New York Sun
By MARY STAUB June 18, 2007
Three pas de deux in two weeks is a lot of material for any young dancer. Three pas de deux in two weeks with a new partner performed under the critical eyes of the former directors from the Kirov Ballet and Paris Opéra Ballet is a hurdle of nearly unimaginable proportions. But that is exactly what a group of 17- to 24 year-old dancers has had to tackle during the New York International Ballet Competition, which holds its final rounds beginning Wednesday at Lincoln Center.
"All dancers have had to learn things the weekend before, but to learn something and be judged on it is different," a dancer, Chris Mackenthun, said after rehearsal at the start of his second week in New York. "Usually it doesn't have to be perfect because things can be off, and the everyday audience doesn't notice. This time, though, the judges will know when you're off, and they'll let you know."
For the past two weeks, 48 young ballet dancers have been sweating out the minutes, up to nine hours a day, six days a week, at an uptown dance studio, eagerly learning the steps and styles of three pas de deux — an excerpt from "Coppelia," the Black Swan pas de deux from "Swan Lake," and "Divertimento," a contemporary work by Victoria Mazzarelli, who won the gold medal at the first NYIBC in 1984 — from scratch. Dancers compete in three rounds and a gala performance for various prizes, including one-year contracts with American Ballet Theatre and the Joffrey Ballet. Past winners include ABT principal dancer Gillian Murphy, Royal Ballet principal dancer Sarah Lamb, and Paris Opera Ballet dancer Ludmilla Pagliero,
Several dancers, including Mr. Mackenthun, entered the competition with the added difficulty of only recently having met his or her partner. Five weeks prior to coming to New York, Mr. Mackenthun flew down to Costa Rica to meet Margarita Peralta. The two dancers became acquainted and rehearsed for five weeks, then took a one-week break before meeting again in New York in early June. Ms. Peralta was driven to seek a partner outside Costa Rica because, as she put it, "in Costa Rica there are no male ballet dancers and people don't really care about ballet."
With dancers from 19 countries including Russia, the Philippines, and Costa Rica, NYIBC unites competitors from very distinct sets of circumstances.
Some are just out of school and have little stage experience, while others have worked as full-fledged company members for years. Some arrived solo, others with well-rehearsed partners. Some have toured widely and know what it is like to adapt to new stages, while others have mainly local recitals under their belt.
From day one during class it is evident to most competitors — or participants as they prefer to be called — that their fellow dancers bring with them a wide range of experience, schooling, technique, and style. But what might be cause for contention, competition or intimidation, has instead been a source of inspiration for most.
"It's been a great learning experience to watch different dancers and many I can see where they've been trained," a dancer, Crystal Hartford, 17, said while sipping Coke at the end of a nine-hour day of dance. Because ballet technique can be taught in various styles, including the Russian Vaganova technique, the Italian Chiccetti style, and the American Balanchine method, the same steps can appear wildly different on dancers from various backgrounds. "When rehearsing, I want to watch others, too, because it's so interesting to see what others are doing versus what we're doing," Ms. Hartford said.
Although the rules demand that all dancers must learn and perform the exact same steps and nothing be altered — regardless of how much an individual might struggle with a particular piqué turn to his right versus left — the dancers are encouraged to freely integrate into their performances their own heritage, background, schooling, and culture.
"As judges, we have to see beyond the steps, beyond the extensions, jumps and turns, to what's inside the steps, the passion," the president of judges and the director of Dance Conservatory of New York, Valentina Kozlova, said. "Although they have to know the movement, it's not about technique. It's about how they relate to each other and it has to do with touching the heart of the audience. They must touch the audience, make you feel, and tell a story; that is the artistry."
The learning process, though, isn't limited to choreography. For some dancers, it includes learning English, and for others it means gaining more experience onstage, or dealing with exceptional pressures in a very short amount of time.
"I always hope dancers go away a little richer and wiser and have learned something about themselves," the competition's cofounder, Ilona Copen, said. "Of course, I hope that they go home as better artists, but I also hope they gain a generosity of heart towards other dancers and more openness towards other cultures."
