Tag Archive George Balanchine

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Agon at Pacific Northwest Ballet

PNB dancers in Agon. Photo © Angela Sterling c/o PNB.

Pacific Northwest Ballet is starting their 2019/2020 season with a powerful pair of 20th century ballets: George Balanchine’s Agon and Kent Stowell’s Carmina Burana. Paired with crowd-pleaser Carmina Burana, Agon tends to be a bit overlooked. But as any reader of fiction knows, it’s never a good idea to overlook the quiet ones.  

Pure Dance

As I mentioned before Agon is a dancers’ dance. It’s contemporary ballet stripped down to the essentials. There is no sense of narrative or even character. The dancers wear black leotards with white tights or white ones with black pants. There are no sets and even the lighting is straightforward.

With nothing else going on, you are forced to concentrate on the movement, which does not lend itself to interpretation. Agon is really about geometry – dancers move through lines and angles ending in interesting shapes at pauses in the music. It’s like the world’s most beautiful math class. Agon gives us surprise and asymmetry rather where classical ballet offers harmonious balance and satisfied expectations.

Challenging Music

Stravinsky said he was inspired by a 17th century manual of French court dances when he wrote the music for Agon. I will have to take his word for it, because I can’t find the sonic connection. The program booklet describes the score as a

…fiendishly – and to him [Balanchine], delectably – difficult score

-Jeanie Thomas, PNB program

I’m not sure about delectable, but it is certainly difficult for the listener. I’m open-minded – I don’t think music has to be pretty. In fact, I’m listening to the new Blood Red Throne as I write this. Even so, I would have to say the music of Agon is rather more grating than challenging.

I would never listen to this without the accompanying ballet. But that’s okay, because the two were (literally) made for each other, and the score would be pointless without the ballet. When people first start watching ballet, they often expect each physical movement to tightly bound to each musical note, as if the dance were the literal physical translation of the music into movement. As much as it is physically possible to do so, Agon actually does this. It’s like the section of Fantasia where the oboe is a squiggly, pink line.

Intellectual Humor

So, yeah, Agon is a ballet more for the head than the heart. But surprisingly, it also has a lot of humor. Scattered throughout all the dramatic and elegant shapes are movements that are just – silly. Granted, the opening night audience was pretty high-energy (Artistic Director Peter Boal even commented “We got the party crowd tonight” when he came out on stage to address the audience) but chuckles rippled through the audience several times during Agon. Sometimes they were in response to funny movements like prissy little hand waves while walking en pointe. But sometimes the laughter expressed sheer delight and surprise, like when Lesley Rausch moved from a classic ended up in this iconic pose in a movement so quick audiences could hardly see how she got there.

Lesley Rausch and Seth Orza in Agon (choreographed by George Balanchine © The George Balanchine Trust). Photo © Angela Sterling c/o PNB.

Agon may be a heady ballet, but it has a little heart, too.

Details

Music: Igor Stravinsky
Choreography: George Balanchine © The George Balanchine Trust
Staging: Francia Russell
Lighting Design: Randall G. Chiarelli
Running Time: 30 minutes

Premiere: December 1, 1957; New York City Ballet
Pacific Northwest Ballet Premiere: March 30, 1993

Remaining Performances

October 3, 4 & 5 at 7:30 PM

October 6 at 1:00 PM

Tickets start at $37, and are available through the PNB Box Office at 206.441.2424, in person at 301 Mercer Street, or online.

Cast I Saw

1st Pas de Trois
Benjamin Griffiths
Elle Macy*
Margaret Mullin

2nd Pas de Trois
Noelani Pantastico
Dylan Wald*
Christopher D’Ariano*

Pas de Deux
Lesley Rausch
Seth Orza

{I attended Carmina Burana/Agon courtesy of Pacific Northwest Ballet. The tickets were theirs; the opinions are mine.}

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Power Couple: Agon and Carmina Burana at Pacific Northwest Ballet

PNB dancers and the Pacific Lutheran University Choral Union in Kent Stowell’s Carmina Burana. Photo © Angela Sterling c/o PNB.

Pacific Northwest Ballet is starting their 2019/2020 season (their 47th, for anyone keeping track) with a powerful pair of 20th century ballets: George Balanchine’s Agon and Kent Stowell’s Carmina Burana. Both ballets had their PNB premiere in 1993 (the same year I started attending regularly) but otherwise, they could hardly be more different.

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Balanchine’s Theme and Variations at PNB

The final program of Pacific Northwest Ballet’s regular season is Themes & Variations, a mixed rep of four ballets that finishes with the title piece, George Balanchine’s Theme & Variations. It’s common for PNB to end a mixed rep program with a very traditional Balanchine piece. Balanchine is the foundation of this company, and his more classical pieces are sure to satisfy audiences at the end of an eclectic program, especially one that contains works like The Moor’s Pavane that aren’t for everyone. Theme & Variations is what people think of when they think of ballet.

