Blog

Balanchine in Paris
BALANCHINE IN PARIS, a film by Dominique Delouche, was shown at the Walter Reade Theater on Monday afternoon, January 30th. In the movie, we see footage of Ghislaine Thesmar (above), Alicia Markova, Nina Vyroubova and Violette Verdy coaching dancers of the Paris Opera Ballet and the Bayerische Staatsballett in Balanchine repertoire:

Le Palais de Cristal/Symphony in C
Musique de Georges Bizet, chorégraphie Balanchine (1947/1949)
Ghislaine Thesmar coaching Isabelle Ciaravola et Hervé Moreau, étoiles de l’Opéra de Paris

Le Rossignol
Musique Igor Stravinsky, chorégraphie Balanchine (1929)
Dame Alicia Markova coaching Myriam Ould Braham, première danseuse de l’Opéra de Paris

La Somnambula
Musique Rieti, chorégraphie Balanchine (1960)
Nina Vyroubova et Milorad Miskovitch coaching Muriel Hallé et Valery Colin, sujets à l’Opéra de Paris

Liebeslieder Walzer
Musique Brahms, chorégraphie Balanchine (1960)
Violette Verdy coaching Lucia Lacarra et Cyrille Pierre, étoiles au Bayerisches Staatsballett

Sonatine
Musique Ravel, chorégraphie Balanchine (1975)
Violette Verdy coaching Monique Loudières, étoile de l’Opéra de Paris

The entire film is a delight for ballet fans, and for Balanchine’s admirers in particular. The most moving segment for me was Thesmar coaching Palais de Cristal. And the refinements of Liebeslieder Walzer as coached by Violette Verdy make me more appreciative than ever of that perfumed masterpiece. I certainly hope this film will be released on DVD in the USA.
The showing was prefaced two films by Gabrielle Lamb: En Dedans is a ten-minute reverie on dancers’ dreams which she created for Philaelphia’s Ballet X and which I like especially because my friend Colby Damon is in it. Gabrielle showed me a raw copy of this film on her computer one day last year down at Gibney Dance Center. The finished work is truly dreamlike, the dancers moving in a studio that seems to be drifting through the clouds.

The jewel-like miniature Figment may be viewed on Gabrielle’s website here. Evolving from a dream that she had about a woman with a sword dancing in a tall, slender space this movie has an eerie charm. I also enjoyed hearing Gabrielle, a dancer with a powerful dramatic resonance, speaking about her filmworks.

From Figment
Gabrielle Lamb (2010)
January 30, 2012
Rehearsal: Lydia Johnson’s FALLING OUT

Friday January 27, 2012 – Today at the Battery Dance studio, Lydia Johnson’s dancers were rehearsing her 2006 dancework FALLING OUT. Set to music of Philip Glass (his 3rd Symphony) FALLING OUT will be performed at a special matinee at Peridance on Sunday February 26th. In Kokyat’s image at the top, Max van der Sterre and Kerry Shea.

The work is essentially plotless but the theme of a romantic triangle is clearly established: the relationship between Kerry and Max is a tempestuous one in which moments of harmony (above) alternate with fiery outbursts. The ‘other’ woman, danced by Jessica Sand (seated at right in the photo above) remains an enigmatic figure in the piece. Jessica and Max never dance together; we can never be sure if Jessica is real or an idealized vision in Max’s mind that lures his attentions away from Kerry.

Meanwhile a female chorus, at first indifferent to the central conflict but later drawn into it, dance in stylized a commentary on the action. The dancers are Lisa Iannacito McBride, Kaitlin Accetta, Sarah Pon and Laura Di Orio.

It was an overcast day, but from time to time the sun broke thru the clouds and the studio was illuminated. Above: Laura and Kaitlin.

Dramatic structure: the elements of FALLING OUT are brilliantly sorted in Lydia’s choreography which seems like a play without words. She uses the Glass score with deft imagination, balancing speed and stillness, contemplation and action.

