An Occasion

Opening of the 2021/2022 Season
The Washington Ballet
National Building Museum
Washington, DC
October 21, 2021

This opening program was not what the publicity had led people to expect. It was an evening of divertissements, some classic, some new and others somewhat familiar. "Flames of Paris" a 1932 extravaganza by Vassily Vainonen from Soviet Russia that promulgates revolution but not necessarily democracy, wasn't attempted in its entirety. Only the well known, acrobatic, neoclassical  pas de deux was shown. There were standard duos "after " Marius Petipa such as "Diana and Acteon" and "Don Quixote". Brand new was DC choreographer Andile Ndlovu's "B1"  to Ape Chimba music. The ballroom balletics of Twyla Tharp's "Sinatra Suite" were passionately presented by long time favorites Sona Kharatian and Tamas Kizsa, New as well as familiar performers appeared in the first item, Jessica Lang's "Reverence" octet to Schumann music. Silas Farley's "Lament" was to a Kyle Werner composition. 

 Striking throughout the program were the company's rich renditions of slow and controlled movement. Of course, there was also speedy dancing, brio that had push and pulse plus showing how neat this bravura could be. But it is in thoughtful passages, in sumptuous elongations of anatomy that The Washington Ballet seems to be specializing. Who are the people responsible for this trend? There were no printed programs but a little information had been posted on line at the company's Internet website. Of course, the company's directors - Julie Kent and Victor Barbee - are undoubtedly to be credited. They did not appear on stage at the performance. This was not an occasion for showing Kent's newest gown. Who, though, actually coached which dancers? Who turned the National Building Museum, a 19th Century exhibition hall like London's Crystal Palace or Vienna's Prater Rotunde, into a serviceable proscenium theater? Four of the architecture's huge gilded columns backed by an immense gauze curtain served as decor without belittling the dancing. How the company adapts its style to whole ballets, traditional and novel, should be very worth watching.  

copyright © 2021 by George Jackson