True Tutu Ballet

Even if you’ve never seen it before, you can tell from the title that it will be a classical tutu ballet with taxing, academic choreography. It’s what nonballet-types are afraid they’ll end up watching if they go, and the sort of thing that beginner balletomanes yearn for as “true ballet.” For the longest time, I had the sophomoric impression that this sort of ballet was like being tricked into watching the dancers practice a set of drills. Lots of technique, but very little choreography – and therefore, kind of boring.

Jerome Tisserand and Lesley Rausch in Theme and Variations, by George Balanchine, Photo © Angela Sterling c/o PNB.

True Skill

I hesitate to say I’ve graduated into some sort of ballet expertise (because I’m sure I’d be wrong). But for the first time in a long time, I was really able to appreciate the structured choreography of a classical ballet for the way it highlighted the dancers’ abilities. The fluid movement of contemporary dance draws attention away from the effort required to perform it. Those dances ask you to think about other things, and any number of mistakes can be made to look intentional. But classical ballet is naked in its predictability, and, like the X-Games of dance, it invites us to marvel at the dancers’ mastery.   

True Beauty

And marvel I did. A lot of the time, classical ballet is more about lines and shapes than combinations of movement. When you allow yourself to focus on the images, there is exquisite beauty in the sculptural poses the dancers hold and in the patterns in which they are arranged on the stage.

If I could stand in Mountain Pose with as much stability as Lesley Rausch does vertical splits on pointe, my yoga teacher would be so proud. Jerome Tisserand seemed almost to disappear when partnering, only to burst into view with bold straight lines and powerful spins when it was his own turn to shine. The corps de ballet, even with the new variation in heights and body types that PNB used to avoid, all molded themselves into synchronous uniformity, fluttering on pointe for ages. Individual expression is very important, but there’s also something very stirring in military precision.

And sometimes, it’s comforting to know what should come next and to trust that the dancers can deliver it.  

Theme and Variations

Music: Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky (Suite No. 3 in G Major, 1884; last movement)
Choreography: George Balanchine © The George Balanchine Trust
Staging: Judith Fugate
Scenic Design: Charlene Hall
Costume Design: Mark Zappone
Lighting Design: Randall G. Chiarelli
Running Time: 26 minutes
Premiere: November 26, 1947, Ballet Theatre (New York)
PNB Premiere: October 16, 1985

Cast I Saw

Lesley Rausch
Jerome Tisserand

Both were performing the role for the first time.

Details

Remaining performances: June 7 – 8 at 7:30 pm and June 9 at 1:00 pm

 Tickets ($30-$187) are on sale through the PNB Box Office:

·         Phone – 206.441.2424
·         In Person – 301 Mercer Street at Seattle Center
·         Online – PNB.org

Subject to availability, tickets are also available 90 minutes prior to show times at McCaw Hall.

{I attended Theme & Variations courtesy of Pacific Northwest Ballet. The tickets were theirs, but the opinions are mine.}

ByGD

Themes & Variations at Pacific Northwest Ballet

The final ballet of Pacific Northwest Ballet’s regular season is Themes & Variations, a mixed program of four ballets that seems kind of random at first glance. Lately I’ve been trying to study more about the ballets I attend, but last week was a whirlwind that left me craving a quiet night on the couch with a book. I dragged myself to the ballet all unprepared and discovered once again that dance is a balm even for the introvert’s soul.

Pieces of a Puzzle

I never used to think much about how the ballets in a mixed rep program fit together, but lately I can’t help but notice. I don’t know if that’s because I’m developing as a viewer or Artistic Director Peter Boal has just been building some really great programs.

Despite being performed from newest to oldest, the four pieces in this program created a progression of ideas. Starting with a celebration of the individual and ending with a celebration of technique, with variations on both those themes throughout, the evening felt like an exploration of everything that’s wonderful about dance.

Signature

Music: Barret Anspach (VVLD, 2015)
Choreography: Price Suddarth
Costume Design: Mark Zappone
Lighting Design: Randall G. Chiarelli
Running Time: 30 minutes
Premiere: November 6, 2015, Pacific Northwest Ballet

I’m pretty sure I’ve seen Signature before, and I’m sure for the same reason that I can’t really remember seeing it. Signature premiered on a bill with Emergence, once of my favorite ballets. There’s no way I would have missed that night, but I would have spent the whole evening just waiting for Emergence. And that was a mistake. Because watching Signature this weekend, I really loved it.

Elizabeth Murphy and Jerome Tisserand in Price Suddarth’s Signature, Photo © Angela Sterling c/o PNB.

The choreographer, PNB soloist Price Suddharth, has described Signature as asking the question “Why me?” Not in the self-pitying sense, but in the imposter syndrome sense of self-doubt. This was a timely question for me, since exhaustion and discouragement go hand-in-hand. So I especially appreciated Suddarth’s answer, “Because me.” The dance celebrates the uniqueness of each individual person, whatever their strengths or weaknesses may be.

