Haglund's Heel

NYCB 9/26 Impressive debuts

        The final performance of the Masters at Work series included successful debuts for Unity Phelan, Peter Walker and Miriam Miller in Tschaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 2. All three clearly had decided beforehand that any errors were going to come from giving too much, not too little. Not only was Unity competent and beautiful, but she was able to add elements that none of the other current interpreters could — such as an arabesque that rose above 90° and a breathtaking and beautifully placed a la second extension that was exclaimed by a magnificently arched foot. Her joy came across as authentic. Her energy was not compromised in any way. Her turns and grand allegro were on the money. This was a very, very good debut performance with the promise of future spectacular ones. We’re not sure why at times Unity seemed rushed — perhaps from trying to make every movement as large as possible or perhaps from her realization that this was a one & done performance that she wanted to make the most of. We wish after the first dismal performance by Sara Mearns, management would have made a complete substitution with Unity. 

        Peter Walker’s debut began with almost overpowering force — like he was trying to be someone else. Peter Walker is good enough to dance this ballet as Peter Walker. He doesn’t need to be anyone else. When he finally settled down, we were able to appreciate his beautiful lines and blazing batterie. His deportment in the central portion of the ballet clearly conveyed his sincerity and the feeling of loss. The few awkward partnering moments with Unity seemed born from over-excitement by both dancers. All of these nerves would have subsided at a second performance if only they had been given one.

 

        Miriam Miller in the soloist role had high energy and danced beautifully but did not have the confidence to try to steal the show. We needed something in between Serenade and Slaughter from her. If only there had been a second performance . . .

 

        While we understand that these days featured corps roles tend to be handed out based on seniority, neither Kristen Segin nor India Bradley captured the elegance of the two women who performed forward-pitched arabesques with the male principal during the center section of the ballet. Both seemed quite awkwardly and uncomfortably perched during each instance. The corps de ballet as a whole danced splendidly in each performance of this ballet.

 

        This evening included repeats of Duo Concertant with Megan Fairchild and Anthony Huxley, and Glass Pieces with Unity Phelan and Adrian Danchig-Waring.  All gave strong, satisfying performances. The Corps de Ballet rocked Glass Pieces, as they tend to do.

 

        Our H.H. Pump Bump Award, a Jimmy Choo jeweled sandal, is bestowed upon Unity Phelan for her promising debut in Tschaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 2. 

 

 

 

 

NYCB 9/25 Mozartiana, M&M, Concerto DSCH

        How freakin' lucky are we at the ballet to be able to listen to a program of four of the greatest composers to ever live! Tschaikovsky, Mozart, Stravinsky, and Shostakovich. That is one huge musical program -- more substantial than what one will likely hear these days at Geffen Hall. NYCB not only comes through with the biggest ballet but with the biggest music played brilliantly by the New York City Ballet Orchestra. Call us grateful.  

         In some respect the ballerina in the Preghiera section of Balanchine’s Mozartiana serves Tschaikovsky’s adaptation of Mozart’s Ave verum corpus like the choir of voices serves Mozart’s hymn. They both tap into the divinity of the music allowing its humanity to flow freely as song. Tiler Peck used reserve and texture in her eloquent interpretation on Wednesday evening. The reserve was the hard part while the musical texturing was innate. Her elimination of the extreme cambré didn’t go unnoticed but it didn’t soil the performance either. Tiler’s elegant curves in the elbows and the length of the triceps in the upper arms revealed a new eloquence in her port de bras that, if one can even imagine, enhanced her storied musicality. The subtle peeling apart of the palms to open a fifth position overhead was one of many details in this exquisite performance.

        The pas de deux with Anthony Huxley revealed slight imperfections while also promising something new and interesting. What could these two offer one another? How might they inspire and challenge each other? Huxley’s allegro solos astonished in their clarity and effortlessness. His allegro sprang from joy and anticipation — always on the “o” of count one, the “f” of the four, the “e” of the eight.

 

        Troy Schumacher’s Gigue was enjoyable, and we were glad to see him back in top form. The Menuet crew of Christina Clark, Naomi Corti, Meaghan Dutton-O’Hara, and Malorie Lundgren were mostly precise but offered some unhelpful facial expressions.

 

        My oh my, how a fresh coat of paint can make the old walls new again. Mira Nadon and Adrian Danchig-Waring brought a daring amount of glamour and sensuality to Monumentum pro Gesualdo and Movements for Piano and Orchestra. It takes a lot more than just the right physiques to bring these two abstruse creations by Balanchine to clarity and to fasten them securely to Stravinsky’s musical ideas. Enlightening, to say the least, were these performances where strength and beauty were equals.