Until July 24 (Lincoln Center, 212-721-6500).
Monday, June 18, 2007
Friday, June 8, 2007
A Partner to Remember
New York Sun
By MARY STAUB June 8, 2007
If professional demand is any measure of expertise, then Roberto Bolle is unquestionably of the highest caliber. Last month, Mr. Bolle, a Ballet Étoile at La Scala in Milan, partnered Darcey Bussell, a beloved principal dancer at London's Royal Ballet, for her farewell performance at Sadler's Wells. This month, the 32-year-old is in New York to partner Alessandra Ferri, a celebrated principal dancer at American Ballet Theatre, in the final performances of her 22-year career with ABT.
While Mr. Bolle has worked as principal guest artist throughout Europe — at the Royal Opera Ballet, Paris Opéra Ballet, the Bolshoi Ballet, and more — for the past 11 years, his career in America is only just beginning. His performance in ABT's "Manon" on June 11 will mark his first principal role in this country.
"It's a great moment in my career, but it is also a very sad one because Alessandra is leaving and Darcey is leaving," Mr. Bolle said modestly in lyrical, Italian-accented English during a break in his tight New York schedule. Sprinkled throughout rehearsals, he had a photo-shoot with Italian Vanity Fair one day, a discussion of his New York debut at the Italian Cultural Institute the next.
Although the Ferri-Bolle pairing is new to American audiences, it is by no means new to the dancers themselves, who danced together for the first time in 2002 at the Bolshoi and who have worked together more than 40 times since. Mr. Bolle credits Ms. Ferri with teaching him what it truly meant to be an artist onstage when the two danced together in "Romeo and Juliet."
"The first time, I have to say I was scared to perform opposite Alessandra because it is very different dancing with her," Mr. Bolle said. "She is so natural, she doesn't care about the steps and technique in this kind of dramatic ballet so much, but really wants to tell stories; she wants you to have real reactions, like a real person. So sometimes she changes reactions or steps because in that moment she feels different."
Any anxieties Mr. Bolle had at the time have clearly vanished. At a recent rehearsal of "Manon" at the Metropolitan Opera House — a rehearsal that included the tragic final scene in which Manon lies dying in her lover des Grieux's arms — Ms. Ferri and Mr. Bolle resembled young children playing at love and death with each other. Each time their steps, turns, or lifts didn't quite match up, they broke into laughter and exchanged animated advice, in Italian on how to adapt to each other's style, steps, and bodies.
"You don't have to put me down, I can just slide off and find the floor. Especially with your shoulders, it's like lying on a bed," Ms. Ferri said, half jokingly, after a descent from atop Mr. Bolle's broad shoulders ended with a clunk.
After another segment, in which Mr. Bolle tossed her seemingly two body-lengths above his head, Ms. Ferri commented, "I know you're high already, but I also know you can go even higher."
Ms. Ferri's coach, Wilhelm Burmann, sat discreetly at the side, offering occasional individual directions — "Make sure the attitude piqué is en face," or "Make sure your foot is stretched" — but left the two dancers to work out most of the details on their own.
Mr. Bolle and Ms. Ferri's ease with each other stems partly from their shared Italian roots — Ms. Ferri is from Milan, Mr. Bolle from Casale Monferrato, a small town in northwestern Italy. In part, though, their ease stems from a palpable shared enjoyment of continuously reinterpreting a story as it take its course.
"It is especially important in these dramatic ballets that you really use the steps to communicate, not just to move," Mr. Bolle said of works such as "Manon" and "Romeo and Juliet." "Just today after rehearsal, Alessandra told me, ‘Be careful because if I feel to do different, I will do it different, and if you feel to do different, you do it and I will react; if you have another feeling — a bit more sad, a bit more angry, you want to be nasty or more jealous — you do it.'"
With his New York debut just around the corner and an overflow of offers to dance with the most popular ballerinas of our time — he reluctantly declined a second request from Darcey Bussell due to scheduling conflicts — there are few things that Mr. Bolle truly longs for in his career. He'd like to dance "Eugene Onegin," and would love the chance to work with more living choreographers. But these are just minor wishes. His only real qualms are over those who are leaving; Ms. Ferri in New York and Ms. Bussell in London.
