"Symphonie Concertante", "Garden Blue", "Fancy Free" 
American Ballet Theatre 
David H. Koch Theater
New York, NY 
October 20, 2018 matinee

At American Ballet Theatre, the dancing did the talking in a program that included a revival of Balanchine's "Symphonie Concertante" to Mozart, once considered lost; "Garden Blue" in which the production carried the day; and an unalloyed classic, Jerome Robbins' "Fancy Free" all with debuts in leading roles.

What amazes initially in "Symphonie Concertante" is how

The Balanchine Woman
Studio 5
New York City Center
New York, New York
October 25, 2018

The New York City Center is celebrating its 75th anniversary this year and to salute the Center's crucial role in the development of the New York City Ballet has arranged an impressive array of Balanchine ballets to be performed by several companies, a glorious mini-festival celebrating the choreographer.  The intimate, innovative Studio 5 series started the party with a presentation by

“Viva Vivaldi (excerpts),” “Aureole,” “Gamelan (excerpts),” “Party Mix”
Dig Dance, Taylor, Joffrey, Arpino: Deliciously Alternative Classics
New York Dance Project, Taylor 2 
92nd St Y
New York, NY 
October 19, 2018

When it comes to dance, particularly 20th century theatrical dance with a classical or neoclassical bent, words can be, if not dangerous, certainly misleading, paving stones on the road to disappointment. This has little to do with the quality of the dancers or dancing but rather

“Watermill”
BAM Fisher
Brooklyn Academy of Music
Brooklyn, New York
October 24, 2018 

Jerome Robbins created “Watermill” for New York City Ballet in 1972. It was staged for what was then known as the State Theater, now the David H. Koch Theater, a proscenium theater of opera house proportions. Choreographer Luca Veggetti has re-imagined the work for the intimate BAM Fisher, and the ballet benefits greatly from it.

Veggetti has been respectful of Robbins’ vision for “Watermill;” his

“Körper”
Sasha Waltz & Guests
Zellerbach Hall, Cal Performances
Berkeley, CA
Oct, 20, 2018

If the body is both the object and the subject of Dance, you can stop worrying about Sasha Waltz’s “Körper” being dance or not, because it is. Waltz made her reputation for making work about the ordinary, the everyday, and she makes us look at it through a prism that enlightens and entertains simultaneously. The human body is about as basic an object to become

“Concerto Barocco,” “Company B” and “Tschaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 2”
Miami City Ballet
Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts
Miami, Florida
October 19th and 21st, 2018

Miami City Ballet Artistic Director Lourdes Lopez addressed the audience before the start of MCBs 33rd season on Friday, October 19^th at the Adrienne Arsht Center and dedicated the performance of “Company B” to choreographer Paul Taylor, who died in August. 

With that, Program I opened to “Concerto Barocco”, danced

“Le Jeune,” “Dream within a Dream (deferred),” “In the Upper Room”
American Ballet Theatre
Fall Gala
David H. Koch Theater
New York, New York
October 12, 2018

Is there something specifically female in the content or experience of a ballet by a woman, besides the fact that a woman created it? In programming a Fall Gala exclusively of works by women at the start of its brief fall season at Lincoln Center, American Ballet Theatre implicitly put this question on

“Songs of Bukovina,” “Garden Blue,” “In the Upper Room”
American Ballet Theatre
David H. Koch Theater
New York, New York
October 19, 2018

Under the rubric, “ABT Women’s Movement,” American Ballet Theatre is promoting women choreographers during its current fall season at the Koch Theater. Two were represented in Friday’s program: Jessica Lang and Twyla Tharp. Tharp, of course, has been on the scene for decades, and “In the Upper Room” has been in ABT’s repertory since

"Handel", "Common Ground"
Alonzo King Lines Ballet
Yerba Buena Center for the Arts
San Francisco, CA
October 11, 2018

The Kronos Quartet and Alonzo King’s Lines Ballet call San Francisco home. Both have pioneered new perspectives in their fields, making them core values of their work. The Kronos was established in 1973, Alonzo King Lines Ballet in 1982. So you wonder, what took them so long to finally get together? For “Common Ground”, their first collaboration, King chose five

“Sutra”
White Lights Festival
Rose Theater, Lincoln Center
New York, New York
October 16, 2018

Belgian choreographer Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui’s “Sutra” is a spectacle in the true sense of the word. Created in 2008, it features monks from the Shaolin Temple in China, as well as sculpture by the well-known British artist Antony Gormley and a score, played live, by Polish composer Szymon Brzóska. Cherkaoui also performs the central role, along with child monk, Xing Kaishuo.

“Reclamation Map,” “Balamouk,” “Midnight Raga,” “The Crane Calling (exerpt)”
Fall For Dance Festival – Program 3
Tayeh Dance with Heather Christian, Dance Theatre of Harlem, Nederlands Dans Theater 2, National Ballet of China
New York City Center
New York, NY
October 5, 2018

In the middle of this year’s Fall For Dance Festival, Program 3 was an assembly of all premieres – two of the works were new to the U.S. audience, the other two altogether new creations. It may

"Split"
Lucy Guerin Inc 
Baryshnikov Arts Center
New York 
October 13, 2018 

Two women – one naked, one in a modest blue dress – dance parallel figures to the sound of drums, on a bare stage marked off by a square of white tape. The gestures suggest a range of human activities: play, sport, religious ritual, repetitive work, rest, sex, sleep, and dance itself, ballet and modern and folk. The moves are identical but look different, articulate and sensuous