The evening certainly demonstrated the admirable qualities of the SFB dancers: their hard-working, good-humoured, go-for-it approach and the range of different talents in the company. The goodwill they generate in the audience is remarkable. Here’s hoping they come back for a return visit soon.
Reviews
Reviews of Dance and Ballet Performances
As the 50th anniversary season draws to a close, it is clear that things have come full circle. The company began with a Swan Lake in 1962; it celebrates this major milestone with another.
The choice of programme was something of a curate’s egg – disappointingly so in view of the company’s rich repertoire – but two out of the four works were excellent and the dancing was spectacular.
When it was announced that Mark Morris would choreograph a new piece for Philadelphia’s Voloshky Ukrainian Dance Ensemble, the collaboration sounded promising.
San Francisco’s second programme was better balanced than the first, with contrasting works created for the company within the past two years.
I saw the first cast led by Jin Yao, the top ballerina in the company. Her acting was superb, and her dancing too had a warm glow throughout.
I loved the way the SFB dancers were so confident with the choreography (of Divertimento No 15), at ease after an understandably tense start.
It’s easy to admire ECLIPSE for its moments of understated beauty, its modesty, its craft, and the quality of the dancing. Why, then, does it ultimately feel so cold and empty?
At the time of its premiere in 1964 The Display shocked its audiences. Highly sexualized, violent and thoroughly modern, the ballet divided audiences and critics. But, seen in the context of Helpman’s life, the choices within the work begin to make sense.
The whole troupe’s dedication and excellence in performance was most commendable, if only there were brighter sections to provide a better contrast to the pervasively dark and mournful tone of this piece.
I'm not sure if this collaboration pushed borders or changed my mind on disability but what I do know is that it was a fine piece of work and I'm very glad I saw it.
...Bart's a gifted and discerning artist, with a deep understanding of the Opera's heritage and style. Rather than trying to "recreate" the long-forgotten original choreography by Arthur St. Leon, Bart's made a new work that feels old, as if it had long been a warhorse of the Opera's repertory, subject to over a century of vagaries in taste and technique, yet emerging today all the richer for the...
It is something of a cliché to say it, but the guiding principle of Morris’s Dido - as in the more recent Socrates - is simplicity. No single element - musc, words, dance - is privileged above the others.
Overall, this thoughtful piece confirms Yang as a choreographer of intelligence and originality. Design, lighting and music are all excellent, as is the dancing from this fine ensemble company.
...remarkable, offering a two-hour program of five diverse Indian dance styles, showing a balance of narrative and pure dance works, in an exciting mix of solos, duets, and ensemble performances. The quality of the dancing was high.
The idea behind Amy Seiwert’s SKETCH 2 is to promote women ballet choreographers. Included in the press kit was an informal survey of twenty-four ballet companies with income over $5 million in the United States. Of the 302 works to be performed this upcoming season only 27 were by seventeen women.
'Oh, Inverted World' is fun and fresh, and it proves McIntyre - who also leads his own company, the Trey McIntyre Project - to be a choreographer of many talents.
Once in a while we experience one of those serendipitous evenings in which we show up with few expectations, only to encounter an oasis of structure, understated virtuosity and, best of all, musical intelligence.
I don’t regret spending two afternoons in the warm sun before the unbelievably early performances ( 6 and 6:30 curtain times), but overall, the dancing, no matter how artistic or technically accomplished, is seriously hindered by the productions and/or venues.
A 40-hour round trip to watch a ballet gala on the other side of the world might be seen as a trifle obsessive by some and perhaps it is. But galas tend to be two a penny these days and this one was certainly very different, both in terms of being in aid of a unique and wonderful cause and in the spectacular diversity of remarkable dancing...