Category: A Midsummer Night's Dream

JARED'S GUEST POST: Liebeslieder Part I

9/30/2015

I am thrilled to present Jared Angle’s first post on Thoughts from the Paint. I have been begging Jared to write about ballet since before the site even launched. I cannot say publicly what I had to threaten to get him to finally do it! I have known Jared for 20 years; he is one of my very best friends as well as my most annoying next door neighbor. In addition to being an amazing artist, he is incredibly insightful about music and dance and hopefully I’ll have enough blackmail material to keep him writing for some time to come! I would like to wish him a happy ballroom birthday!

Liebeslieder Walzer, photo by Paul Kolnik

October 1st is apparently World Ballet Day, when various ballet companies will give behind-the-scenes access to their inner workings on YouTube. Coincidentally it happens to be my birthday, when I will have the privilege of dancing George Balanchine’s Liebeslieder Walzer as part of New York City Ballet’s Fall Season at Lincoln Center. I can think of no better birthday gift than appearing in this wonder of a ballet. Since YouTube cameras will not be transmitting my morning ballet class with the customary “Happy Birthday” tribute played by the accompanying pianist (usually after a tip-off from a colleague), or the inevitable final dress rehearsal of Liebeslieder, I thought I could offer an insider’s perspective of dancing in this ballet which continues to reveal itself in more depth every time I encounter it.

Liebeslieder, choreographed to Johannes Brahms’s Liebeslieder Walzer Op. 52 and Neue Liebeslieder Walzer Op. 65 for four voices and four hands at the piano, is an outlier in Balanchine’s canon. Most of his ballets are set to fuller orchestral scores. And except for some short vocal sections in Mendelsohn’s Midsummer Night’s Dream and the children’s chorus in the snow section of Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker, there are no others in which we get to dance Balanchine’s steps to the sound of the human voice. The mis-en-scène is also atypical for Balanchine, who often preferred

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For Albert

6/23/2015

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Albert in Phlegmatic, photo by Paul Kolnik

Maria Kowroski with Albert in Red Angels, photo by Paul Kolnik

I can’t believe that I am writing this, but Albert Evans has passed away. I am stunned and heartsick by the news. It makes me ache to think that no more blood courses through that once strong, beautiful body. Albert was the kind of guy who would pass by a studio, notice a partnering issue, and step in to effortlessly hoist a girl in the air in demonstration. He was incomparable in roles like Puck in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Ash, Bugaku, Herman Schmerman, Red Angels, Barber Violin Concerto, Stravinsky Violin Concerto, Agon, Fearful Symmetries, Jazz, Liturgy, Open Strings, the Russian pas de deux in Swan Lake, Symphony in Three Movements, The Waltz Project, and Russian Seasons. He was such an incredible artist, intense and a little mysterious. His noble mien contrasted with his animalistic power. In my mind, nobody can top his Phlegmatic in The Four Temperaments. Oftentimes when people perform the difficult attitude front balance in Phlegmatic they look like

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School's Out for Midsummer

6/10/2015

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Me and Jared Angle in Midsummer, photo by Ashley Bouder

On Sunday I closed out the spring season by dancing Helena in Balanchine’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, which is always such a blast to perform. It is so wild and silly; it is one of my very favorite roles. Typically of Midsummer, something unplanned and hilarious occurred during Sunday’s show. During my first pas de deux with Amar Ramasar—which is a violent one in which I throw myself at him and he in turn throws me off—his sleeve got stuck to his pageboy wig and we did much of the crazy partnering one-handed while he struggled to wriggle his arm free without ripping his headgear off and exposing the bald cap underneath! It was a hilarious wardrobe malfunction. We have dubbed it the “sleeve to weave” incident and have added it to the long list of Midsummer bloopers and outtakes. Like restless kids at the end of the school year, we dancers revel in these accidental Midsummer antics.

There are so many props, bulky costumes, moveable set pieces, slippery fog effects, dark lighting, and masks in Act I of Midsummer that often enough, something goes awry. In keeping with the spirit of the ballet, these gaffes are usually hysterically funny. (Act II has one static set, bright lights, and short tutus so it is generally safe from mishap.) Wig issues like Amar’s are a major problem. I remember when one of my best friends—Carla Körbes—was dancing Titania and lost her fake curls during the bower pas de deux. They flew off her head and landed dead middle of the stage. The splatted hairpiece looked like blonde roadkill! James Fayette was playing the Jolly Green Giant, her squire, and he picked the curls up and threw them into the wings and the audience erupted

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Bournonville and Balanchine

6/4/2015

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August Bournonville

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City Ballet Goes Green

2/25/2015

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Le Baiser de la Fee, photo by Julieta Cervantes

Symphony in Three Movements, photo by Paul Kolnik

George Balanchine famously said: “there are no new steps, only new combinations.” He neglected to mention that there are quite a lot of old combinations in his choreography too. This does not diminish his genius—he was so prolific that it rather shows how savvy he was at stealing his own steps. Most choreographers are avid recyclers. They borrow from others, and especially themselves. I get very excited when I spot a patch of repurposed material I hadn’t noticed before, and this week I happened upon two more.

Balanchine’s Harlequinade (1965) cycles through our rep only rarely, and it has been absent for over a decade. I was an Alouette when it last ran, and since the birds don’t appear in Act I, I had never seen it before. So I sat in the audience and watched the dress rehearsal. I was surprised to discover a cribbed verbatim sequence in the children’s choreography. The little girls who play the mini-Harlequins attack Columbine’s dopey suitor Léandre with the same choreography that the adult fairies in Balanchine’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream (1962) employ to attack Puck. Both groups wield sticks, encircle their prey, and go on the offensive with attitude sauté chassé drives. I guess when you have nailed a balletic stick assault you have nowhere else to go with it!

But this isn’t the only bit of recycling going on in Harlequinade. There are the Rouben Ter-Arutunian sets which were originally used for New York City Opera’s production of Cinderella. The plot is

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JARED'S GUEST POST: Liebeslieder Part I

For Albert

School's Out for Midsummer

Bournonville and Balanchine

City Ballet Goes Green

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