21st-century works in The New York City Ballet's Winter season (January 23-March 4) A subtle artistic schism exists for dancers in the New York City Ballet. None of them knew its co-founder Balanchine. They hadn’t taken his classes; they hadn’t watched him choreograph new ballets or lent him their bodies to use as inspiration and building blocks. If they experienced ballets by his later … [Read more...]
Dancers on the Rampage
New York City Ballet premieres new works by Justin Peck and Pontus Lidberg. When a dance really fascinates me, I wish either that I could immediately see it all over again or that I could be instantly at home, hugging it to myself and processing my memories. Justin Peck’s new The Times Are Racing for the New York City Ballet made me feel this way. It’s set to Dan Deacon’s vivid, changeable, … [Read more...]
All American
New York City Ballet, Lincoln Center, April 30 through June 9 In the Spring of 1988, the New York City Ballet put on an American Music Festival. George Balanchine had been dead for five years, and the two Ballet Masters in Chief, Peter Martins and Jerome Robbins, commissioned enough new ballets to keep dancers, guest choreographers, and resident choreographers rushing in and out of the … [Read more...]
See the Music
George Balanchine once said that during his grueling years as a pupil in the Imperial St. Petersburg Theatrical School, he didn’t fall in love with ballet until he was twelve. The change occurred the first time he appeared onstage in Marius Petipa’s Sleeping Beauty, set to Peter Ilyitch Tchaikovsky’s ravishing score, and young Georgi Melitonovitch was cast as a Cupid. His arrows, so to speak, … [Read more...]