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By Committee

Mozart "Divertimento No.15", "Zakouski", Stravinsky "Pulcinella Variations",
"Tchaikovsky Pas de Deux", Stravinsky "Symphony in 3 Movements"
New York City Ballet and Kennedy Center Opera House Orchestra
Opera House
The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts
Washington, DC
March 26, 2018

by George Jackson
© 2018 by George Jackson

A formidable feast, a menu of five different ballets, was served by the New York company for the first of its two 2018 programs in Washington. All the works shared an aesthetic: to take music that had been shaped by human feelings and reflect it as crafted motion, as living architecture, as deliberate anatomic action.

The New York City Ballet in George Balanchine's "Symphony in Three Movements." Photo by Paul Kolnik.

A Hundred and Still Alive

"Opus 19/The Dreamer" "The Cage" "Other Dances" "Fancy Free"
San Francisco Ballet
March 2, 2018
Program V
War Memorial Opera House
San Francisco, CA

by Rita Felciano
copyright © Rita Felciano 2018

A full evening of one-choreo- grapher works is a rarity, eagerly to be anticipated. At SFB it took the one choreo- grapher’s centennial and an artistic director’s thank-you for having enabled him to get a spot on the list of the country’s great male dancers. The men, of course, are Jerome Robbins and Helgi Tomasson. So having a big dose of Robbins choreography was certainly going to be one of the current season’s highlights despite the upcoming "Unbound Festival” which will feature twelve world premieres in two programs. Though superbly danced and carefully balanced, the Robbins tribute left a pinch of dissatisfaction in at least in this viewer. Yet given the law of averages, two and a half of four successes is not negligible. But first the problematic one.

San Francisco Ballet Dancers in Robbins' "The Cage" Photo: Erik Tomasson

Consanguinity

“Signals,” “Wild Wild World,” “Hardness 10”
Stephen Petronio Company
Joyce Theater
New York, NY
March 20, 2018

by Martha Sherman
copyright © 2018 by Martha Sherman

It is all right there. Stephen Petronio is in the middle of a five-year project (maybe longer,) “Bloodlines,” in which he remounts and reflects on the influence of the great choreographers who have been his mentors and inspirations. In the current offering, the link is beautifully clear to the stunning genetic material that he gleaned from Merce Cunningham, whose “Signals” (1970) opened the Petronio Company’s evening at the Joyce Theater, followed by “Wild Wild World,” an excerpt from Petronio’s 2003 work “Underland,” and a world premiere of “Hardness 10.”

Bria Bacon, Elijah Laurant, Tess Montoya (background), Nicholas Sciscione, Ernesto Breton (background), Megan Wright in "Hardness 10." Photo © Yi-Chun Wu.

Color Study

"Dances of Isadora", "The Beauty in Gray", "Piazzolla Caldera"
Paul Taylor American Modern Dance
David H. Koch Theater
Lincoln Center
New York, New York
March 21, 2018

by Mary Cargill
copyright © 2018 by Mary Cargill

With recorded music and a solo piano on the program, the orchestra got the snowy evening off, though most of the audience, buoyed by a $10 snowstorm special, braved the weather and responded enthusiastically.  The program ranged from Isadora Duncan to Bryan Arias' 2018 "The Beauty in Gray", and also included the steamy "Piazzolla Caldera".  Each work, perhaps coincidentally, highlighted a specific color, pink for Duncan, gray (obviously) for Arias' work, and the sultry, sullen red of Loquasto's designs for "Piazzolla Caldera".

Sara Mearns in "Dances of Isadora" photo © Whitney Browne.

ODC Travels -- Locally

Dance Around Town
"Path of Miracles"
Grace Cathedral
Feb. 10, 2018
"What We Carry What We Keep
"News of the World"
March 15, 2018
Buena Vista Center for the Arts Theater
San Francisco, CA

by Rita Felciano
copyright © Rita Felciano 2018

For the last four decades, Brenda Way and KT Nelson have shared the stage during ODC Dance’s annual spring season; Nelson, at first as a superb dancer, today as a choreographer with her own distinct voice. This year the company changed its format. In a program called Dance Around Town, Nelson created world a premiere, “Path of Miracles,” for San Francisco’s Grace Cathedral (February 9/10). Way showed her new “News of the World” and the reprise of “What We Carry What We Keep” at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (March 15-18).

