Vail Dance Festival 2021

[Jeannette]

Playbill for tonight’s Vail Festival NOW: PREMIERES show:

 

https://vaildance.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/VDF2021-NOW-080921_FINAL-NEW-210PM.pdf

 

 

[Bruce Wall]

The Vail stream (up for a week) that Jeannette has referred to is here.  

[Bruce Wall]

Watched the first half of the above referenced Vail 'all premieres' progamme and really enjoyed it.  Glorious to see Robbie Fairchild back on a ballet stage (dare I say where he belongs?) and paired again with the wonderful Unity Phelan in the opening Whiteside - 'A Perpendicular Express'.  This wittily administers such a glorious uplift I just had to watch it a second time.  Refreshing indeed.  Well worth the standing ovation that the dedicated (and capacity) Vail audience gave it.  Boylston also radiates jubilance here.  Lovette and Lil Buck poignantly mash bouree with moonwalk in their 'Until We Meet Again' and the very young Mira Nadon mesmerises in Tiler Peck's haunting 'And So' to a persuasive new score by Caroline Shaw.  The obvious influence of the mighty Woetzel - the Nijinksy/Kirstein combo of our times - is clearly having a persuasive effect on Roman Mejia's ever prevailing dynamism.  His is one that does not need to shout.  It merely is ... and only ever seems to bud in its euphoric vigour.  

 

 

Edited August 10, 2021 by Bruce Wall

[Bruce Wall]

13 minutes ago, alison said:

Thank you, Jeannette and Bruce.  I've put the "bare bones" of the details in the Community Calendar: if anyone can be more precise about ending time please let me know and I'll edit it - I presume it has to be me since I started it.

 

The programme file runs 2.23.50 in length and will be available for a week for free viewing so through 2.30 am next Tuesday GMT.  Hope that helps.

[Jeannette]

Totally agree with your assessment, Bruce. I particularly enjoyed the wit of Whiteside’s ballet, A Perpendicular Expression (to Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsody)...and the panache and dash of all six star performers: Fairchild, Phelan, Stearns, Teauscher, and both “Cindies” (Whiteside and Boylston)! So far I’ve seen only three ballets by Whiteside — New American Romance and City of Women, both for ABT — but truly love his musicality and obvious love of tradition, cloaked in modernity.

 

In the second half, I was awed by Justin Peck’s modern take on Balanchine’s Tchaik pdd...titled Bloom, to an original score by Caroline Shaw with many references to Tchaikovsky. A real tour de force for dancers Tiler Peck & Herman Cornejo!

 

The Big finale - Cleo Parker Robinson’s Standing on the Shoulders to Omar Thomas’ jazzy-Mardi Gras style score - with all dancers joining in at the end - had me dancing & clapping in front of my computer! Whee!!! 🎉 🥳 🎈 

[Jeannette]

Actual performance time (both parts, seven ballets) runs about 87 minutes.

 

I watched live & I timed it thus:

 

(Began about 10 mins late...”blank time”)

 

Intro talks - 10 minutes

 

Part 1 - four ballets - 45 mins

 

Intermission, with cool music in the background, by resident string quartet Brooklyn Rider - 30 mins

 

Part 2 - three ballets + end credits - 42 mins

 

[Bruce Wall]

Just watched the new Peck PDD, ‘Bloom’ in the second part of Vail’s NOW PREMIERE’s programme.  (I should be working but couldn’t resist.)  I predict this will become every bit as much international balletic standard gala fare as Balanchine’s Tschai Pas – which both ‘Bloom’s music and choreography quote - has been for decades.  I - for just one I'm sure - can't wait to see it live.  Assuredly I bet this will soon be part of the established NYCB rep with resplendent justification.  The phantasmagorical score by the very talented Caroline Shaw springs forth as if the glories of Tchaikovsky had been passed through a Copeland strain and moistened with Shaw’s own key dramatic salt.  Peck’s choreography – here created for two internationally loved senior ballet artists – Tiler Peck and Hermann Cornejo – is not only reminiscent of the 20^th Century Ballet Master in whose shadow he was wrought but one whose prism is cut through with notations to De Mille, Tudor and Robbins.  What a gift!  This is American balletic artistry at its pinnacle.  How fortunate we are to be able to gaze upon the original creative/creators’ impulse of this rapture.  This is a sorely needed gift for our troubled times.  Thanks so Mr. Woetzel for your extraordinary vision in making this all come together.  You and your entire team are visionaries to venerate. Together you champion humane wonder; animate heartfelt bliss.  

 

Edited August 10, 2021 by Bruce Wall

[Rina]

On 10/08/2021 at 14:06, Bruce Wall said:

Just watched the new Peck PDD, ‘Bloom’ in the second part of Vail’s NOW PREMIERE’s programme.  (I should be working but couldn’t resist.)  I predict this will become every bit as much international balletic standard gala fare as Balanchine’s Tschai Pas – which both ‘Bloom’s music and choreography quote - has been for decades.

