her Farrell-ish looks and body (which have been as much of a deficit as an asset) she seemed stuck as a comedienne who rarely got to do comedy. How exciting to watch her and see more than prodigious facility. Alas, after saving the day in “Agon,” Marcovici ran out of gas for his own part in “Chaconne.”