"I've danced with Darcey for eight years, Alessandra for five," Mr. Bolle said. "And there are no other dancers like that, with that experience, that maturity, that artistry."
June 11, 14, and 23 (Lincoln Center, 212-721-6500).
By MARY STAUB June 8, 2007
If professional demand is any measure of expertise, then Roberto Bolle is unquestionably of the highest caliber. Last month, Mr. Bolle, a Ballet Étoile at La Scala in Milan, partnered Darcey Bussell, a beloved principal dancer at London's Royal Ballet, for her farewell performance at Sadler's Wells. This month, the 32-year-old is in New York to partner Alessandra Ferri, a celebrated principal dancer at American Ballet Theatre, in the final performances of her 22-year career with ABT.
While Mr. Bolle has worked as principal guest artist throughout Europe — at the Royal Opera Ballet, Paris Opéra Ballet, the Bolshoi Ballet, and more — for the past 11 years, his career in America is only just beginning. His performance in ABT's "Manon" on June 11 will mark his first principal role in this country.
"It's a great moment in my career, but it is also a very sad one because Alessandra is leaving and Darcey is leaving," Mr. Bolle said modestly in lyrical, Italian-accented English during a break in his tight New York schedule. Sprinkled throughout rehearsals, he had a photo-shoot with Italian Vanity Fair one day, a discussion of his New York debut at the Italian Cultural Institute the next.
Although the Ferri-Bolle pairing is new to American audiences, it is by no means new to the dancers themselves, who danced together for the first time in 2002 at the Bolshoi and who have worked together more than 40 times since. Mr. Bolle credits Ms. Ferri with teaching him what it truly meant to be an artist onstage when the two danced together in "Romeo and Juliet."
"The first time, I have to say I was scared to perform opposite Alessandra because it is very different dancing with her," Mr. Bolle said. "She is so natural, she doesn't care about the steps and technique in this kind of dramatic ballet so much, but really wants to tell stories; she wants you to have real reactions, like a real person. So sometimes she changes reactions or steps because in that moment she feels different."
Any anxieties Mr. Bolle had at the time have clearly vanished. At a recent rehearsal of "Manon" at the Metropolitan Opera House — a rehearsal that included the tragic final scene in which Manon lies dying in her lover des Grieux's arms — Ms. Ferri and Mr. Bolle resembled young children playing at love and death with each other. Each time their steps, turns, or lifts didn't quite match up, they broke into laughter and exchanged animated advice, in Italian on how to adapt to each other's style, steps, and bodies.
"You don't have to put me down, I can just slide off and find the floor. Especially with your shoulders, it's like lying on a bed," Ms. Ferri said, half jokingly, after a descent from atop Mr. Bolle's broad shoulders ended with a clunk.
After another segment, in which Mr. Bolle tossed her seemingly two body-lengths above his head, Ms. Ferri commented, "I know you're high already, but I also know you can go even higher."
Ms. Ferri's coach, Wilhelm Burmann, sat discreetly at the side, offering occasional individual directions — "Make sure the attitude piqué is en face," or "Make sure your foot is stretched" — but left the two dancers to work out most of the details on their own.
Mr. Bolle and Ms. Ferri's ease with each other stems partly from their shared Italian roots — Ms. Ferri is from Milan, Mr. Bolle from Casale Monferrato, a small town in northwestern Italy. In part, though, their ease stems from a palpable shared enjoyment of continuously reinterpreting a story as it take its course.
"It is especially important in these dramatic ballets that you really use the steps to communicate, not just to move," Mr. Bolle said of works such as "Manon" and "Romeo and Juliet." "Just today after rehearsal, Alessandra told me, ‘Be careful because if I feel to do different, I will do it different, and if you feel to do different, you do it and I will react; if you have another feeling — a bit more sad, a bit more angry, you want to be nasty or more jealous — you do it.'"
