Ballet BC’S versatile moves
Three works on the program range from the abstract to the theatrical
Ballet BC showed its versatility as a contemporary ballet company with three distinctive performances in Walking Mad & Other Works.
It was a program that had something for everyone. It began with clas-sical-style ballet en pointe in an atmospheric and abstract work and ended with a contemporary dance that was much more theatrical and dramatic. In between was a work with a little of both, the abstract and theatrical in its combination of contemporary and folk dance.
Opening the evening Thursday was between disappearing and becoming by Emily Molnar, Ballet BC’S artistic director. Dramatic lighting, overhead and to the side, created a mysterious mood as the dancers existed in a twilight world between light and shadow.
Particularly striking were the women as they bourréed across the stage. On several occasions, they entered the stage en pointe with their arms by their side and continued with quick little steps across until they left the other side. They looked like ballet spirits condemned to keep dancing forever on their toes.
The music was Without Sinking by the Icelandic cellist Hildur Gud-nadottir. It started out strong with a kind of mournful layered drone but after a while it was a battle against the music, and difficult to concentrate on the dancing.
The second new work created for the evening was Vitulare by Aszure Barton. Latin for ‘ to sing or rejoice,’ Vitulare lived up to its title as a physical and celebratory dance. It was performed to eight songs, several of which included beautiful group and a cap-pella singing in different languages.
All the dancers wore costumes that resembled chic versions of what workers might wear on a communal farm. The work evoked folk dancing and a people sharing a common tradition.
There were a few moments of individuality and flash, especially an inspired urban street- style solo by Darren Devaney.
The highlight of the evening was the final work Walking Mad by Johan Inger. If the first work on the program was cerebral and cool, the second festive and physical, the third was definitely a little mad and inspired.
The bulk of Walking Mad was danced to Maurice Ravel’s Bolero. Commissioned for a ballet in 1928, it’s one of those popular orchestral works with a history that Inger had to confront to make new again. He did that by changing the focus from its historic association with sensuality to the battle of the sexes.
Walking Mad follows the musical arc of Bolero from controlled to frenzied. The crazy bits include the men wearing absurd red conical party hats far too small for their heads as they dash around the stage. If the men aren’t chasing the women, they’re trapping them with their bodies. But the women manage to wiggle their way to momentary freedom.
One of its central metaphors and props is a wall on wheels. Not only does the versatile wall becomes a surface to dance on and against, it also becomes a ledge to hang from and balance on. Dancers come and go through its doors and run around it like they’re creatures on a racetrack.
After Bolero’s dramatic ending, the music shifts to the sparse minimalism of Arvo Part’s Fur Alina. This is where Walking Mad goes beyond a Hollywood ending. Introduced at the beginning, Gilbert Small and Makaila Wallace return to the stage to continue their tentative relationship. They dance a beautiful duet together that’s full of capture and release. But she doesn’t want to be trapped. The gulf between them proves to be too great and their relationship ends in tragedy.