danceviewtimes

Sharing the Stage

"In Mouth," "Armed Guard"
Jen Rosenblit, Vanessa Anspaugh
New York Live Arts
New York, NY
February 16, 2012

By Carol Pardo
Copyright ©2012 by Carol Pardo

Jen Rosenblit (Hampshire College, class of 2005) and Vanessa Anspaugh (B.A. Antioch 2002, M.F.A. 2008 Smith) are young choreographers, both closing in on thirty with a dozen or so works to their credit. Both are in the process of securing their places in the New York dance scene. Splitting an evening at New York Live Arts is a big step forward toward doing so; next stop, a full evening all their own. But neither dance maker could have gotten there without their collaborating dancers or yard goods.

 

Learning a Lot From Lydia

"New Untitled Work", "Falling Out"
Lydia Johnson Dance
Peridance's Salvatore Capezio Theater
New York, New York
February 26, 2012

by Mary Cargill
copyright © 2012 by Mary Cargill

There were no tattoos to be seen at Lydia Johnson's matinee at the intimate Capezio Theater, but there was a lot to enjoy.  The small, female company (with the addition of former NYCB dancer Max van der Sterre as a guest artist) is ballet based, with a weightlessness and controlled upper bodies, which they combine with everyday, non-balletic gestures.  Johnson uses these everyday gestures--walking, waving, swinging the arms--abstractly and formally, almost obliquely, to create a mood rather than a specific feeling, and the dancers all moved with an easy formality.  There was no sense of a work-in-progress in the new, as yet untitled piece.  Set to selections from the Argentinian composer Osvaldo Golijov, it uses the plaintive, rhythmic music to create a feeling of ritual mourning.  The five dancers are rather formally costumed, in black lace tops and long fullish skirts of gold and green, and the shifting shapes evoke both the Spanish baroque and archaic Greece.

Play and Work

"Play"
Ballet Arizona
Joyce Theater
New York, New York
February 22, 2012

by Mary Cargill
copyright © 2012 by Mary Cargill

Ib Andersen, the elegant, understated, and irreplaceable New York City dancer (and for those of us with a long memory, Bournonville stylist extraordinaire) returned to New York as the director of the 35 member Ballet Arizona.  Not surprisingly, these dancers embody some of his best traits; elegant, open upper bodies, modesty, precision, musicality, and the strength to make everything look easy.  The dancers, from a wide variety of countries and schools, all move in a coherent and vivid style; this is a true company, and not a collection of dancers. 

Small is Beautiful

“Caprice,” “Leise, Leise,” “Emilia,” “Spieglein,” “Slow Dancing to Kurt Weil,” “Ghost Story”
New Chamber Ballet - Program 3
City Center Studios
New York, New York
February 11, 2012

By Michael Popkin
Copyright © 2012 by Michael Popkin

New Chamber Ballet’s evening of six short works – four by company director Miro Magloire and one each by Emery LeCrone and Constantine Baecher – was a refreshing counterpoint to big company ballet. The works use classical dance unpretentiously to tell stories, seasoned by good music and the appeal of attractive dancers.  In the close-up space of City Center Studios, the audience sits in five rows of folding chairs right on top of the performance space, and the immediate experience of music and dance carried the day.

Getting Back in Business

"Six Piano Pieces (Harlem Style)," "In the Mirror of her Mind," "Glinka pas de trois," "En Avant," "Contested Space"
Dance Theatre of Harlem II
The Joyce Theater
February 9, 2012
New York, NY

By Carol Pardo
Copyright ©2012 by Carol Pardo

If good will were all, Dance Theatre of Harlem would be thriving. But there must also be money and that’s where the company came to grief. Founded by Arthur Mitchell and Karel Shook in 1969 in the wake of the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., DTH, in debt and overwhelmed, went "on hiatus" in 2004 though the company school stayed in business. There was also a small touring group, made up of students from the school, the Dance Theater of Harlem Ensemble now known as DTH II. And yes, it felt odd to be watching DTH II when there is no DTH I. Money permitting, that should change; auditions began last month for the first company whose New York debut is planned for April 2013.