Max and Kerry have developed an impressive partnership in which Max’s strength and skill allows Kerry complete freedom to simply be her beautiful self. They have all the moves down pat and spent the rehearsal mainly working on exploring nuances of gesture and expression. Lydia’s style of encouraging her dancers to paticipate in the process of refining the movement makes her rehearsals unusually satisfying to watch.

Star power: Max’s t-shirt says it all. Great presence, and a real force in the studio.

Max and Kerry

Mood swings: the couple go from tender…

…to turbulent in a flash.

Mysterious force: Jessica Sand keeps us wondering exactly who this woman is, interloper or silent muse? The questions that FALLING OUT raises about the idea of devotion vs desire give us pause to contemplate the realties and illusions of romantic relationships.

Sleeping beauties

FALLING OUT, along with Lydia’s as-yet-untitled new Golijov piece, will be shown at Peridance on Sunday February 26th at 2:30 PM. $10.00 donation-based admission.

All photos by Kokyat. His Leica images from this rehearsal are here.

January 29, 2012
Images from Wheeldon’s LES CARILLONS

These photographs by New York City Ballet’s Paul Kolnik are from the new Christopher Wheeldon ballet LES CARILLONS which premiered on January 28th, 2012. Above: Wendy Whelan and Robert Fairchild. Click on each image to enlarge.

Ensemble of stars: Tyler Angle. Maria Kowroski, Amar Ramasar, Sara Mearns, Robert Fairchild, Wendy Whelan, Daniel Ulbricht.

Above: Tiler Peck and Gonzalo Garcia. Tiler had a heroic evening, dancing superbly in both LES CARILLONS and DANSE A GRANDE VITESSE as well as stepping in mid-ballet in POLYPHONIA for her injured colleague, Jennie Somogyi.

Read about this all-Wheeldon evening here. My thanks to the NYC Ballet press office for providing these photographs.

January 29, 2012
All-Wheeldon @ New York City Ballet

Saturday January 28, 2012 evening – I’ve waited a long time for this: the first programme at New York City Ballet devoted entirely to works of Christopher Wheeldon. Christopher, who danced with the Company and attained the rank of soloist before resigning the position to devote all his energies to choreography, eventually served a stint as NYCB‘s first resident choreographer. He then spent three seasons running his own company, MORPHOSES. Now he is one of the most sought-after creators of new ballets in the world. Meanwhile his established works increasingly crop up in the repertoire of top international companies.

Tonight we saw the world premiere of LES CARILLONS, set to music from Bizet’s L’Arlesienne suites; POLYPHONIA which I tend to think is Wheeldon’s greatest masterpiece to date; and the New York City Ballet premiere of DANSE A GRANDE VITESSE, originally created for the Royal Ballet in 2006. The evening was a huge personal triumph for Christopher and for the individual dancers.

An unfortunate injury to Jennie Somogyi during her valse in POLYPHONIA was unsettling and surely affected her colleagues in the ballet, though they danced on with poise. After a few minutes, Tiler Peck – who was dancing in the other two ballets tonight – stepped onto the stage and finished the ballet in Somogyi’s place.

LES CARILLONS is the most purely appealing new ballet I’ve seen at New York City Ballet since Melissa Barak’s SIMPLE SYMPHONY. CARILLONS shares with with the Barak gem its use of familiar and ear-pleasing music, excellent structuring, and striking passages of dance where the classical movement vocabulary gets stretched but never breaks, giving an overall impression of freshness. Andrews Sill, on the podium, mined the Bizet score to perfection, displaying the melodic and rhythmic variety of the music while providing solid support for the dancers.

CARILLONS begins with ten men onstage; they wear dark fitted costumes with one arm bare; semi-see-thru tops are accented with panels of deep reds or blues. They dance to one of Bizet’s most familiar tunes, soon joined by the women whose wine-toned skirts give the piece an aspect of visual richness. (There is a backdrop but it’s not visible from the 5th Ring).

