Ballet Austin. - Bass Concert Hall, Austin, Texas - dance reviews

Dance Magazine, May, 1995 by Sondra Lomax

February 3-4, 1995 Reviewed by Sondra Lomax

To celebrate its recent tour to Cyprus, Ballet Austin presented "Myths and Mythology," a trio of Greek ballets by artistic director Lambros Lambrou.

Icarus, the fable of the boy who dares to fly too close to the sun, starred Krzysztof Starczewski in the title role, with Guennadi Chtcheberiako as his father. Despite their talents, the men could not compete--literally or figuratively--with The Sun, performed by guest artist and bharata natyam dancer Anuradha Naimpally. Radiant in a gold sari, she exquisitely danced traditional movements, including a Hindi prayer that was translated with English supertitles. Her performance was riveting.

The symbolism was apt: the sun--brilliant, eternal, omnipotent--portrayed in sacred Eastern dance form, and humanity--impulsive, mortal, fallible--represented in secular Western dance. Blending the two styles proved fascinating, especially when movements overlapped. Stefan Passernig's set, Greek columns framing an orange sky, and Tony Tucci's golden lighting created a warm, uplifting mood, as did the music from Philip Glass and Ravi Shankar's collaborative score, Passages.

In contrast, Elektra was a rendition of the classical Greek tragedy of regicide and revenge. Abstracted sex, violence, and insanity staggered across the stage, grounded by Dana Lewis's intense and powerful performance of the title role. Lewis exploded in grands jetes and lightning-fast chaines, partnered by Jeffrey Plourde, as Orestes. Ann Arnoult and Alexei Koriaguine portrayed Clytemnestra and Aegisthus, while the chorus's friezelike poses offered relief from the lead characters' angst.

Byzantium, an elegant pageant staged in hierarchical groupings against a background of twinkling stars, was the evening's crowning work. Gina Patterson and Cornel Crabtree danced a sensuous, regal pas de deux, their bodies sculpting poses reminiscent of medieval icons. Inga Loujerenko and Rafael Padilla breezed through elaborate partnering in another duet. Like Icarus, Byzantium represented the melding of East and West, as Lambrou blended classical and modern movements. Greek composer Christos Hatzis's music wrapped the ballet in Eastern rhythms, while Pamela Anson's jeweltoned costumes shimmered under Tucci's lighting.

RELATED ARTICLE: NAT'L VIEW

Pennyslvania Ballet began its spring season with an ending: two performances of Giselle (Merriam Theatre, Philadelphia, February 8 & 11, 1995) marked the finale of Tamara Hadley's stage career after twenty years with PAB, nineteen as a principal dancer.

Best known for her powerful technique and presence, Hadley has excelled in the Balanchine repertoire and in modern works set on her. She has always been more Odile than Giselle, more suited to flashing than to floating, and in the first performance her Giselle appeared rather too close to earth. Her peasant girl had homespun charm, her Wili desperation gradually overcome by ghostlines, but the Mad Scene lacked both pathos and energy. I wish I could have seen Hadley once more in Swan Lake or Prodigal Son. William DeGregory, Hardley's husband, was an attentive Albrecht; Leslie Carothers was technically and dramatically a riveting Myrtha. The program opened with donizetti Variations, perky but superfluous.

Susan Gould

The American premiere of two works choreographed by Dennis Wayne provided a crowd-pleasing centerpiece to an ambitious bill presented by Memphis Concert Ballet (Orpheum Theatre, Memphis, February 18-19, 1995). Directed by Dorothy Gunther Pugh, this young company appears to flourish when challenged with athletic complexities like those by Wayne.

In the hauntingly erotic Andante, Jaynellen Walsh and Dmitri Kouznetsov envoked a sad and searing memory of love lost; their elegiac pas de deux was as fluid and effortless as the Rachmaninoff to which they danced. The swirling, swooping curves and sudden, jerky thrusts of the kaleidoscopic Moments Passing allowed a dozen dancers to explore, in a frenzy of often breakneck elegance, the kind of romance that is only possible in the lush and dreamy landscape of a choreographer's imagination. The Wayne works were flanked by something old (Paquita) and something new (Legends of Camelot).

Timothy Hedgepeth

At the start of his new solo, Heart, Ray Eliot Schwartz (Artspace, Richmond, February 16-18, 1995) is an intriguing figure. Crouched in a tunic and slim pants, his long hair tangled in the scarf that blindfolds him, he makes a sad and dangerous androgyne. He fondles a bowie knife with which he could either pleasure or kill himself. His topic, it seems, is sex and destruction, and if his knife-dancing doesn't make that plain, his words soon do.

Heart is either dancing or talking but rarely both. Schwartz's account of anonymous sex in parks and discos is filled with statements" and "I pray my body does not bear the marks of my proclivities." He may be forgiven his ponderous musings, but Schwartz leaves the viewer frustrated with his talk-a-little, dance-a-little structure. A movement vignette in the middle of Heart that brings him to the floor, writhing and snapping under the presumed glare of an unknown partner, strikes at the poignant and disturbing core of his material. That, for me, was the heart of Schwartz's work, a juicy and vital center that could well give life to other forms.