Royal Opera House/Royal Ballet – Live from Covent Garden: First Concert
★★★✰✰ The first concert was not much of a consolation for all that we have lost. So far, the Royal Ballet appears a token add-on to the opera’s contributions…
Richard Alston Dance Company – Final Edition – London
★★★★✰ 8th March at Sadler’s Wells was the last time we were able to see Richard Alston’s work performed by his own company of dancers. Jann Parry with a full and perceptive review of Alston’s latest work and last company show.
Svetlana Zakharova – Modanse: Gabrielle Chanel, Come un Respiro – London
★★★✰✰ Stunning images of Bolshoi ballerina Svetlana Zakahrova dressed as Coco Chanel whetted the appetite for the London Premiere of her latest how, Modanse.
Richard Alston Dance Company – Detour, Quartermark, Proverb, Brahms Hungarian – London
★★★★✰ Alston’s choreography is formal in that it has structure, style and steps, instead of resorting to running in circles. Its partnering etiquette is courteous rather than abusive.
Alonzo King LINES Ballet – Handel, Common Ground (world premiere with Kronos Quartet) – San Francisco
★★★★✰ For those dance fans who are also music devotees, this bill is a must see.
New English Ballet Theatre – The Four Seasons, Remembrance – London
★★★✰✰ Both pieces are demanding and elicit some impressively stylish moments, though there’s a fair amount of unevenness…
Semperoper Ballett – In the Middle, Somewhat Elevated, Neue Suite, Enemy in the Figure – London
★★★✰✰ Semperoper’s dancers distort the classical ballet line more than the Paris Opera Ballet’s (or ENB’s) and don’t bother much with fifth positions or precise épaulement for Forsythe’s endless tendus. They seem contemporary dancers rather than étoiles being outrageous.
Richard Alston Dance Company – Mid Century Modern, Carnaval, Cut and Run – London
★★★★★ It must be tempting to get carried away by sentiment when it comes to celebrating both a 70th birthday and fifty years as a choreographer in a programme that also marks the departure of a special muse.
School of American Ballet – Workshop Performance: Danses Concertantes, Les Gentilhommes, The Four Temperaments – New York
★★★★✰ Each spring, the School of American Ballet, New York City Ballet’s breeding-ground, holds a series of “Workshop” performances to show off the crème de la crème of its upper-level students.
Ballet Memphis – Confluence, I Am a Woman: Moult, The Darting Eyes, Politics – New York
Without a doubt, the most eccentric piece on the program is Gabrielle Lamb’s I Am a Woman: Moult, originally commissioned as part of an evening of works by women choreographers. (A noble cause.) …
The Mikhailovsky Ballet’s American Debut at the Lincoln Center
Having wowed London with three acclaimed seasons over the last six years, at last the Mikhailovsky Ballet make their American debut in NY. Lisa Snyder introduces the company and its repertoire…
Mark Morris Dance Group – Acis and Galatea – New York
As he has shown again and again, the choreographer Mark Morris has a way with Baroque music. He clearly adores it…
Yale School of Music & Yale School of Drama – The Soldier’s Tale – New York
Stravinsky’s is a bitter tale with folk roots, about a soldier (played by the convincingly guileless, agile Tom Pecinka) returning home from the front who is sidetracked by the devil….
Mark Morris Dance Group – L’Allegro, il Penseroso ed il Moderato – New York
L’Allegro, with its painterly tableaux, classical references, and unselfconscious evocations of sex and death, feels both ancient – almost pagan – and perfectly of our time…
Ballet v6.0 Festival – Whim W’Him, BalletCollective and Jessica Lang Dance – New York
The Ballet v6.0 Festival has just been on at New York’s Joyce Theater and Marina Harss was there for. So where are young choreographers taking contemporary ballet…?
San Francisco Ballet – Criss-Cross, Francesca da Rimini, Symphony in Three Movements – San Francisco
Program 7 made me think a lot about this tricky issue of programming because this bill is a weird sandwich made with a delectable gourmet filling between slices of bland Wonder bread.
LINES Ballet – Constellation – San Francisco
Someone who has embodied King’s choreographic essence thoroughly in a few short years is Michael Montgomery. Everything he does feels completely natural, utterly effortless, like a child running freely, exploring his surroundings and his body without self-consciousness.