The ten magnificent principals (yes, I include Ana Sophia Scheller since she should be) then embark on a series of vivid solos, duets and ensembles in which Christopher gives them complex and varied things to do, most especially in the partnering aspects and in the use of hands and arms. Meanwhile the corps of ten, equally handsome dancers all, swirl on and off, enriching the visual textures.

There is a lush saxophone melody to which Sara Mearns and Amar Ramasar dance a spacious pas de deux; there is a vivacious pas de quatre for Ms. Scheller, Tiler Peck, Gonzalo Garcia and Daniel Ulbricht. Wendy Whelan and Robert Fairchild dance a lovely nocturnal duet; then Wendy remains onstage, wandering among the corps dancers as they weave intricate patterns. Wendy’s solo shows her at her radiant best. Wendy and Maria Kowroski (who looked particularly sumptuous in her scarlet gown) dance in beautiful snyc to yet another familiar Bizet melody, and Maria has a gorgeous saxophone adagio with Tyler Angle. In a passage of pure seduction, Sara Mearns displays incredible star power, later joined by the men. The harp lends lyric mystery to a solo impressively danced by Tiler Peck which later extends into a pas de trois for her, Gonzalo and Daniel. Amar Ramasar races around the stage in a series of brilliant leaps. The eye is constantly drawn to one and then another of these charismatic dancers.

Joshua Thew from the corps de ballet joins the principal men in certain passages; Joshua looked totally at home in this stellar ensemble and with his tall, handsome presence he seems like a dancer deserving of greater opportunities to shine.

As the ballet’s original musical theme returns, the cast unite for a richly-wrought finale. The crowd let loose with uninhibited shouts of approval as the dancers came forward to bow; flowers for the ladies and lots of screaming when Christopher appeared onstage. After two high-profile strikeouts with new ballets (SEVEN DEADLY SINS and OCEAN’S KINGDOM – failures to be blamed on bad narratives and uninteresting music) I think the public felt they were entitled to express their unbridled enthusiasm. In CARILLONS, Christopher Wheeldon takes music we want to hear and dancers we love to watch and produces structure and movement that does ballet proud.

POLYPHONIA is always a mesmerizing ballet but it seemed even more so tonight; premiered on January 4th, 2001, this Ligeti-inspired work has always been for me the first dance masterpiece of the 21st century. It continues to fascinate and – like all great danceworks – has passages that we wait for with keen anticipation. Cameron Grant and Alan Moverman at the keyboard made Ligeti’s quirky, nuanced music tingle the ear.

Jennie Somogyi’s injury, coming during one of my favorite parts of the ballet, placed the performance in a darkish aspect. The other dancers were surely affected by the incident but managed to forge onward with some intriguing dancing.

The duet for Gonzalo Garcia and Adrian Danchig-Waring, Sara Mearns’ quiet radiance in her mysterious solo, Craig Hall’s godlike presence, the lively pairing of Sterling Hyltin and Adrian Danchig-Waring (can’t wait to see them together in IN G MAJOR coming up), and Tiler Peck’s cool and collected artistry as she unexpectedly added to her already-busy evening by taking over here – all these made strong impressions.

Central to POLYPHONIA are the two superb duets for Wendy Whelan and Jared Angle. Wendy’s suppleness and the way she turns the angular shapings of her body into poetic statements keep the viewer riveted, while Jared brings an unexpected quality of nobility to the partnering. As Wendy backbends over Jared’s knee and snakes herself into her final kneeling pose, her enigmatic beauty is distilled into a single unforgettable image.

I really wish I could come to appreciate DANSE A GRAND VITESSE but, seeing it tonight for the second time (the first was danced by Angel Corella’s company at City Center) I found it overly-long, with the athletic partnering tending to lose impact as we see more and more of it. The City Ballet dancers – led by Teresa Reichlen/Craig Hall, Ashley Bouder/Joaquin de Luz, Maria Kowroski/Tyler Angle and Tiler Peck/Andrew Veyette – were nothing short of spectacular, and the corps excelled. But I found my attention wandering as the piece progressed, despite Clothilde Otranto’s dynamic reading of the Michael Nyman score. The best passages seem to me to be for the corps where, in spacious patterns, they and their shadows filled the space. The audience loved it, so clearly I’m in the minority here. I found myself wishing that instead of DGV we could have had a revival of either EVENFALL or KLAVIER, or even of Christopher’s misunderstood and magnificent SHAMBARDS.

