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A New York Triple

On April 22, the Mark Morris Dance Group returns to BAM with two programs of new works, including Morris’s take on The Rite of Spring, which he calls Spring, Spring, Spring. If you want to know why, check out my preview feature for the Times:

The Mark Morris Dance Group in Spring, Spring, Spring.
The Mark Morris Dance Group in Spring, Spring, Spring.

Christopher Wheeldon’s new musical An American in Paris opens on Broadway on April 12. I spoke with him about the challenges of adapting the movie for the stage for this piece, and also to Robert Fairchild and Leanne Cope. Curious?

 

 

Leanne Cope and Robert Fairchild in An American in Paris. Photo by Matthew Murphy
Leanne Cope and Robert Fairchild in An American in Paris. Photo by Matthew Murphy.

 

And finally, a review of two flamenco shows, Soledad Barrio and Olga Pericet, at Joe’s Pub and the Repertorio Español. About as different as two flamenco shows can be.

Olga Pericet by Michael Palma.
Olga Pericet by Michael Palma.

 

Emilio Florido and Soledad Barrio in Cambio de Tercio. By Kevin Yatarola
Emilio Florido and Soledad Barrio in Cambio de Tercio. By Kevin Yatarola
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Twyla Gets Countrified

I interviewed the members of the old-time string-band Carolina Chocolate Drops as well as Tiler Peck and Robert Fairchild for this piece on Twyla Tharp’s new dance suite set to five of the Drops’ songs.The dance premièred at BAM last week (unfortunately I was out of town). The band has a wonderfully down-home, and yet modern sound, and they’re excellent musicians. Each of them plays several instruments, from fiddle to banjo to various kinds of percussion and jug. Rhiannon Giddens, the informal leader of the group, has a strong, intelligent singing style (she trained as an opera singer). And of course their kind of music is right up Twyla Tharp’s alley.

You can read the piece here.

And here are the Drops in their infectious “Cornbread and Butterbeans”:

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Opening Night at New York City Ballet

Janie Taylor and Anthony Huxley in Ivesiana. Photo by Paul Kolnik.
Janie Taylor and Anthony Huxley in Ivesiana. Photo by Paul Kolnik.

The company kicked off its spring season — a.k.a. the American Music Festival — on April 30, with an all-Balanchine program. (The date also marked the thirtieth anniversary of Balanchine’s death.) On the program: Who Cares?, Tarantella, Stars and Stripes, and the revival of that most mysterious ballet, Ivesiana (not performed since 2004). The cast of Ivesiana was mostly new, and included Ashley Laracey in her first big role since being promoted to soloist int the spring. And what a striking, chilling ballet it is. You can read my review (for DanceTabs) here.

And here’s a short excerpt:

“Made in 1954 (the same year as Western Symphony, of all things) for a cast of dancers that included Janet Reed, Allegra Kent, Tanaquil LeClercq, Francisco Moncion, and Todd Bolender, Ivesiana is one of Balnachine’s simplest, and most unnerving, compositions. Four ideas, four sections, not many steps, and no pointe-work – except in the crazed third chapter, “In the Inn,” which is crammed to the gills with steps and performed on pointe…. The entire thing is steeped in an atsmophere of suffocating irresolution, of irratonal occurrences and otherworldliness.”