Friday, September 24, 2021 may not go down in the history books as anything special, but it was a momentous occasion for me. It was my first night out since the pandemic started. The last time I attended a public event was Charlie Parker’s Yardbird at Seattle Opera on March 7, 2020, just days before the first lockdown. Under those circumstances, the experience itself would threaten to upstage whatever performance I went to see. Except that I saw the Singularly Cerrudo program at Pacific Northwest Ballet. And nothing upstages Cerrudo.
I’ve attended regular season ballet performances since I was 18. But last season was the first time I attended any of Pacific Northwest Ballet’s “extra” events – like performance previews and Ballet 101 lectures. Of those, the extra performances like Season Encore and NEXT STEP were my favorites. This year I couldn’t attend NEXT STEP, but I did get to see the Season Encore. It’s called an encore, but it’s not just a highlights reel of the most popular dances of the past season.
Family Night
PNB Artistic Director Peter Boal describes the Season Encore
performance as “Family Night.” And that’s not far from the truth. The program
always includes some of the biggest hits and most interesting additions to the
repertory from the last season. But it also includes pieces selected by retiring
dancers. Those dancers are honored with a between-dances slide show a lot like
the one celebrating graduating seniors get at high school pep rallies. And there’s
an element of pep rally to it, too, with flowers and endless standing ovations
for the departing dancers. There is a celebratory in-crowd vibe to the whole
event, which really does seem to be more for the dancers and their families
than for paying audience members. But at the same time, by choosing to attend
this non-season performance, regular audience members get to feel like part of
the family.
Retirements
Dancers
This year we said farewell to two principal dancers, Jonathon Poretta and Rachel Foster. Peter Boal talked about his long history with Poretta and Foster’s strength as a dancer. Dances that showcased male dancers were a rarity when I started watching ballet early in his career, but they’ve always been among my favorites. Now I realize that’s at least partly a result of Poretta’s performances back when I didn’t pay attention to who the dancers were. Similarly, my preference for contemporary ballet has a lot to do with Foster’s flawless performances.
Most of us in the auditorium don’t pay a lot of attention to
the behind-the-scenes credits in the program, but if something seems “off” on
stage next season, it might be because there were important retirements
backstage this year, too.
I used to watch Ballet Master Paul Gibson dance when he was a soloist and a principal at PNB. I met him once when I was working on a story about the Nutcracker. He graciously allowed me to sit in on one of his toughest jobs – rehearsing the children who dance the battle between mice and nutcracker soldiers. Gibson always prioritized his job at PNB, but he was also a choreographer.
Backstage
Costume Shop Manager Larae Hascall and Resident Lighting Designer Randall Chiarelli both came out to take their first – and final – bows. My mind raced over the dances in the program, realizing that they showcased striking costumes and dramatic lighting. For a moment I thought that was purposefully honoring these two, just like including ballets that showcased the performances of the retiring dancers. Then I realized – any ballet in the repertory would highlight the talent and skill of these two professionals. I realized with something like a pang of fear that I have never seen a performance at PNB that these two were not involved in.
Theme & Variations was the final piece in the program that closed only a week before. I wrote an entire post about it then, so I don’t have much to add here. I could add that seeing it at the beginning of the evening instead of as a finale gave it a slightly different color. And even if I can’t always consciously identify the differences, I always enjoy seeing different dancers interpret the same roles. During the season program, I saw Jerome Tisserand and Lesley Rausch perform; on this night it was Laura Tisserand and Dylan Wald.
The Piano Dance (pas de deux) Music: Gyorgy Ligeti Choreography: Paul Gibson
I was certain that I had never seen Paul Gibson’s The Piano Dance before. In fact, I could only remember seeing one of Gibson’s ballets, and I remembered it as being very neoclassical and pretty. Then, when I heard the first chords of Ligeti’s music, I remembered the whole thing. I hadn’t seen it in at least a decade, but every moment of the pas de deux evoked an “Ah yes, that’s right,” response. The stark lighting and red leotards. The spiky, spiderlike movements. An atmosphere that built ominous tension, only to instantly deflate it with humor. It was a truly unique work, and all the more enjoyable in contrast to what I thought I knew about Gibson’s choreography.
Rassemblement (pas de deux) Music: Toto Bissainthe Choreography: Nacho Duato
Only
a few days earlier, I was telling my husband about one of the dances in Theme
& Variations and he was trying to remember if he had seen it before. “Oh,
was it the one with…?” and he lifted his elbows and dropped his head like he
was hanging on a scarecrow.