What mattered though was that Christopher Wheeldon has brought us a new Bizet ballet to admire and – hopefully – to see again, although ticket pricing now at NYCB makes seeing things twice something to ponder deeply before heading to the box office.

The big ovation Christopher received as he came out for a solo bow at the end of the evening was so thoroughly well-deserved.

January 28, 2012
Three Robbins Ballets @ NYCB

Tuesday January 24, 2012 – Three works by Jerome Robbins, each featuring an ideal ballerina in its central role, were performed tonight at New York City Ballet. The music? Ravel, Berg, Chopin. What a great way to spend a cold Winter’s evening! In the Paul Kolnik photo at the top, Wendy Whelan borne aloft by Jared Angle and Ask LaCour at the end of IN MEMORY OF…

The evening opened on a beach where the dancers, in pastel 1920s beachwear, cavorted to the Ravel piano concerto IN G MAJOR. Maria Kowroski (above in a Paul Kolnik) gave a radiant performance and Tyler Angle was a frisky young god in his solo. In the ballet’s central adagio, the two dancers found a fine rapport and a sense of freshness that kept the audience spellbound as they shaped their long limbs into a series of beautiful snapshots. The final lift, as Maria’s leg sweeps heavenward and her pointed foot seems to brush the sky, was thrilling. Excellent corps dancing: a neat moment when Maria is partnered by the tall and slender Austin Laurent made me wish that principals and corpsmen could dance together more extensively. IN G MAJOR has a striking backdrop by Erté , a designer perhaps forgotten nowadays but whose work resonates with Art Deco elegance. His set features a fanciful sunburst and dark outlines suggesting clouds and waves: a remarkably classy beachscape.

With George Manahan (of New York City Opera) as a guest conductor bringing out some lovely nuances in the score and pianist Susan Walters giving a polished performance at the keyboard, the musicians and dancers conspired to make this a wonderfully gratifying performance in every regard.

Mr. Manahan also took up the baton for IN MEMORY OF…, the poignantly dramatic work that Robbins set to the violin concerto of Alban Berg. The composer crafted this, his only concerto for solo instrument, in reaction to the death from polio of Manon Gropius (daughter of Alma Mahler and Walter Gropius) at the age of 22. Berg was deeply shaken by the girl’s demise and wrote “To the Memory of an Angel” on the score’s title-page. Tonight the City Ballet‘s concertmaster Kurt Nikkanen gave the work a lustrous performance.

Robbins sets the ballet in a three-part narrative where we first see the young woman dancing with her beau, later joined by friends. Signs of the girl’s illness begin to manifest and as the corps stride in unison across the stage, the figure of Death appears.

In a long and intense pas de deux, Death stalks the girl (Ask LaCour and Wendy Whelan, above). She puts up a mighty struggle but in the end she is bested by his implacable strength. Her crumpled body is borne away as the stage fills with the corps, now white-clad angels, who eventually welcome the young woman to the celestial realm.

Of the many and varied roles in Wendy Whelan’s repertory, the central character in Robbins’ dramatic IN MEMORY OF… suits her most particularly well. Here she is able to convey the girl’s passionate love of life, her confused state as Death begins to attack her, her frantic attempts to stave off the inevitable, and her luminous vulnerability as she succumbs. In the ballet’s final moments, Wendy re-appears, now in virginal white with her hair down, moving among the spirits. Every element of technique, dramatic instinct and expression that Wendy embodies are filtered into this character and her performance is a complete marvel in every sense.

Ask LaCour, towering over the ballerina, brings an interesting sense of nobility to the Death figure. As he gains control over the girl’s soul, Ask uses his long arms and expressive hands to keep her in his thrall even as she tries to escape. An excellent portrait. Jared Angle was handsome and gently ardent as Wendy’s mortal lover, and I was especially happy to see Faye Arthurs back onstage – after a long hiatus – dancing with the very attractive corps ensemble.

