“The Legacy of The New Dance Group”
Choreography by Jane Dudley, Sophie Maslow, Anna Sokolow and Talley Beatty
Coolidge Auditorium
The Library of Congress
Washington, DC
April 19, 2019

Seldom anymore do we get to see live performances of historic modern dance or, as it is called with loving irony, of “old modern”. Once upon a time, it constituted a successful revolution, or at least a fashion. That was from the 1920s into the 1960s, and not only in America.

“Significant Strangers,” “Counterpoint,” “Blind Revelry”
Tom Gold Dance
The Kaye Playhouse at Hunter College
New York, NY
April 3, 2019

The spring program by Tom Gold Dance at The Kaye Playhouse at Hunter College, lasting only two days, was brief but choreogra- phically engaging. Tom Gold’s three works selected for the evening presented whimsical partnerships with the world premiere of “Significant Strangers,” theater with the New York premiere of last year’s dramatic “Blind Revelry,” and distinctly more modern

“5 Soldiers: The Body is the Frontline”
Rosie Kay Dance Company
San Francisco Performances
Taube Atrium Theater
San Francisco, CA
April 11, 2019

A West Coast American premiere of a work created in Britain is not an everyday event. One produced “In Association with the British Army” definitely would have to be considered esoteric. Kudos for San Francisco Performances for having taking the risk to program something as unusual. The Rosie Kay Dance Company’s “5 Soldiers: The Body is

“Le Corsaire”
The Mariinsky Ballet
Opera House
The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts
Washington, DC
April 11, 2019

Eighty-one dancers are listed by Russia’s Mariinsky Ballet in its current Kennedy Center program. That does not include the children who supplement in the grand, Act 3 divertissement of “Le Corsaire”. These junior dancers are local, from two ballet schools – the DC Kirov Academy and The Washington School of Ballet. Of the company’s regular dancers, 44

New Works and New Productions
“Easy”, “In the Night”, “The Runaway”, “Something to Dance About”
New York City Ballet
Opera House
The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts
Washington, DC
April 5, 2019

The dancers of New York City Ballet are artists in their own right. They may not be the masterminds behind the locomotive patterns in which they travel or the original composers of the movement they exude, but in the end, they decide what happens on

“Le Corsaire”
The Mariinsky Ballet
Opera House
The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts
Washington, DC
April 9, 2019

A minimum of five composers, four text smiths, plus ten choreographers and ballet masters was required to reconstruct the 19th Century ballet “Le Corsaire”, which the Mariinsky company has brought to Washington. It shows. The action is choppy, especially at the start of what is a three-act production with prologue and epilogue. Not even mentioned up front in

“Live! The Realest MC”
A.I.M.
NYU Skirball
New York, New York
April 4, 2019

There was a time when both choreographers and critics thought dance should say it all. Language in any form was considered a corrupting influence that compromised dance’s autonomy. However, as modernism has faded, dancers have stopped being afraid of language. Now it is more often seen as a valuable adjunct to dance. I thought of that during Kyle Abraham’s concert at the

“Wood Work”, “Shadow Lands”, “Teeming Waltzes”
The Washington Ballet
Harman Hall
Washington, DC
April 6, 2019

In the barrage of new ballets that Washington has had lately, only one eluded a fundamental sameness. It was Trey McIntyre’s “Teeming Waltzes”. I’m thinking not just of The Washington Ballet’s bill of three premiers but also of the Jones/Zane group’s trilogy, of the New York City Ballet’s two programs and of additional fare. Melding hipster configurations of

“Your Flesh Shall Be a Great Poem” “Bound To” “…two united in a single soul. . .”
San Francisco Ballet
War Memorial Opera House
San Francisco, CA
March 27, 2019

Many ballet companies seem to feel that story ballets bring in much needed, faithful audiences. It would, however, be difficult to imagine that anyone watching SFB’s most recent triple bill would not want to return to see more ballet. After the reprise from last year’s Unbound Festival of Trey McIntyre’

“The Leaves are Fading,’  “Flutter,” “In Absentia,” “Six Years Later,” “Ave Maria,” “Valse Triste”
Natalia Osipova’s Pure Dance with David Hallberg
New York City Center
New York, New York
April 3, 2019

It has become commonplace for ballet stars to gather a few supporting dancers to tour a program of solos and duets. Natalia Osipova is in town this weekend for just such a program at City Center. However, choosing David Hallberg as one of her three

"Rodeo: Four Dance Episodes" "Die Toteninsel"
Bjork Ballet"
San Francisco Ballet
War Memorial Opera House
San Francisco, CA
March 29, 2019

The last of this season’s triple bills includes the premiere of Liam Scarlett’s “Die Toteninsel”; Justin Beck’s 2015 “Rodeo: Four Dance Episodes”, new last year for SFB; and Artur Pita’s “Bjork Ballet”, a delirious costume phantasmagoria with a bit of a dark underbelly. Well performed, this last program leads up to the final two that

“Composer’s Holiday”, “Kammermusik No. 2”,
“Opus 19, The Dreamer”, “Symphony in C”
New York City Ballet
Opera House
The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts
Washington, DC
April 2, 2019

The company’s new bosses, former dancers Jonathan Stafford and Wendy Whelan, introduced this DC opening. Both were dressed casually. Their brief appearance in front of the curtains was followed by a premiere – Gianna Reisen’s “Composer’s Holiday” to Lukas Foss music. It is a ballet