Plus, the music by Barret Anspach was just gorgeous.

Tarantella

Music: Louis Moreau Gottschalk (Grande Tarantelle, Op. 67, c.1866), reconstructed and orchestrated by Hershy Kay
Choreography: George Balanchine © The George Balanchine Trust
Staging: Peter Boal
Costume Design: Mark Zappone
Lighting Design: Randall G. Chiarelli
Running Time: 8 minutes
Premiere: January 7, 1964, New York City Ballet
PNB Premiere: January 31, 1985

Tarantella is one of those faux-folk dances that classical ballet choreographers love to throw into the middle of story ballets, and that’s not usually my thing. Those dances often feel pretentious to me, like an academic in overalls. But Tarantella is energetic and cheerful with just a hint of camp embedded in its humor, and I was with my 15-year-old daughter, who loves all of those things. Watching her delight made me enjoy Tarantella more. The fact that Angelica Generosa was performing helped, too. I’ve always thought nobody does saucy like she does. At least I did until my daughter whispered, “He’s a saucy boi,” thus proving that Generosa’s partner Kyle Davis can lay it on thick, too.

Angelica Generosa and Kyle Davis in Tarantella, by George Balanchine, Photo © Angela Sterling c/o PNB.

How does it fit into the program? Signature was about our character as individuals. Tarantella is about two individual characters, Neapolitan street performers. Compared to the contemporary ballet choreography of Signature, Tarantella takes a more academic approach, using classical technique even as it tells a story of common people.

The Moor’s Pavane

(Variations on the theme of Othello)

Music: Henry Purcell (The Gordian Knot Untied, Abdelazer, or The Moor’s Revenge), arranged by Simon Sadoff
Choreography: José Limón
Direction and Staging: Alice Condodina
Costume Design: Pauline Lawrence
Lighting Design: Randall G. Chiarelli
Running Time: 24 minutes
Premiere: August 17, 1949, José Limón Dance Company
PNB Premiere: November 12, 1986

Shifting from a common story told through classical technique, The Moore’s Pavane tells a classical story (Othello) through experimental technique. I know I’ve seen The Moore’s Pavane before. Even though it was probably back in the 1990’s, the choreography is instantly recognizable. Back then, I remember disliking it. It was just too weird. If they had prelectures back then, I never went, so I had no idea that the choreographer, José Límon, was experimenting with a particular philosophy of movement that made it look unlike any other ballet.

(L-R) Lindsi Dec, Steven Loch, Joshua Grant, and Elizabeth Murphy The Moor’s Pavane, Photo © Angela Sterling c/o PNB

Armed with that information, the entire piece looked different. The pendulous Límon movements were forced into rigid patterns among the four dancers that gradually disintegrate as the story progresses and the characters’ own behavior deviates from social norms.

It is still weird. But this time it was also intellectually engaging and as a result, emotionally satisfying. Like Heironymous Bosch, a little Límon goes a long way. But you do need a little bit of it.

Theme and Variations

Music: Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky (Suite No. 3 in G Major, 1884; last movement)
Choreography: George Balanchine © The George Balanchine Trust
Staging: Judith Fugate
Scenic Design: Charlene Hall
Costume Design: Mark Zappone
Lighting Design: Randall G. Chiarelli
Running Time: 26 minutes
Premiere: November 26, 1947, Ballet Theatre (New York)
PNB Premiere: October 16, 1985

When I first started watching ballet, I couldn’t wait to see a “real tutu ballet.” I was so disappointed when I did. Compared to the contemporary choreography I really love, tutu ballets are so rigid and predictable. With a name like Theme and Variations, it’s easy to suspect you’re being tricked into watching dancers perform practice drills. Sometimes traditional classical ballets do feel like that.

Jerome Tisserand and Lesley Rausch in Theme and Variations, by George Balanchine, Photo © Angela Sterling c/o PNB.

But sometimes, when you’ve had a rough week, predictable is soothing instead of boring. Sometimes, when you’ve just watched academic choreography based on an experimental philosophy, it’s easier to enjoy academic choreography based on traditional technique. Instead of looking for novelty or surprises, you can just enjoy flawless execution of high level technique.

Details

Remaining performances: June 6 – 8 at 7:30 pm and June 9 at 1:00 pm

Tickets ($30-$187) are on sale online, by phone – 206.441.2424, or in person at 301 Mercer Street at Seattle Center. Subject to availability, tickets are also available 90 minutes prior to show times at McCaw Hall.

{I attended Theme & Variations courtesy of Pacific Northwest Ballet. The tickets were theirs, but the opinions are mine.}

ByGD

50 Years of Jewels

Milestone birthdays inspire reflection. Especially when the milestone in question is 50 years, and Jewels are being reflected. This year, Jewels, the collection of three gemstone-themed ballets by George Balanchine, turns 50. I’ve been watching Pacific Northwest Ballet for nearly half that time – I fell in love with ballet at PNB’s Nutcracker in 1993. Read More