Mary Cargill

"Dances at a Gathering", "Brahms-Schoenberg Quartet"
New York City Ballet
David H. Koch Theater
Lincoln Center
New York, New York
May 12, 2024

The double bill of Jerome Robbins’ “Dances at a Gathering” and Balanchine’s “Brahms-Schoenberg Quartet” was a glimpse back at an idealized European past, where elegant youths wore colorful chiffon while dancing to Chopin and, in an idealized Vienna, beautiful and mysterious women enticed stalwart men while luscious Gypsies cavorted on the green.  Both ballets

"Rubies", "Dig the Say", "Underneath, There is Light"
New York City Ballet
David H. Koch Theater
Lincoln Center
New York, New York
May 2, 2024

New York City Ballet’s Spring gala had one Balanchine, two premieres, three brief speeches, and no intermission and clocked in at a very efficient one and a half hours.  It opened with sparkling version of “Rubies”, in all its bright red glory, danced by the veterans Megan Fairchild and Anthony Huxley, with

"Bourrée Fantasque", "The Steadfast Tin Soldier", "Errante", "Symphony in C"
New York City Ballet
David H. Koch Theater
Lincoln Center
New York, New York
April 24, 2024

The New York City Ballet opened it’s 75th Anniversary Spring season, subtitled “The Future”, with an all-Balanchine program of four ballets whose dates ranged from 1940’s (“Symphony in C”, 1947 and Bourrée Fantasque, 1949 ) to 1975 (“The Steadfast Tin Soldier” and “Errante”, the new name for “Tzigane”).  The future,

"The Four Temperaments", "Liebeslieder Walzer"
New York City Ballet
David H. Koch Theater
Lincoln Center
New York, New York
February 16, 2024

This program, made up of two of Balanchine’s finest ballets, had several important debuts; the company’s lower ranks are full of fine and interesting dancers and it’s encouraging that so many are getting opportunities.  These ballets, though, need not only fine dancers, but dancers with style, imagination, and depth, characteristics that usually

"Opus 19/The Dreamer", "Solitude", "Symphony in Three Movements"
New York City Ballet
David H. Koch Theater
Lincoln Center
New York, New York
February 15, 2024

“Solitude”, the first ballet Alexei Ratmansky has choreographed since becoming New York City Ballet’s Artist in Residence, is dedicated “to the children of Ukraine, victims of the war”; Marina Harss, writing in the New York Times about the creation of the work, explained that the inspiration came from a photograph of a father

Something for Everyone

"Ballo della Regina", "In a Landscape", "Hallelujah Junction", "The Concert"
New York City Ballet
David H. Koch Theater
Lincoln Center
New York, New York
February 9, 2024

This varied program began with Balanchine’s “Ballo della Regina”, a luscious soap bubble set to Verdi, continued with two more astringent ballets, a revival of Albert Evans’ “In a Landscape” to John Cage followed by Peter Martins’ high energy “Hallelujah Junction” to John Adams, and ended with Jerome Robbins’

"The Four Temperaments", "Liebeslieder Walzer"
New York City Ballet
David H. Koch Theater
Lincoln Center
New York, New York
February 6, 2024

NYCB’s yearlong celebration of its 75th anniversary is in it second phase, called "Evolution", but it paused for an evening to look back, and this program featured two of Balanchine’s most memorable works, “The Four Temperaments” (1946) and “Liebeslieder Walzer” (1960), two of Balanchine’s most memorable works.  “The Four Temperaments” is danced

"Rotunda", "Concerto for Two Pianos", "Odesa"
New York City Ballet
David H. Koch Theater
Lincoln Center
New York, New York
February 1, 2024

Tiler Peck’s new ballet “Concerto for Two Pianos” premiered in a program featuring ballets created in the twenty-first century; rather optimistically NYCB calls the program “New Combinations”. It also included Justin Peck’s 2020 “Rotunda” and Alexei Ratmansky’s 2017 “Odesa” (the updated spelling for “Odessa”).  All three were abstract, all three explored different

"Fancy Free", "In the Night", "The Four Seasons"
New York City Ballet
David H. Koch Theater
Lincoln Center
New York, New York
January 24, 2024

The Winter season of NYCB’s 75th anniversary is titled “The Evolution” and includes works of a selection of choreographers whose works presumably evolved from Balanchine, who was so gloriously celebrated in the Fall.  Three works by Jerome Robbins, who after Balanchine, is the choreographer most closely associated with NYCB, opened the Winter

"Somewhere in the Middle", "Eventide", "Esplanade"
Paul Taylor Dance Company
David H. Koch Theater
Lincoln Center
New York, New York
November 12, 2023 

“I love bugs!” Eran Bugge says Paul Taylor told her at her audition.  The audience at her retirement certainly agreed as she and Christina Lynch Markham, the most senior members of the company, both retired at the end of the Lincoln Center season to cheers and flowers.  Neither looked retirement

"Book of Beasts", "Le Sacre du Printemps (The Rehearsal)", "Black Tuesday"
Paul Taylor Dance Company
David H. Koch Theater
Lincoln Center
New York, New York
November 8, 2023 

This all-Taylor program showed the choreographer looking backwards, from the zany take on Medieval bestiaries (combined with satires of ballet dancers) of “Book of Beasts”, to the odd homage to Nijinsky in “Le Sacre du Printemps (the Rehearsal)” with its oblique references to gangster melodramas, and ending with “Black Tuesday”, Taylor’

"Echo", "Vespers", "Piazzolla Caldera"
Paul Taylor Dance Company
David H. Koch Theater
Lincoln Center
New York, New York
November 4, 2023 evening

This triple bill showed the Taylor Company expanding its repertoire offering a new work by Lauren Lovette (“Echo”) with an all-male cast and “Vespers”, choreographed in 1986 by Ulysses Dove for the Dayton Contemporary Dance Company with an all-female cast.  Both of these works got committed, fierce  performances, showing off the company's thrilling technique.  But,