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San Francisco BalletApril 2003 San Francisco, Opera House by Renee Renouf |
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The principal interest in Program V was Helgi Tomasson’s decision to follow a perennial with a strong roster of younger San Francisco corps de ballet members dancing works, which displayed their technical accomplishments. In effect, he was saying, ‘Look what’s coming up.’ Such programs are always a thrill for confirmed ballet lovers who want to spot the next soloist or principal. It also is an adroit way to keep the younger dancers’ energy focused, not that the current economy looks as though dancers can float freely and pick up work just any old place.
The Waltz Project April 1: Pauli Magierek, Zachary Hench; Julie Diana, Benjamin Pierce; Amanda Schull, David Arce; Nicole Starbuck, Steven Norman April 2: Emily Halpin; Brett Bauer; Nicole Starbuck, Sergio Torrado; Elizabeth Miner, James Sofranko; Rachel Viselli, Moises Martin Peter Martins certainly responded to New York City’s urban culture in a spirit not dissimilar Balanchine’s initial Broadway exposure. The khaki-colored pillar with classic incised lines, embellished with graffiti, certainly underscored that visually. Martins’ choreography continued the impression to John Cage’s atonal tinkerings with the piano as the dancers climbed over the men as they stood in carefully assumed postures of the studied casual, which, with every change to accommodate their climbing partners proclaimed, ‘Oh, so, now what’s that! The 'been there, done that’ was proclaimed loud and clear in the visual equivalent of that surface, summary statement. April 1 we had two principals and two soloists, April 2 one soloist and one soloist designate. Aside from the singular stretches, bends and angles the men manage to put the women through, I think the most distinguishing part was when Amanda Schull and Elizabeth Miner on their respective evenings came out in heavy-duty jazz shoes, cavorting in enticing manner. Martins obviously was utilizing not only the musical qualities of the various pieces, not of them quite so dissonant as Cage but certainly not Tales of the Vienna Woods variety, but the various moods of male- female attraction and female compliance. All the dancers deserve an E for their energy, and A for their game attitude. I can’t say the choreography fitted them to a T, but uniformly good in their assignments, it also provided valuable exposure to these winsome corps members.
Nanna's Lied
April 1:Nanna: Yuan Yuan Tan
April 2:Nanna: Julie Diana Nanna’s Lied was created to challenge Elizabeth Loscavio and Tina LeBlanc transformed the role with her interpretation. This is Yuan Yuan Tan’s second go around with it, and Julie Diana’s inaugural exposure. Legate’s smooth-talking portrait of Johnny is a good one, and Yuri Possokhov became the man you love to hate, just as Nanna was reduced to spent energy by Johnny’s amoral magnetism. Of the two, Diana is the more convincing. She demonstrated a similar cogency in MacMillan’s Invitation. Tan has become more convincing, but has a problem in letting form give way to the emotionally dominated awkward posture, gesture. She is always classically informed, where Diana is emotionally motivated. I was anxious to see Brandenhoff’s Jacob Schmidt, for I remember his hulking predatory quality as one of the two men, roles, which all the men seem to rise to with, relish. He gave just the right quality of a repressed Central European male genuinely aroused by Nanna’s frailty,wanting her to fulfill all his nerdish sexual fantasies. Their scene together could have been straight from Franz Kafka. Of the two casts of street women, I felt the Schull, Altman pair were the more convincing, but my memory still registers the chill calculation in Julia Adam’s in red.
Connotations This is a Caniparoli work, which I did not seen in its initial two seasons. I was lucky the casts remained the same in both programs I saw. Danced to a Britten work written on the eve of World War II, the four couples are singular and separate, joined by the fateful couple danced with serious swiftness by Joan Boada and Megan Low in an impressive solo debut. Boada, in a shift from Don Quixote, shone with attentiveness and unpretentious brilliance. Low’s delivery made me want to see how she can handle the legato and sustained adagio. If she demonstrates rubato liked she handled the demands of this role, she is definitely on her way. Katita Waldo always is competent, but I wanted to see her less covered. She was partnered by Ruben Martin, another soloist designate. It was left, not unexpectedly,for Muriel Maffre and Pierre Francois Vilanoba to provide the centerpiece of anguish to the violin's high register arpeggios. It was clear Maffre was in some kind of torment,Vilanoba supporting her through it, concerned and stalwart. They are always excellent when cast as partners.
Program V therefore had its moments, an interlude with uniformly good dancing, uneven in the works scheduled.
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