Oberon's Grove: CEDAR LAKE II & JEWELS III

Saturday June 7, 2008 - An unexpected chance to see a second performance of Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet's Spring production gave me another Saturday full of dance. After attending their opening, I was hoping to get back to see the cast changes in the Nicolo Fonte and Angelin Preljocaj works and to have a chance to have a second look at those pieces and at Jo Stromgren's SUNDAY, AGAIN. Now that I am getting to know the dancers of the Cedar Lake Company it becomes increasingly interesting to watch them assume new roles in works that I've already seen. On a very hot day, Cedar Lake's theatre seemed like a cool, dark cavern.

The changes in principal casting altered the tone of the first two works and in Nicolo Fonte's LASTING IMPRINT the ensemble also included some new faces and forms which gave the piece a different look. Golan Yosef gave the demanding lead role a vulnerable, poetic quality. The movement flows thru his lithe and fluid body, shaping the lines with clarity while his gaze seems to be questing a distant horizon. He was beautifully matched by the enigmatic Acacia Schachte; Acacia sustains one of the work's most memorable images as she is spotlit laying on the floor at the edge of the stage, back arched and head thrust back with her foot pointed towards the heavens. She holds this pose with incredible control.

Seeing the work for the second time allowed me the opportunity to take a broader view of what was happening onstage and to focus on individuals within the ensemble. What impresses me about Cedar Lake's dancers, aside from their powerful technical abilities, is the strength of their individual personalities. You never feel that you are observing a set of anonymous dancers going thru the motions; instead when you focus on any one dancer at any given time you find compelling intensity and sense of commitment. You feel they are capable of anything.

In the roles of the Angel and Mary in Angelin Preljocaj's strikingly dramatic L'ANNOCIATION, Kristen Weiser and Harumi Terayama in a Paul B Goode rehearsal photo, left. This long duet built around the depiction of the Immaculate Conception lost none of its potency on second viewing. Despite knowing about the climactic moment and having experienced the powerful shift in the score from Vivaldi to turbulent mechanical sounds, L'ANNONCIATION was breath-taking. Raised in a Christian household, I can't begin to guess on how many Sundays I mechanically droned the Apostle's Creed: "...born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate..." The Immaculate Conception...have you ever stopped to imagine what that was actually like? Preljojac gives us a dazzlingly dramatic interpretation of the kozmic event.

Mary was probably no more than a child herself when this awesome burden was thrust upon her, and Harumi Terayama's girlish innocence and sense of wonder perfectly illuminated the narrative. Harumi's child-like persona played beautifully off the powerful presence of Kristen Weiser as the Angel. Kristen brought an intriguing maternal quality to her role. The girls danced smoothly in sync and built the drama leading up to the 'kiss of life' with mutual tenderness. With a thunderous explosion of sound, L'ANNOCIATION reaches its climax. The Angel withdraws and Mary is left in her innocent state. Innocent, but altered.

Jo Stromgren's SUNDAY, AGAIN gives us a view of the entire Company; though filled with humorous vignettes, the underlying tone is rather dark and there are some almost sinister moments. The narrative aspects are well offset with lots of dancing and it's a great piece to show off the individual communicative strengths of the Cedar Lake dancers.

On a sweltering day I decided to walk from 26th Street to Lincoln Center; en route I met Laura who had just come from the NYC Ballet's matinee.

"Too much of a good thing is never enough." That's the excuse I used - as if i needed one - for seeing my third JEWELS this season, this time with Wei. The Paul Kolnik photo of Teresa Reichlen in RUBIES captures one of the many high points of Balanchine's plotless masterpiece.

With the exception of the brilliant Joaquin de Luz stepping in to replace Benjamin Millepied in RUBIES, the cast was the same as my earlier performance. Rachel Rutherford in EMERALDS was especially radiant this evening. Teresa Reichlen continues to generate enormous star-power in RUBIES; Ashley Bouder and Joaquin played cunningly against one another while setting off technical fireworks.

Wendy Whelan and Philip Neal were thrilling in DIAMONDS; I've seen them do this ballet together so many times and they always keep it not merely fresh but revelatory. Perhaps their greatest gift, beyond technique, is their pure sense of the music and of refining their gestures to echo the phrasing from Tchaikovsky's score. Wendy and Philip elicited cheers from the large but somewhat stodgy audience. It's amusing that the crowd seems to want to see the dancers come out for curtain calls but a large percentage of the audience can't be bothered to actually applaud.

Wendy's luminous performance - and seeing Faye Arthurs up close (she was a demi in DIAMONDS) - made a nice belated birthday gift for Wei.