Berlin Ballet double bill

[Vanartus]

https://www.staatsballett-berlin.de/en/spielplan/celis-eyal/29-09-2018/779

 

...before reading this click on the trailer.

 

Well, the grumpy old “why has the Berlin Staatsballett ignored the MacMillan legacy” me, has been - albeit temporarily- laid to rest with/by a double bill of such surprising intensity that I left the theatre realising that things can change for the better. 

 

The first piece was good, very good in parts, and looked/felt both new for the company, and yet there was a line traceable to varied modern dance movements -on a personal memory level I had fleeting memory shots of NDT, 

 Alston, Bausch all wrapped up in something that was as non-Duato as you can get. So far, so good, time for interval drink. Then it came - one of those OMG, I’m here at the right time, the piece is danced at the right time, done by the right company at the right time in the right city with exactly the right choreography to the right music. Although it was originally done for the Royal Swedish Ballet, it could have been tailor made for/on the Berlin Staatsballett. If you wanted, you could even call the piece “The Berghain Requiem”, but I have never seen such an amazing marriage of Haute Techno and appropriate choreography. For me last night, I saw a company reset, reenergised and renewed by a piece that was pure Berlin. The complaint made against Shechter that he didn’t take advantage of the RB dancers couldn’t be made here. Only ballet dancers could do what they did with/in/to this piece - Half Life. Eyal is a wonderful find for me - was completely off my radar! Amazing. This double bill will be performed around 4 more times, then Half Life comes back with a different opener later on in the season. I should add that the standing ovation happened immediately on curtain down. And the 70 year olds next to me were cheering! 

Edited September 23, 2018 by Vanartus
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