Sterling Hyltin talks about her role in THE CONCERT here.

No performance at the ballet or opera these days can ever be free of audience distractions. I had such a nice seat for the evening but on returning from the intermission two idiot girls sitting a couple of seats away had brought in snacks and a bottle of water which they decided to enjoy during IN MEMORY OF… they were just far enough away so that shushing them was to no avail.

I therefore decided to move for the closing ballet; but having heard that the ushers now don’t allow people to move to another part of the house (even if you’ve paid $100 and want to sit in an unused $29 seat), I decided to try watching THE CONCERT on the screen on the Promende. This did not work out too well, but at least got to watch Sterling and Joaquin de Luz for a while.

The saddest aspect of the evening was seeing the vast emptiness of the 4th Ring which was open but occupied by only 2 or 3 spectators. I’m simply at a loss to comprehend what the administration is doing to my favorite dance company. It’s disheartening and alienating. They can spin it however they want, but empty seats are empty seats. It’s especially depressing because the Company are dancing so well.

January 25, 2012
Dance from the Heart 2012

Tuesday January 24, 2012 – “The best-laid plans…” I was planning to attend both nights of the annual Dance from the Heart programmes at Cedar Lake Theater but the ominous message “…due to a police investigation” came over the loudspeaker as the train I was on sat in the tunnel just south of 181st Street. Twenty minutes later we pulled into 168th; I should have switched to the #1 there but we quickly proceeded…into the tunnel where we sat for another ten minutes. By the time we reached 145th it was clear I’d never get down to Chelsea by curtain time. Trying to get home then was equally frustrating, due to a “sick passenger”. Not a good night for the MTA.

But I did get to Cedar Lake for the second night. Mixed-bag dance evenings are not really my cup of tea; there was exciting dancing all evening but from a musical and choreographic standpoint only about half the works on offer were of interest to me.

The opening VIDA from Cecilia Marta Dance Company was jazzy, nicely lit and danced with a suggestive sway. In the duet Falling, of course Misty Copeland and Matthew Prescott looked great dancing together, but the schlocky arrangement of an Elvis Presley classic was not very inspiring. Why not use The King’s own version?

It wasn’t til Clifton Brown and Kana Kimura stepped onstage to dance a duet from Jessica Lang’s i.n.k. that the evening really perked up for me: Clifton and Kana (Kokyat’s studio photo above) look wonderful together and their dancing is compelling and poetic. The Jakub Ciupinski score and the Shinichi Maruyama filmed projection enhanced the choreography and the dancing, making this all of a piece.

Sustaining the high level set by the Lang, four dancers from Paul Taylor Dance Company performed an excerpt from Paul Taylor’s PIAZZOLLA CALDERA: a pair of torridly expressive duets, the first for two men (Jeffrey Smith and Michael Apuzzo) and the second for Michelle Fleet and Michael Trusnovec. This quartet of dance royalty whetted the appetite for the upcoming Taylor season at Lincoln Center, as if further whetting was needed. Bravi!

The evening ended on a festive note with Jeremy McQueen’s CONCERTO NUOVO, a setting of Bach’s music most familiar in its Balanchine incarnation as CONCERTO BAROCCO. The all-women ensemble seemed like vivacious contemporary cygnets in their short ruffled white frocks, and each brought a distinctive personality to Jeremy’s visual polyphony. As this lively finale drew to an end, champagne was served.

Lovely to see Arlene Cooper, Rachel Berman, Jessica Lane, Kanji Segawa, Jeremy McQueen, Lynda Senisi and Caleb Custer among the crowd. How fine it is that Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet put their superb venue and their staff at the disposal of the Dancers Responding to AIDS team for this annual event. One more reason to love Cedar Lake!

