Above: Leonid Desyatnikov, composer of RUSSIAN SEASONS.
Thursday February 23, 2012 - New York City Ballet has been my home away from home since I moved to New York City in 1998. In fact, NYCB was a major factor in my desire to move here in the first place. This season has seen the effects of changes in ticket pricing and seating availability, along with the marginalizing of the 4th Ring Society and the way long-time friends and supporters of the Company feel they have been treated by the powers that be. The official stance seems to be that the changes are working and that everything's hunky-dory, but the gaping emptiness of the 4th Ring (ten people sitting up there tonight) is a sad commentary on the real situation.
Increases in ticket prices are a necessary evil from time to time, but it's the way it was done and the lack of sync between the website and the box office in terms of availability and pricing that is off-putting to say the least. The level of dancing is very high and the lure of Balanchine is as strong as ever, but the sheer joy of attending often and feeling you are part of a happy family of ballet-goers is greatly diminished these days. In this Winter season where I'd ear-marked 14 performances on my calendar, I ended up only going six times.
At any rate, when the curtain rose on STRAVINSKY VIOLIN CONCERTO tonight and Janie Taylor was standing there with four handsome boys, I forgot my misgivings. On the podium, George Manahan brought out individual voices in the orchestra - as we might expect a seasoned opera conductor to do - and violinist Lydia Hong conveyed the angular beauty of the concerto in an overall very pleasing performance.
Janie and her partner Ask LaCour gave an especially fine rendering of their duet; in the course of it I noticed things in the choreography that I'd somehow never picked up on before. The allure of the two dancers, and the Taylor mystique, seemed in a way to create a narrative where there isn't one. I really enjoyed watching them.
Maria Kowroski and Amar Ramasar are developing into a powerful and vastly appealing partnership. Their pas de deux was marvelous in its sense of nuanced dramatic detail and in the dancers' technical strength and clarity which both underscored the complex choreography and made it seem inevitable.
The corps danced beautifully, and it is wonderful to see Faye Arthurs onstage again after a hiatus. It was a performance of this classic work that re-affirmed its iconic standing in the Balanchine pantheon.
Ratmansky's RUSSIAN SEASONS is an unique ballet in many ways; drawing on aspects of Russian peasant life, the choreographer presents characters who are anonymous yet differentiated by finely detailed aspects of gesture and movement. The music, with it's prominent violin (Arturo Delmoni) and soulful singing (Irina Rindzuner) all came back to me from the moment of Manahan's downbeat. The score, and the rich colours of the dancers' costumes, weaves a particular spell. I was very glad to see this piece again after a few seasons' absence from the repertoire.
The Playbill now denotes role debuts at NYCB, and only Georgina Pazcoguin had previously appeared in her role as the Woman in Red. Abi Stafford danced in the premiere of RUSSIAN SEASONS but has now switched to the role originally created by Jenifer Ringer. Beyond that, the cast drew together some of the Company's most attractive personalities.
Amanda Hankes, Marika Anderson and Lauren Lovette were each lovely and distinctive to watch, while the presence of Taylor Stanley, David Prottas, Andrew Veyette, Adrian Danchig-Waring and Christian Tworzyanski showed off the strengths of the Company's male contingent.
Abi Stafford's performance had a nice sense of freshness to compliment her clarity of movement. As the central couple, Rebecca Krohn and Robert Fairchild used their personal magnetism to full advantage. Rebecca's dancing was serene - and poignant in the passage where she seems to have been abandoned. Rob Fairchild seized the opportunity to make yet another ballet 'sing' to his charismatic approach. His dancing was technically impressive and dramatically vivid.
In a glorious performance, Georgina Pazcoguin's Woman in Red was suffused with her highly individual beauty and intensity; as she swirled with a restless spirit through the many swift pirouettes and space-filling combinations of this demanding role, Gina seemed like a woman possessed. Truly breath-taking at every moment.
STRAVINSKY VIOLIN CONCERTO: Taylor, la Cour, Kowroski, Ramasar
RUSSIAN SEASONS: Pazcoguin, *Krohn, *A. Stafford, *Lovette, *Hankes, *Anderson, *R. Fairchild, *Prottas, *Stanley, *Tworzyanski, *Danchig-Waring, *Veyette