 

        Ratmansky’s Concerto DSCH saw the performance levels of David Gabriel and KJ Takahashi soar to their next stages. Both of them — so charismatic and confident. Indiana Woodward as their scampering compeer blazed through her allegro like her feet just couldn’t stop even if she wanted them to. Sara Mearns and Tyler Angle showed great joy in their pas de deux. However, Tyler appeared to be dead-lifting Sara most of the time. Can he accomplish that and make it work? Yes, he’s that strong. Should he have to? No.

 

        The corps de ballet in DSCH was ready to go. We need to make a special mention of Mary Elizabeth Sell who always excels in this work. Stephen Gosling's piano performance was worth the price of the ticket.

 

        The H.H. Pump Bump Award, black lace from Manolo Blahnik, is bestowed upon Tiler Peck for her dancing in Mozartiana — not yet at the center of her bailiwick but soon could be.

 

 

 

NYC Ballet 9/21 evening Intelligence For Our Times

        The highlight of Saturday evening was Lar Lubovitch’s Each In Their Own Time, a pas de deux he created for New York City Center’s Fall for Dance Festival in 2021 to Johannes Brahms’ Eight Piano Pieces. Lubovitch was 79 years old when he created this dance to Brahms’ 188-year-old piano cycle using a style of choreography steeped in the classical ballet idiom several hundred years old and reflecting the 20th Century influence of Jose Limon. The end result was a sensitive, universal, timeless portrayal of two human beings connecting through dance, connecting through music, connecting via their educated instruments that allowed them to speak with unusual eloquence.

        Susan Walters beautifully performed the Brahms from her piano positioned up stage and properly amplified while Adrian Danchig-Waring and Taylor Stanley amplified the beauty of Lubovitch’s signature style — oceanic in its flow with swirling undercurrents and waves washing over the music. 

 

        Indiana Woodward and David Gabriel brought imagination to Balanchine's Divertimento from Le Baiser de la Fée and handled the intricate, difficult choreography with ease. Alston Macgill and Mary Elizabeth Sell were lovely demi-soloists, and the corps included newer members and apprentices who at times wore terrified expressions which we assume will subside quickly.

 

        Sara Mearns and Tyler Angle performed Christopher Wheeldon’s This Bitter Earth. It was all competently and smoothly danced, but Wheeldon’s casting of this ballet is curious because the choreography clearly calls for subtle and languid qualities such as those found in Wendy Whelan, Ashley Laracey, and Yuan Yuan Tan of San Francisco Ballet. The dancers managed all the positions and partnering, but to what end, we’re not sure.

 

        Jerome Robbins' The Four Seasons included standout performances by Olivia MacKinnon in Spring and Ashley Laracey in Summer. The sweeping romantic pas de deux showed MacKinnon at her best and gave her ample opportunity to show us that she could inhabit a role with style, particularly when partnered by the skilled Chun Wai Chan. Ashley Laracey’s engaging mysterious quality was perfect for the sultry Summer section. Her partner, Davide Riccardo, responded with his own sensual, alluring style. Summer never felt so hot.

 

        Erica Pereira, Devin Alberda, and Andres Zuniga skated through the Winter section in a lively manner. The fabulous Fall section was led by Unity Phelan and Andrew Veyette with KJ Takahashi as the little goat. No complaints at all about Unity’s output; she was gorgeous and danced impeccably. Veyette — what can we say — he held nothing back. He simply would not let go of any turns and pushed his grand allegro to its maximum. He was at times thrilling because the viewer had no idea if he was going to survive what he set out to do.

 

        The H.H. Pump Bump Award, A Jimmy Choo blue-green sea sandal, is bestowed upon Adrian Danchig-Waring and Taylor Stanley for their moving interpretation of Lubovitch’s thoughtful and highly crafted ballet.

 

 

 

NYC Ballet 9/17-18Ready or not, here we come!

        The theater doors sprang open and in we ran on the first night of New York City Ballet's Fall Season. As if in a game of Hide & Go Seek since June, we had counted a hundred days with our eyes closed and now we were on the hunt for Balanchine.