 

I so agree. I've just watched it and particularly appreciated the contrast between the beautiful smooth legato movements given to Tiler Peck and the sudden pizzicato darting and changes of direction, culminating in an incredible final minute. It shows how well the intimate textures of a string quartet can work in a pdd, eg scope for an instrument to have a solo and be joined by others, thinning and thickening layers of complexity, giving lots of potential to the choreographer. On second viewing I turned off the music, and felt that the ballet worked perfectly on its own - for me something of an acid test of a new work. It's balletic quicksilver - I've seen it a few times now and am not tiring of it.

[Rina]

Thank you Jeannette for your link to the Vail Dance Festival (still available today), and your recommendations.
I was drawn especially to James Whiteside's ballet (and the extract from his City of Women in the ABT Celebration you posted earlier). As you mention, he seems to have a definite aesthetic of his own. 

In A Perpendicular Expression, set for three couples, he uses a wide variety of jumps and turns, with lots of pointwork and epaulement. In the short extract he manages to include a pdd for each couple without giving the impression that that's all the work consists of or that anything is being rushed. They transition well with the other segments. An example of his wit is a moment towards the end when one woman jumps into the arms of three men standing in line, who gently lower her to the ground and roll her away. Then a second woman jumps into their arms but instead of lowering her to the ground, they hold on to her while a third woman hops backwards on pointe before them. It's a delicious upset of expectations.

In City of Women, set for nine women, he gives them all the strumming gesture from Balanchine's Apollo - a hint perhaps that they are the nine Muses. Lots of witty head and hand movements, and some gorgeous epaulement. He is not afraid of simplicity and moments of stillness on stage. That requires a certain amount of confidence and being comfortable in his own skin. In the final tableau, all nine kneel on the ground but each has a subtly different hand or arm gesture, which seems fitting. The ending - very simple - all on pointe facing the audience with arms raised, touching hands in solidarity - brought a tear to my eye. He is good, and I hope to see more of his work, albeit only via a streaming.   

[Bruce Wall]

What a magnificent treat.  Just watched both the Whiteside and the (J) Peck for the fifth time before they disappear from view.  There is no question in my mind but that they are both keepers for time.  Such jubilant fare and so gloriously shot so that we could truly appreciate the dignified complicity of the choreography.  The long and mid-shots ensured such while the close ups were keenly appreciated in the hugely applauded calls so that we too could bear witness to the thrill the dancers (and creators) had - one shared with the exultant dynamism of their audience - in mutual celebrations.  Both were pinpoint conversations of jocose beatitude.  

 

Happily I imagined a programme which could now be shared by both NYCB and ABT at the same time; one night at that which I will always know as State Theatre, the next at the Met.  It would comprehensively be known as 'Reawakening', much as the Royal Ballet used Sleeping Beauty to dust off the ROH after the war.  It would start with a first act of Ratmansky's 'Valse Triste', followed by Whiteside's A Perpendicular Express and finishing with Peck's 'Bloom'.  The second act would entail Peck's Rodeo followed Balanchine's Tschai PDD.  The Resident Choreographers of both Companies would here be celebrated as would their dancers.  They are after all the current champions of our modern balletic globe.  Both could then rightfully bow - as could we all - to the imortal splendour of the Master Choreographer who, himself, created so much of the language we all long to champion.  ....   

 

Well, one can dream ... 

 

Edited August 17, 2021 by Bruce Wall

[alison]

Oh blast, the video's gone - I'd been intending to watch it again, having forgotten about it until yesterday.  Very much enjoyed the Whiteside, the Peck and the last piece, but I would have wanted to have another look at several of them.

[Rina]

I also tuned in again on the final evening and missed it! I find that I never quite know when a streaming will switch off so to speak, half expecting it to be there longer than it says.

I've been looking again at the extract from Whiteside's City of Women in the ABT Summer Celebration posted by Jeannette (it's at 46.09). It's also been posted by ABT as a standalone item on YouTube, with a longer extract from a few years' earlier under the title "City of Women ABT Incubator". If you search against "Whiteside City of Women" both come up.

Seeing both extracts I had the strange feeling that, although Whiteside is very American in style, his work also has affinities with Ashton. Primarily its musicality which Jeanette pointed out, but also his liking for sculptural groupings or tableaux. The beginning of the Incubator video looks like a lost Ashton work from the 1930s! I guess because Whiteside also reveres Petipa. The choreography for the supporting six women appears quite simple in places but this is deceptive, as it might end with a very striking dance image. Whiteside likes to hold poses for a second or two as Ashton advised. There is a restraint (no lifts for example in this or, apart from short hops, in A Perpendicular Expression) coupled with a lovely sensation of loosening, following the music. He repeats and then alters. Playful glances and hand gestures, suggestions of the dancers talking with each other, and movingly also a few mythic touches of bringing to life.

 

 

Edited August 19, 2021 by Rina