January 24, 2012
Rita Gorr Has Passed Away

Another colossal figure from my early days as an opera lover has passed away: the Belgian mezzo-soprano Rita Gorr died on January 22, 2012 at the age of 85. The great singer had a relatively brief but busy career at the Metropolitan Opera; from 1962 thru 1966 she sang 42 performances in New York City and on tour, including Amneris, Eboli, Dalila, Santuzza, Waltraute in GOTTERDAMMERUNG and Azucena. It was in the last-named role that I heard her live for the only time, at the Old Met:

Metropolitan Opera House November 25, 1965
IL TROVATORE {350} Giuseppe Verdi Manrico.................Bruno Prevedi Leonora.................Gabriella Tucci Count Di Luna...........Robert Merrill Azucena.................Rita Gorr Ferrando................Bonaldo Giaiotti Ines....................Lynn Owen Ruiz....................Charles Anthony Messenger...............Hal Roberts Gypsy...................Luis Forero
Conductor...............Georges Pretre

Her singing was powerful and intense, and all evening long she and her colleagues received vociferous applause and bravos. What a great evening for a young opera buff!

Rita Gorr extended her career into the 21st century; her final stage performances were in 2007 as the Old Countess in Tchaikovsky’s QUEEN OF SPADES at Ghent and Antwerp.

Only recently I acquired a copy of the Leinsdorf recording of Wagner’s LOHENGRIN and have been listening to it over the past few days. It now takes on greater significance since Ms. Gorr is the majestic Ortrud, singing in the grand manner. In the great duet for husband and wife which open Act II, William Dooley as Telramund expresses his fear that his defeat by Lohengrin in Act I was a sign from God. “Gott????!!” Gorr/Ortrud responds ironically, then lets out a daemonic laugh. Brilliant!

Rita Gorr’s classic EMI solo disc of arias seems to be unavailable now; I owned it on LP as a young man and literally wore out the grooves. But several tracks can be found on YouTube. Here is her Liebestod from TRISTAN UND ISOLDE, sung with an Old World grandeur that seems to have vanished as opera moves away from its voice-centric uniqueness into a more generalized feeling of being mere entertainment.

January 23, 2012
NYCB NUTCRACKER 2011 #4

Tuesday December 27, 2011 – Above, today’s Sugar Plum Fairy at New York City Ballet: Abi Stafford in a Henry Leutwyler photo. Thanks to the Company’s new pricing policy, I only got to see four NUTCRACKERs this season as opposed to my usual seven or eight. I simply can’t afford to go as often as I would have liked, and the notion of bringing a guest is pretty much a thing of the past.

I’m sure by this point in the holiday season that the dancers and musicians are thoroughly sick of this ballet but they never gave any indication of their NUTZ-fatigue tonight. The house was substantially full despite some gaps of empty seats in the orchestra. To see Abi’s Sugar Plum, with Amar Ramasar as her Cavalier, was a big draw for me this evening. And I hadn’t see Janie Taylor’s Dewdrop in recent seasons so the lineup tonight was especially appealing.

Vincent Paradiso’s Drosselmeyer is vigorous, and he looks dapper as a prematurely grey and still youthful ‘uncle’. Excellent rapport with the children and guests; Vincent brings some real dancing into his interpretation and animates the entire scene with his lively gestures. Marika Anderson’s Frau Stahlbaum has an interestingly high-strung quality; Christian Tworzyanski is her genial spouse. Conductor Ryan McAdams took the soldier’s solo at an unusually fast pace but Troy Schumacher nailed it with some virtuoso dancing; Sarah Villwock and Kristen Segin were charming in the commedia dell’arte kissing duet. In the Snow Scene I was smitten with Lauren Lovette’s radiant dancing.

