It’s a discreet rush moving a la Louis XIV
The concert’s title, “300 Years On: A Dance Collection From the Reign of Louis XIV,” may have seemed a mite ponderous for such airy fare, but the Berkeley Festival did right by including movement in its 2012 edition. This generous sampling of dance, accompanied by the historically informed playing of Musica Pacifica, added up to a revealing two hours Wednesday evening at First Congregational Church.
The eponymous collection is the “Nouveau Recüeil de Dance de Bal et celle de Ballet,” published in France around 1713 by one Louis-Guillaume Pécour, who choreographed most of the 14 short dances performed here. Articulating this cultural heritage in authentic period costumes (farthingales and blocky heels for the women, jabot ruffles for the men) were renowned dance historian Linda Tomko and expert colleagues Olsi Gjeci, Ken Pierce and Jennifer Thorp. The repertoire drew from the social and theatrical dance legacies.
Again, it struck this observer how much of the enduring French music of that era was written to accompany dance (a sequence performed to André Campra’s “Les Fêtes Vénitiennes” proved especially rewarding). Yet even more amazing was sensing the influence this courtly dance would have on the codification of the ballet language more than a century later.
You could see that in the carriage of the dancers, the épaulement, the measured virtuosity, the softly rounded arms, which reach out at you modestly. And you sense an artful design in the movement patterns. Here, a hop is a discreet exaltation, an entrechat seems like a cadence, rather than an applause machine, tendus are gentle; a fouette, an ancestor of those “Black Swan” mixmaster simulations, seems organic here.
Yet this material simmers with passion. Two dancers touch palms and, in context, it’s like fireworks going off; when all four link hands, it seems like a consummation. Tomko and colleagues appeared totally immersed in the cultural implications of the material.
That said, another rehearsal or two with the musicians might have smoothed over some hesitations, and, even at its best, the slightly raised platform at First Congregational is not an ideal place to see dance. On their own, the players of Musica Pacifica, seated to the right, offered works by Francois Couperin (lacking an ideal rhythmic profile) and a Telemann quartet, which alternately buoyed the spirits and tried the patience.