With his New York debut just around the corner and an overflow of offers to dance with the most popular ballerinas of our time — he reluctantly declined a second request from Darcey Bussell due to scheduling conflicts — there are few things that Mr. Bolle truly longs for in his career. He'd like to dance "Eugene Onegin," and would love the chance to work with more living choreographers. But these are just minor wishes. His only real qualms are over those who are leaving; Ms. Ferri in New York and Ms. Bussell in London.
"I've danced with Darcey for eight years, Alessandra for five," Mr. Bolle said. "And there are no other dancers like that, with that experience, that maturity, that artistry."
June 11, 14, and 23 (Lincoln Center, 212-721-6500).
Monday, June 4, 2007
Cedar Lake Goes Gaga
New York Sun
By MARY STAUB June 4, 2007
Adapting to a new choreographer's style is never easy, but this season has been a particular challenge for the dancers at Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet. Working under the direction of guest choreographer Ohad Naharin, the artistic director of Israel's Batsheva Dance Company, the classically trained dancers have had to discover a whole new approach to movement: "gaga."
For the past three months Mr. Naharin and assistants from his company have supplemented the Cedar Lake dancers' classical training with daily workshops in gaga, Mr. Naharin's original movement approach, to prepare them for performances of Mr. Naharin's "Decadance," a piece composed of excerpts from 10 past works that begins performances June 7.
Gaga has more to do with the discovery of a certain quality, texture, and intention of movement than a specific technique, according to the choreographer. "The first thing we do is cover the mirrors and we try to get the dancers to really start sensing their bodies," Mr. Naharin explained on a recent afternoon between rehearsals. "So many dancers dance with just one idea; their school's idea, a strength idea, an idea of line, or form, or drama. But there's always more than just one idea that you can work with."
For most dancers, working without mirrors during the rehearsal process is like jumping into water without swimming lessons. There's nothing to hold onto, no way to know what's right. Without the continuous ability to watch one's own reflection and check one's placement, movement, rhythm or spacing, dancers invariably discover new sources of feedback.
"I've been trained in a way that something was either correct or not and I've now had to let go of these concepts of right and wrong and learn to make more of a feeling be the aim," a dancer in his third season with Cedar Lake, Jubal Battisti, said. "When you check yourself in the mirror constantly, it distracts from the sensation and emotion of what you're doing. All you have while you're working now is yourself, the images in your head, the people around you, and you're suddenly relying more on sensation and imagery in your head, rather than shape."
The approach of gaga is something Mr. Naharin has been developing for many years. While he was recovering from a back injury more than 20 years ago, he found he had to discover new and more efficient ways of moving. Over the subsequent years, he has continued to integrate input from dancers and nondancers alike. Mr. Naharin makes a point to collaborate with companies without any prior experience in more sensorial approaches to dance, and tries to help these dancers fine-tune their sense of expression.
"Many things are already in their bodies: ability, musicality, fantasy. They're just not using it because it's locked in," Mr. Naharin said. "It's hard if a company is very story oriented, or point oriented, or skinny-ballerina oriented. I try to find the right key to help them unlock something new."
In one of the early gaga classes Mr. Battisti recalled lying on the floor like overcooked spaghetti in a pot of boiling water.
"I don't know what this looked like, but it's not about what it looks like," he said, sounding slightly worried about appearances. "We were basically flopping around on the ground, but in your head you're feeling like you're spaghetti and in a pot of boiling water."
Since then, Cedar Lake dancers have come a long way. "They start to feel how the body is made up of 1,000 small places that can isolate," Mr. Naharin said. "Even if you're moving in one piece, you're moving many pieces together, not just a block. This is important to be alive in your dance."
During a recent rehearsal of an excerpt from "Black Milk" at Cedar Lake's Chelsea theater, four male dancers moved toward one another slowly, peering in over a fifth dancer lying on the floor beneath them. After a first runthrough of the excerpt, Mr. Naharin had the dancers repeat this segment again and again, gently giving them information about their attitude and intention.