“No,
no, no,” I replied. “You’re thinking of Rassemblement.” I don’t tell
this story to make us sound like ballet experts, because we’re not. It’s just
that Rassemblement was one of the very first contemporary ballets from
outside the Balanchine lineage that we ever saw. And, to put it bluntly, it
blew our fucking minds. It was the first time we ever rushed to our programs to
learn the name of the choreographer and the ballet so that we could remember it
later and be sure to see it again.
Choreographer
Nacho Duato is special for Rachel Foster, too. She danced in the ensemble when
PNB performed this piece 12 years ago, but on her final night as a performer,
she chose to learn a new role and dance the final duet.
Bacchus Music: Oliver Davis Choreography: Matthew Neenan
Bacchus premiered at Director’s Choice earlier in the season. Seeing it for the second time around, I was a less put off by the men’s costumes and didn’t waste any energy on metaphors. This time I could just enjoy the dancing as unreservedly as I enjoyed the music the first time I saw it.
After the Rain pas de deux Music: Arvo Pärt Choreography: Christopher Wheeldon
I hate crying in public. After the Rain is so beautiful and heartbreaking it’s hard not to cry, though. Especially when it’s a favorite of the ballerina dancing it and it’s the last time she’s dancing it and she made you cry the first time you saw it, too.
Silent Ghost Music: Dustin Hamman, King Creosote & Jon Hopkins, Ólafur Arnalds, Nils Frahm Choreography: Alejandro Cerrudo
Part of this season’s All Premiere program, Silent Ghost is a few of my favorite things: I love the music and the choreographer. I saw Rachel Foster when it premiered, and she danced in it again at the Season Encore. So even though I love Silent Ghost, mostly what I remember is the endless standing ovation she got for this, the last performance of her PNB career.
Jonathan Poretta chose Prodigal Son as his farewell performance, and no wonder. Remember when I mentioned ballet showcasing male dancers? This biblical tale choreographed in 1929 was one of the only ones available until recent years. Like The Piano Song and Rassemblement, it’s one that redefined ballet for me, and has really stuck with me, even years after seeing it. It was probably Poretta on stage the only other time I saw it, and then as now, I was struck by how ugly it is.
But it’s also captivating in the way
that it uses strength and brutish movements to communicate emotions; so
different from the sterile pantomime of most biblical retellings. What I didn’t
remember was that even this male-focused dance includes one of the most dramatic
– and lengthy – en pointe solos in the history of dance. My younger self was
also less sensitive to the brutal beating that Poretta’s knees must take as he
crawls and stumbles in the role. Yes, that was makeup on his knees, but it
would be real blood if I tried it.
The middle of the 20th century was such a retrograde era, those of us born in its wake don’t always realize how much creative exploration really took part in the first part of that century. Prodigal Son (like The Moor’s Pavane) still looks fresh and unexpected, nearly a century later.
Last Bow
For years I’ve said that Director’s Choice is my favorite program of the season. Lately, All Premiere has been pretty special, too. Season Encore doesn’t stand on its own like those two; part of what makes it so wonderful is the shared history among audience and dancers of experiencing all the other programs, in the season that is ending, and for many seasons before. But as family nights go, this one is favorite.
{I attended Season Encore compliments of PNB. Opinions are entirely my own.}
All Premiere, the second program of Pacific Northwest Ballet’s 2018-2019 season, is an annual tradition. Together with Director’s Choice, you can count on All Premiere to feature some of the most interesting and innovative dance in the ballet world. This year was as exceptional as always. I’ve already talked about A Dark and Lonely Space, which surprised me with its – literally – cosmic scope. The ballet I was most looking forward to was the middle piece of the program, Silent Ghost by Alejandro Cerrudo.
All Premiere is the second program of Pacific Northwest Ballet’s 2018-2019 season. In contrast to the Jerome Robbins Festival, which was a unique sort of double feature, All Premiere is an annual tradition at PNB. Every year, PNB does one program of all new ballets. Sometimes they are literally brand new, and sometimes they are just new to PNB. Usually there’s some of both. Like Director’s Choice, you can count on All Premiere to feature some of the most interesting and innovative contemporary ballet available. This year was no exception in being exceptionally good. Read More