Abi Stafford’s Sugar Plum Fairy opened the second act with her finely-danced solo; she then greeted the procession of divertissement dancers, led off by Mary Elizabeth Sell and Zachary Catazaro who looked authentically Spanish and danced brightly, with Mary holding one balance to striking effect. She’s a dancer deserving of more and more opportunities. Georgina Pazcoguin’s sultry glamour as Arabian held the audience in the palm of her hand: “I like her best!” the little boy sitting behind me said aloud as Gina finished her solo; her fantastic combinations in the finale were the frosting on a delicious Pazcoguin cake. Giovanni Villalobos, another dancer we should see more of, was a sprighty Tea and Sean Suozzi’s space-filling, theatrically vivid Candy Cane energized the crowd. Ashley Laracey danced the tricky Marzipan solo with total command, polishing off her triple pirouettes to perfection. In the ensuing Waltz of the Flowers, Amanda Hankes and Brittany Pollack danced beautifully, leaving me to ponder which of them has the loveliest smile.

Janie Taylor (Leutwyler image, above) is the most ethereal Dewdrop I’ve seen; all different ballerina-types have been cast in this role over the years, from majestic goddesses to petite princesses. I love the variety of interpretations, and Janie’s stands out. With her high-flying extension and elegant jetes, the ballerina brings a touch of impetuosity to everything she does. The audience seemed very taken with her performance, showering her with applause as she flashed thru the brilliant fouette combination; later, in the finale her swift pirouette-to-arabesque sequence was beautifully timed, then she went flying off in a big, stretched-out leap.

Abi and Amar kept the audience, full of youngsters, in a keenly attentive state with their dancing of the adagio, the grand climax of the Balanchine NUTCRACKER. Here the choreographer shows us the art of classical ballet partnering, echoing the lyric grandeur of the Tchaikovsky score. In this pas de deux, Abi and Amar combined youthful freshness and a sense of courtly manners. Building from one passage to the next, the dancers capitalized on the inherent drama of the duet with its final suspenseful promenade and Abi’s sustained balance; Amar then daringly tossed the ballerina into the air before sweeping her into the final dive. The audience ate it up.

TUESDAY EVENING, DECEMBER 27, 6 PM (Conductor: McAdams)

SUGARPLUM: A. Stafford; CAVALIER: Ramasar; DEWDROP: Taylor; HERR DROSSELMEIER: Paradiso; MARZIPAN: Laracey; HOT CHOCOLATE: Sell, Catazaro; COFFEE: Pazcoguin; TEA: Villalobos; CANDY CANE: Suozzi; MOTHER GINGER: Thew; FLOWERS: Hankes, Pollack; DOLLS: Villwock, Segin; SOLDIER: Schumacher; MOUSE KING: Dieck; DR & FRAU STAHLBAUM: Anderson, Tworzyanski

As we now head into the Winter season at New York City Ballet, many long-time fans of the Company are finding their loyalty tested as they remain fully supportive of the dancers but find the marketing practices of the current regime off-putting. How it will play out remains to be seen.

December 27, 2011
Ailey Dances Taylor’s ARDEN COURT

Saturday December 24, 2011 matinee – Paul Taylor’s ARDEN COURT is one of the 20th century’s great dance masterpieces; this season it is being danced by Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater (photo above by Mark Lennihan) during their season at City Center, the first Taylor work to be performed by the Ailey Company. Looking at my packed December calendar a couple of weeks ago, I realized that today was going to be my one Ailey opportunity of the year, and how fortunate that ARDEN COURT was part of an extremely attractive programme:

Arden Court
Cry
The Hunt
Revelations

One of the finest dancers on the current scene, Kanji Segawa, joined Ailey earlier this year and Kokyat and I were especially happy to find Kanji dancing a lot this afternoon. Kokyat photographed Kanji (above) dancing with MORPHOSES at the Guggenheim in the Autumn of 2010. His brilliant, buoyant leaps in the men’s diagonal entree passage of ARDEN COURT were outstanding, and he flung himself into the non-stop demands of Robert Battle’s dark and sexy THE HUNT with characteristic flair.

Taylor danced by Ailey looks phenomenal. The dancers, in their sleek costumes, are propelled with effortless grace and power thru the demanding combinations, swept along on the vivid and superby danceable music of William Boyce. ARDEN COURT was set on the Ailey Company by one of the all-time great Taylor dancers, Cathy McCann.