"You're curious about him, that's why you bend in, don't think about how far down you have to bend because that looks stiff and hostile. You're interested, not confrontational; think less, do less, sense more," Mr. Naharin said, as he and his assistants demonstrated on the side. The dancers tried to let go of their more dramatic approach. Mr. Naharin added one more command: "And have fun."
Begins June 7 (547 W. 26th St., between Tenth and Eleventh avenues, 212-868-4444).
By MARY STAUB June 4, 2007
Adapting to a new choreographer's style is never easy, but this season has been a particular challenge for the dancers at Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet. Working under the direction of guest choreographer Ohad Naharin, the artistic director of Israel's Batsheva Dance Company, the classically trained dancers have had to discover a whole new approach to movement: "gaga."
For the past three months Mr. Naharin and assistants from his company have supplemented the Cedar Lake dancers' classical training with daily workshops in gaga, Mr. Naharin's original movement approach, to prepare them for performances of Mr. Naharin's "Decadance," a piece composed of excerpts from 10 past works that begins performances June 7.
Gaga has more to do with the discovery of a certain quality, texture, and intention of movement than a specific technique, according to the choreographer. "The first thing we do is cover the mirrors and we try to get the dancers to really start sensing their bodies," Mr. Naharin explained on a recent afternoon between rehearsals. "So many dancers dance with just one idea; their school's idea, a strength idea, an idea of line, or form, or drama. But there's always more than just one idea that you can work with."
For most dancers, working without mirrors during the rehearsal process is like jumping into water without swimming lessons. There's nothing to hold onto, no way to know what's right. Without the continuous ability to watch one's own reflection and check one's placement, movement, rhythm or spacing, dancers invariably discover new sources of feedback.
"I've been trained in a way that something was either correct or not and I've now had to let go of these concepts of right and wrong and learn to make more of a feeling be the aim," a dancer in his third season with Cedar Lake, Jubal Battisti, said. "When you check yourself in the mirror constantly, it distracts from the sensation and emotion of what you're doing. All you have while you're working now is yourself, the images in your head, the people around you, and you're suddenly relying more on sensation and imagery in your head, rather than shape."
The approach of gaga is something Mr. Naharin has been developing for many years. While he was recovering from a back injury more than 20 years ago, he found he had to discover new and more efficient ways of moving. Over the subsequent years, he has continued to integrate input from dancers and nondancers alike. Mr. Naharin makes a point to collaborate with companies without any prior experience in more sensorial approaches to dance, and tries to help these dancers fine-tune their sense of expression.
"Many things are already in their bodies: ability, musicality, fantasy. They're just not using it because it's locked in," Mr. Naharin said. "It's hard if a company is very story oriented, or point oriented, or skinny-ballerina oriented. I try to find the right key to help them unlock something new."
In one of the early gaga classes Mr. Battisti recalled lying on the floor like overcooked spaghetti in a pot of boiling water.
"I don't know what this looked like, but it's not about what it looks like," he said, sounding slightly worried about appearances. "We were basically flopping around on the ground, but in your head you're feeling like you're spaghetti and in a pot of boiling water."
Since then, Cedar Lake dancers have come a long way. "They start to feel how the body is made up of 1,000 small places that can isolate," Mr. Naharin said. "Even if you're moving in one piece, you're moving many pieces together, not just a block. This is important to be alive in your dance."
During a recent rehearsal of an excerpt from "Black Milk" at Cedar Lake's Chelsea theater, four male dancers moved toward one another slowly, peering in over a fifth dancer lying on the floor beneath them. After a first runthrough of the excerpt, Mr. Naharin had the dancers repeat this segment again and again, gently giving them information about their attitude and intention.
"You're curious about him, that's why you bend in, don't think about how far down you have to bend because that looks stiff and hostile. You're interested, not confrontational; think less, do less, sense more," Mr. Naharin said, as he and his assistants demonstrated on the side. The dancers tried to let go of their more dramatic approach. Mr. Naharin added one more command: "And have fun."
Begins June 7 (547 W. 26th St., between Tenth and Eleventh avenues, 212-868-4444).
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