        Boy oh boy, did we ever flush out of hiding a magnificent performance of Tschaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 2 by Tiler Peck, Chun Wai Chan and an energized corps de ballet. Following a polite, somewhat colorless grand allegro solo by Olivia MacKinnon in the opening moments where she wove in and out of a circle of corps women and danced her steps spiritedly, Tiler calmly walked from the upstage wing to the center of the stage and began a master class in what it means to be a ballerina. She is in terrific physical shape with new length in her port de bras and upper back & neck. Her speed seemingly required no force — almost as if her joy propelled her. Watching Tiler embrace Tschaikovsky was to watch a dancer literally living the music. As much joy as it was for her to dance, we hope she understands the incredible joy it brought to the audience. Chun Wai Chan was the perfect partner and seemed to find a new comfort in releasing emotion. Beautiful batterie and grand allegro although the size of that grand allegro may have gone down since his Houston Ballet days. The composite elegance of Chan and Peck was so natural and effortless that it made their pas de deux a dance of one.

        Unfortunately, the performance on the second night didn’t rise anywhere near to what we witnessed on the first night. Haglund knows that Sara Mearns has a tribe who will gush over anything and everything she does. But honestly, her performance on Wednesday wasn’t good and at times was mediocre. She shuffled through allegro, “kind of” doing beats while showing great effort. She fell off point while doing a couple of simple fouettes. The throwaway arms and arabesques were worse than we’d ever seen them. At one point in the last section when she and her partner were standing watching the soloist dance, Sara just let her arms hang at her side like she was standing on the subway platform waiting for a train. From her first entry until her final step, there was a serious question as to why this ballet was in her rep. Her partner, Tyler Angle, on the other hand, made it clear that he was committed to delivering a respectable performance without fudging beats or heaving grand allegro like a DSNY worker heaving a load of trash into the back of a truck. Angle was good, very good in every respect.

 

        The star of this performance, however, was the soloist Emily Kikta who simply stole the show with her glamour, expansive dancing, speed & clarity, rapport with the audience from the orchestra up into the tiers, and all around generosity of artistry. She should have been dancing the lead ballerina role on this night — and on future nights.

 

        The corps de ballet was ready on night one and busted out of the gate at the bell — racing their hearts out. As the women shared the stage with Tiler Peck in the initial section, they beamed and seemed inspired to give even more. We’ve seen this before. When Tiler comes out and dazzles with her grace and artistic force, the whole corps de ballet responds by raising its level even higher. 

 

        Duo Concertant received fine performances from Megan Fairchild with Anthony Huxley and Indiana Woodward paired with Taylor Stanley. Huxley, in particular, possessed style in spades. Duo is his surfing speed. 

 

        Glass Pieces was a little rough on the first night and gave the impression that it was slower than usual. The initial crowd sequence included some innovative randomness that was cleared up by the second night. By the third performance, everyone was up to high speed and dancing with the verve and joy that makes Glass Pieces so enjoyable to watch. Unity Phelan with Adrian Danchig-Waring and Ashley Hod with Aaron Sanz were handsome pairs and displayed eloquent lines in the central pas de deux.

 

        The H.H. Pump Bump Award, a creative beauty from Badgley Mischka, is bestowed upon Tiler Peck for her glorious performance in Tschaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 2. What a pleasure it is to watch this artist lovingly create a new piece of art every time she takes the stage.

 

 

observations 9/6

            It's time to rev up the ole pointe shoes for the fall season. Vroom vroom vroom. Let's poke some holes in those tailpipes to make sure that everybody can hear that the ballet is taking over Lincoln Center once again. However . . .

        . . . if anyone is looking to cram a little extra into his or her ballet schedule, Haglund highly recommends a short swim across the Milstein Pond to the Beaumont Theater to experience the brilliance of Robert Downey, Jr. as McNeal in Bartlett Sher's new riveting production. What an evening of innovative, carefully written, intelligent theater! It's hard to believe that last night was Downey's debut in a Broadway theater. He has crafted enormous detail into his characterization of the Nobel winning author whose life crumbles before our eyes. Didn’t want him to walk out of any scene. The production makes extremely clever use of Artificial Intelligence while probing the downside of AI and how it can wreck people’s lives. Incredible use of technology to further the story as opposed to substituting for a weak script as so many other shows do. At the end, the audience gets confused about what is real and what is AI. Andrea Martin is fantastic as McNeal's literary agent. Great chemistry between the two.

    McNeal runs through November 24th, but see it right away because you'll want to see it again!

    Bravo LCT - the best of Broadway again!