Wednesday, October 19

[dirac]

An interview with the new artistic director of New York Theater Ballet.

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But in another sense, Melendez is subtly shifting the company’s emphasis. The changes he proposes are less about the work itself than about its social purpose. Since its founding, the company’s repertory has consisted mostly of 20th-century chamber ballets of the kind considered too small, and perhaps too old-fashioned, for big ballet troupes, like de Mille’s “Carousel” and Limón’s “Mazurkas.” (Byer also gave opportunities to a crop of new choreographers, some of whom, like Gemma Bond, Pam Tanowitz and Matthew Neenan, have gone on to major careers.)

Melendez, 36, plans to keep many of them, he said, though what motivates him is different: “Diana liked these works because of their value to the history of dance. But I like them because I think that if contextualized correctly, they will invite new-to-dance audiences to understand why dance is important.”

 

[dirac]

Reviews of the Royal Ballet.

The Guardian

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When Canadian choreographer Crystal Pite created Flight Pattern for the Royal Ballet in 2017, she proved you could use ballet to illuminate pressing real-world issues – in this case the plight of refugees – in a way that wasn’t trite or melodramatic but teeming with authentic emotion. Flight Pattern was set to the first movement of Górecki’s Symphony of Sorrowful Songs, and now Pite has expanded the piece into a full-length work using the whole symphony.

The Independent

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Flight Pattern sets the tone for the evening-length work, and remains the most intense. Dancers rock and flow together, making a perilous journey. Movement goes from naturalistic to stylised and back again, as a coat is cradled like a child or heaped into someone else’s arms. Kristen McNally and Marcelino Sambé are haunting in solo roles.

Bachtrack

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Crystal Pite’s first full-length work for The Royal Ballet begins with a reprisal of Flight Pattern, her 2017 one-act ballet themed upon the refugee crisis, which has now been augmented by two new parts to create Light of Passage. Taken together, it is a work that touches many extremes: although unremittingly doleful and largely colourless, it is nonetheless monumental, a scale that is achieved exclusively through her management of a multiplicity of human forms. And, it is hauntingly (sometimes breathtakingly) beautiful in the way in which Pite constructs flowing movement to represent Henryk Górecki’s Third Symphony, known as the Symphony of Sorrowful Songs.

 

[dirac]

A preview of Miami City Ballet's new season.

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With a return to live orchestra accompanying every program, MCB begins with two grand, evening-length story ballets; followed by three contemporary world premieres, positioned next to seminal works by legendary pioneers of modern dance; and ending with a tribute to the legacy that anchors MCB’s aesthetic.

 

[dirac]

Inland Pacific Ballet announces casting for Clara in this year's Nutcracker.

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Rehearsals for the Nutcracker are already underway. In its 28th production of the holiday classic, this year’s ensemble consists of 80 cast members including academy, pre-professional, and company dancers.

 

[dirac]

 Orlando Ballet presents "Dracula."

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Well, Halloween is nearly here and Pink’s vampire lord will be holding court in Steinmetz Hall for a long weekend courtesy the Orlando Ballet. Dispatching with the usual conceptions of ballet as ethereal and elegant, Pink’s Dracula is physical and gothic.

 

[dirac]

 Reviews of the Royal Ballet.

Alastair Macaulay for Slipped Disc

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Nothing about Light of Passage, Crystal Pite’s new three-part creation for the Royal Ballet at Covent Garden, feels spontaneous; nothing about it feels sincere. Instead, everything feels intensely choreographed, earnest, showily expressionistic. Pite’s choreography is magisterial in its way – for some people, she is one of today’s great choreographers – but it reminds me of a line written in March 1939 by Edwin Denby about some disturbing tendencies in inferior examples of American modern dance: “I smell a Führer somewhere.”

Mark Monahan for The Daily Telegraph

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Last night’s premiere revealed the result – at 90 minutes, the shortest Covent Garden three-parter I have ever known – to be both exasperating and rewarding. Exasperating, because Flight Pattern, now Part One, is indeed the straight-sets standout, meaning that its impact can only be diluted by its new brethren. Rewarding, because Pite is incapable of producing poor work, and those two new sections do have much to offer.

 

[dirac]

A review of New York City Ballet by Leigh Witchel for dancelog.nyc.

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Jonathan Fahoury began the ballet with a solo. Deacon’s rompers for “The Runaway” had echoes of childhood, these also had ruffs, recalling Watteau’s Pierrot. Fahoury danced a note-for-step solo of isolated non-ballet movement, walking and locking to the Blake.

The difference between what Abraham set on Fahoury and what he set on Taylor Stanley in his first ballet was that this was not-ballet. Stanley built a bridge between Abraham’s vocabulary and ballet; that was what made their collaboration so exciting. This opening felt either/or rather than both.