 

Second Casts at Work

 

"Trio", "Francesca da Rimini", "Le Carnaval des Animaux"
San Francisco Ballet
Program 3
War Memorial Opera House
San Francisco, CA
February 18, 2012
by Rita Felciano

Copyright © Rita Felciano, 2012

Watching second casts at work has its own pleasure. You discover less experienced artists and see others in unusual roles. Who would have thought that Sarah Van Patten could be such a fine elephant? Choreographically, SFB's third program ranged from delicious to middling to ill conceived. It was not one of the Company's glory points.

Pure Dance, Pure Joy

"Chroma," "Beaux," "Number Nine,"
San Francisco Ballet
Program 2
War Memorial Opera House
San Francisco, CA
February 14, 20

by Rita Felciano
Copyright © Rita Felciano, 2012

Sean Bennett, Apprentice dancer to San Francisco Ballet, could hardly control his smiles such was his delight performing in the world premiere of Mark Morris' incandescent "Beaux" with some of the company's finest male dancers. And why not? Morris has created an elegant, decorous nonet, suggesting perhaps an 18th Century garden party, perhaps an ancient Greek gymnasium. Basing the work on Bohuslav Martinu's lively neoclassical "Concerto for Harpsichord and Small Orchestra" and "Two pieces for harpsichord", he proposed a male community at ease with itself, though not without its moments when playfulness and gamboling reveal emotional undercurrents. Bracketed by fine performances of Wayne McGregor's "Chroma" and Christopher Wheeldon's "Number Nine," this was a program in which contemporary ballet -- at its purest and at its most diverse -- shone.

Mirrors and Reflections

"Untitled," "Counterfeit Scenario"
Amanda Loulaki, Levi Gonzalez
The Kitchen
New York, NY
February 10, 2012

By Martha Sherman
Copyright © 2012 by Martha Sherman

Even though they came from opposite poles, Amanda Loulaki and Levi Gonzalez turned out to be a surprisingly well-matched pair of choreographers: one introspective, the other extroverted. In their shared program, Loulaki’s solo, “Untitled,” was a study of measured movement reflected in only light and shadow. Gonzalez’s duet, “Counterfeit Scenario,” had Natalie Green, his dancing partner, move to his instructions as they shared a state of mind. Both choreographers invited, pulled, and persuaded the audience into becoming part of their subtle equations.

Christian Spuck’s “Das Fräulein von S.” offers another gem to the ballets inspired by E.T.A. Hoffmann

“Das Fräulein von S.”
Stuttgart Ballet
State Opera Stuttgart, Germany
February 10, 2012

by Horst Koegler
copyright 2012 by Horst Koegler 

A piercing scream and a multilayered crashing chord cut through the pitch-dark stillness of the opera-house. Then the curtain goes up and on the stage we stare at a tableau vivant of baroque-clad people, paralyzed: another mysterious murder has shocked the Parisian population at the court of Louis XIV, the Sun King. But then they start to move hectically, chasing, tumbling over each other, a man falls to the ground, sinister policemen arrest a youth and there happens a maddening tumult. Thus opens the spectacular new ballet noir “Das Fräulein von S.” by Christian Spuck, resident choreographer of the Stuttgart Ballet.

 

The Royal Ballet Comings and Goings, and a "Dream/Song of the Earth" mixed bill

"The Dream," "Song of the Earth"
The Royal Ballet
Royal Opera House
Covent Garden
London
9 February 2012

by Juditih Cruickshank
copyright 2012 by Judith Cruickshank

First the nasty shock, then the pleasant surprise. The shock came with the sudden departure of the Royal Ballet’s young Russian principal Sergei Polunin, for reasons which only he knows and has commendably refused to reveal. Polunin was due to make his debut as Oberon in Frederick Ashton’s "The Dream" only days after his departure, and it looked at first as if the alternate cast, the Australian Steven McRae, would dance all performances.

This inevitably raises the question of how it could be that a company of the size and reputation of the Royal Ballet fails to have a stand-by cast ready to go on, even with some last-minute polishing required? It seems extraordinary that none of the male soloists or principals was considered suitable to seize his chance and step into the breach.