Tegan Schwab and James Gilmer in  KT Nelson's "Path of Miracles".  Photo: Andrew Weeks

Alone Together

"Menagerie", "Myriad", "The Outset"
The Washington Ballet
Harman Hall
Washington, DC
March 18, 2018 at 1:30 PM 

by George Jackson
© 2018 by George Jackson

The surprise of this ambitious bill of three brand new ballets was the similarity of the dramatic theme which tantalized the 3 different, rather new choreographers. Clifton Brown, Gemma Bond and Marcelo Gomes addressed the relationship of the individual to that person's group. I suspect the similarity wasn't due to collusion but astonished the dance makers and also Julie Kent, director of  The Washington Ballet, who had commissioned the premieres. Music for two of the ballets - Brown's and Gomes's - was, commendably, performed live. Brown's treatment of the group and its constituents was lighthearted and casual, Bond's seemed anxious  and earnest, and Gomes's minutely detailed. 

Photo: The Washington Ballet Menagerie: Venus Villa and Tamás Krizsa. Photo by media4artists Theo Kossenas.

 

Running the Gamut

“Set and Reset,” “Dances of Isadora,” “Esplanade”
Trisha Brown Dance Company, Sara Mearns, Paul Taylor Dance Company
Paul Taylor Modern American Dance and The American Dance Festival
David H. Koch Theater
New York, New York
March 18, 2018

by Michael Popkin
Copyright 2018 © by Michael Popkin

On the second Sunday evening of its Lincoln Center season, Paul Taylor showcased the rebranding of his organization as Paul Taylor American Modern Dance. While the program called Icons – also sponsored by the American Dance Festival – started in cool Zen mode with the Trisha Brown Dance Company presenting a revival of its 1983 “Set and Reset,” the program built steadily in energy and force. New York City Ballet’s superb ballerina Sara Mearns was then unforgettably dramatic performing barefoot in a series of dances that claimed to be recreations of works by Isadora Duncan, before the Taylor company – as the home team - wound things up with a rendition of “Esplanade” of more startling attack than anything seen here for years in that particular work.

Photo © Darial Sneed of Sara Mearns in “Dances of Isadora”

Statements

Choreography by Michio Ito and Dana Burgess
Dana Tai Soon Burgess Dance Company
National Portrait Gallery
Washington, DC
March 17, 2018

by George Jackson
© 2018 by George Jackson

The site of the performance was an oblong salon on the Portrait Gallery's second floor. Prominently on display in addition to the dancing was a large portrait of a female dancer by Ferdinand Hodler (1853 -1918), the Swiss German painter. Hodler shows both motion and pause in his subject's pose, and areas of geometric flattening and of volumetric rounding in her body's contours. The painting's palette is modern, with a purposely limited selection of coloring book, semi-pastel shades. The first three dances on the program, Ito's, were simpler than Burgess's explorations of shifting or conflicting moods in the four other pieces. Most of the dances by both choreographers were solos or duos. Only one work by Burgess required a larger cast - six performers. It seemed, however, not a single entity but a confluence of sequential statements.

Members of the Dana Tai Soon Burgess dance company: (from left) Ryan Carlough, Ian Ceccarelli, Felipe Oyarzun Moltedo and Sarah Halzack.

Atmospheric Conditions

"Aureole", "Changes", "Eventide", "Piazzolla Caldera"
Paul Taylor Dance Company
David H. Koch Theater
New York, New York
March 17, 2018, matinee

by Mary Cargill
copyright © 2018 by Mary Cargill

The generously programmed matinee had four substantial pieces, from the breakthrough "Aureole" (1962) to the more recent "Changes" (2008), in addition to two powerful works from 1997, "Eventide" and "Piazzolla Caldera". While "Changes", to songs by the Mamas and the Papas, was enthusiastic, the earlier works were richer and more imaginative, showing Taylor's magnificent ability to evoke mood and develop characters without overt narrative.

Paul Taylor Dance Company in "Changes" photo © Paul B. Goode.

The Litmus Test

"The Sleeping Beauty"
The National Ballet of Canada
Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts
Toronto, Canada
March 8, 2018

by Denise Sum
copyright © 2018 by Denise Sum

This month marks the 200th birthday of the great Marius Petipa. What better way to mark the occasion than with performances of his masterpiece, "The Sleeping Beauty"? In addition to representing the zenith of the imperial Russian style, Rudolf Nureyev's 1972 production will always hold a special place in the National Ballet of Canada's repertoire. The NBoC came of age with this production, touring it widely across North America, galvanized by Nureyev's vision and star quality. It remains a grand and lavish work that the company should be proud of. It also provides a periodic checkup of the troupe's cohesiveness and mettle in this all hands on deck technically and stylistically demanding production. Any respectable classical company must be able to pull off a convincing version of this perennial classic, and the NBoC gave a fine performance here. 

Photo: Heather Ogden and Guillaume Côté in "The Sleeping Beauty". Photo by Bruce Zinger.