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Thursday 4 December 2008

Unsung hero

New York City Ballet
London Coliseum

In The Four Seasons Robbins takes full advantage of every musical nuance, gently sending up the infectiously brassy operatic tastiness of my fellow countryman’s ballet music. Yet he also maintains Verdi’s original plan for the opera ballet, following the composer’s directions for each of the numbers, which he interpolated with additional excerpts from Verdi’s other opera ballets. Humorous and sparkling as it may be, the 1979 The Four Seasons was never meant to become a choreographic romp, nor to slip into cheap slapstick. Something I wish New York City Ballet’s dancers had kept more firmly in mind on the opening night, for there were a number of times when things got badly out of hand. And it was not just a problem with interpretation: the technical rendition, flashy as it may have looked, was also anything but tidy and precise. Still, the colourfulness of the work and the caution-to-the-wind approach of some of the principal artists brought the house down.

Technical insecurity and lack of precision also marred Moves, one of the most enthralling examples of ballet set to complete silence. Alas, the lack of any aural accompaniment makes one focus even more on the movement, highlighting every minimal imprecision. The work, first seen in 1984, remains a ground-breaking example of modern ballet, but requires mathematical precision in its execution to come across fully. Unfortunately, the final sections appeared to be the weakest, thus thwarting the climactic ‘anti-climactic’ — please forgive the pun — ending, in which the dancers literally walk away from the public.

Luckily, the evening ended on a high note with the riotously hilarious absurdities of The Concert, a work which used to be one of the Royal Ballet’s hits. This 1956 Hellzapoppin’-like work has not lost its comic potential and, from the very moment the pianist walks on stage, stares at the audience and dusts the keyboard of her Steinway, you know you are in for a lot of good fun. Thunderous laughter accompanied well-known moments such as the ‘Mistake Waltz’ and its prelude, in which female dancers are comically carried on stage as dummies or props. Technically less demanding than the other two items on the programme, The Concert provides its interpreters with a unique acting challenge. Luckily, artists such as Sterling Hyltin, Andrew Veyette and Gwyneth Muller, together with the rest of the cast, have the required talent to tackle this great example of quirky choreographic comedy. A few minutes into it and the disappointment caused by the rest of the programme was but a distant memory; I do not recall the last time a ballet made me laugh that much.

More articles from: Giannandrea Poesio | this section

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