Briana Reed (above, photographed by Paul Kolnik) danced the extended three-part Alvin Ailey solo CRY; with her unfettered extension and combination of strength and tenderness, Ms. Reed scored a huge hit with the crowd and was greeted with rockstar ovations, thoroughly deserved.

Robert Battle’s powerful all-male ensemble work THE HUNT (above, Eduardo Patino photo) is set to a driven, percussive score by Les Tambours du Bronx. With six men (it seems like more) in long black skirts swirling and sailing thru the air, this work is sexy, ritualistic and mysterious all at once. There are few moments of repose in this martial-arts inspired, combative dance.

Revelation: Clifton Brown, above, photographed by Kokyat earlier this year in rehearsal with Lar Lubovitch. We’ve been so fortunate to have been in the studio with Clifton several times in 2011 while he’s been working with Lubovitch and with Jessica Lang Dance. Today, in Ailey’s classic REVELATIONS Clifton burst onto the stage in Sinner Man and treated us to some simply magnificent dancing. In the finale he was a god-like cavalier, radiating both majesty and warmth.

Each section of REVELATIONS is set to traditional spirituals and gospel hymns, celebrating congregation and community while sometimes investigating individual journeys of the spirit. One memorable segment is I Wanna Be Ready, superbly danced today by Michael Francis McBride. In the finale, the women appear in marigold-yellow gowns with fans on a sweltering summer afternoon for a jubilant cotillion with their handsome beaus.

I hardly ever have a chance to see the Ailey Company; their season always falls at the busiest time of the year. This afternoon’s performance showed them to be on peak form as the Robert Battle era commences with a bang! Such splendid dancers: I need to get to know them better.

December 25, 2011
Picasso @ The Frick

Above: Pablo Picasso’s Two Women With Hats (1921)

Friday December 23, 2011 – Last week my friend Debbie and I spent a delightful hour at The Frick looking at the exhibit of Picasso’s drawings. I couldn’t help thinking how much Kokyat would enjoy this collection, which is so beautifully displayed in the small galleries of The Frick‘s lower level. So this afternoon, after a delicious holiday lunch at LeSteak Bistro on 3rd Avenue, my photographer-friend and I headed to the museum with its restful atrium. I was hoping we would hit a time slot when the galleries were not too crowded, and we were indeed lucky in that regard. One advantage of The Frick is that children under ten years old are not admitted; this eliminates the annoying baby strollers and wailing infants who so often spoil our treks to The Met.

Photography is not allowed at The Frick so we simply devoted our attention to the incredible drawings which provide a lovely panorama of Picasso’s works from the period 1890 to 1921. The earliest examples come from the nine-year-old prodigy; by the time he was 15, Picasso created a drawing of his father that is uncanny in its depth and style.

One of my favorite drawings on display was Three Bathers by the Shore (above) which has an exact dating of August 20, 1920. Of course you can find images of many of Picasso’s works on the Internet, but nothing compares to standing before these masterworks live and imagining the artist’s hands at work in their creation, and to ponder the thousands of other eyes that have beheld them over the span of the century of their existence.

Above: self-portrait of the artist as a young man. I’ve always loved reading about the period of time when Pablo Picasso was part of Gerald and Sara Murphy’s circle on the French Riviera…the long afternoons on the plage where everyone was a bit in love with Sara. Ah, to have been alive then.

The Picasso exhibit is only at The Frick til January 8th; it is very much worth seeing. If you go – and you should – be sure to watch a showing of two brief films, one about the Frick Collection and the second about the Picasso exhibit, in the museum’s music room. Very informative.

Sometime between the day Debbie and I were at The Frick and today, a new space has been opened in the museum: the Portico Gallery. This long, narrow hallway is lined with glass-fronted display cabinets full of delicate porcelains. The far end of the passageway opens onto a small windowed temple-like chamber…

…where Jean-Antoine Houdon’s Diana the Huntress (above) presides magnificently. I will return to this small shrine, immediately a favorite Gotham place for reverie, often.

A perfect day with my perfect companion.

December 23, 2011