Is there anything better than a well-curated repertory program?
Last night, Houston Ballet opened their latest mixed repertory In the Night, featuring works from Jerome Robbins, Stanton Welch, and Lila York. And the answer is no, there is nothing better than a well-curated repertory program – which is exactly what Houston Ballet has brought to the stage.
The program opens with the titular ballet In the Night, exquisitely choreographed by Jerome Robbins. The ballet, set against a starry backdrop, originally premiered in 1970 and is a series of three pas de deux, which unfold to four nocturnes by Frédéric Chopin brilliantly brought to life by pianist Katherine Burkwall-Ciscon. It’s a romantic study in contrasts, each couple embodying a different type of relationship.
Karina González and Eric Best are quietly elegant and genteel, with a sweet fragility to their partnering that grows in intensity as the music swells. Danbi Kim and Harper Watters follow, the subtle shift in the lighting – by designer Jennifer Tipton, recreated by Nicole Pearce – offering only a small clue to the difference we’re about to see.
Together, Kim and Watters are commanding, dancing with a sense of familiarity that seems almost a boast – particularly during the more dramatic moments, as when Watters holds Kim upside down and ramrod straight.
The final pas de deux is danced by Yuriko Kajiya and Connor Walsh, and from the moment the pair emerge from the wings, they wear the fraught nature of their relationship on their faces. Theirs is a battle, a charged current coursing through their bodies that seems to both repel and draw them irresistibly back together in turn.
Despite the dreamy beauty offered by In the Night, the actual draw of this mixed rep program starts after the 25-minute intermission that follows. That’s when Stanton Welch’s Maninyas began.
Maninyas was commissioned by the San Francisco Ballet in 1996 – Welch’s first for an American company – and it is quite an impressive statement. The program notes that the piece is about the “unveiling” process that occurs within a relationship as people get to know one another, and this is certainly hinted at by three long swaths of fabric, or veils, hanging from the rafters from behind which the dancers emerge, peek, and hide. Five women materialize from under the veils into stark spotlights from lighting designer Lisa J. Pinkham, but the work that follows, set to a concerto for violin and orchestra by Australian composer Ross Edwards, is abstract. It feels elemental, Welch’s choreography as sensual as it is clever and curious.
The dancers are paired and color-coded, but they mix-and-match and group together, moving around and across the stage in sharp jerks and springy jumps, whole-body shakes and outstretched arms. Denise Tarrant’s violin sings a wordless song that Welch is perfectly attuned to; his choices are as captivating as they are unexpected and memorable, from the women one-by-one gathering the fabric of their skirts – also designed by Welch – and slapping it against the ground, to the almost menacing trip the dancers take across the stage crouched down in a second position plié. Welch is bold, and it pays off perfectly in Maninyas.
After a shorter 15-minute intermission, the dancers return to the stage for the highlight of the evening: Celts by Lila York, an absolutely breath-stealing tribute to the choreographer’s Irish heritage. The piece, which premiered in 1996, starts energetically, with the dancers soon adopting that familiar posture – upper body stiff and still, arms at their sides – coupled with blisteringly quick feet. You’ll be forgiven if Riverdance springs to mind (apparently, and coincidentally, Ireland has a moment in the mid-’90s), though York does include music from Riverdance composer Bill Whelan alongside selections from The Chieftains, Celtic Thunder, and more.
Ireland echoes beautifully throughout Celts, and through well placed tonal shifts, emphasized by James F. Ingalls’ lighting designs. Though overwhelmingly celebratory, York finds poignancy in an atmospheric pas de deux danced affectingly by Chase O’Connell and Beckanne Sisk (to an equally haunting piece by Mason Daring) and a sense of hard-won victory in a primal, ritualistic section led by Walsh to William J. Ruyle’s unforgiving drums. But the crowd favorite, deservedly so, is Rench Soriano. Dancing the role long dubbed the “green boy,” Soriano embodies the spirit of Ireland, delighting the audience by leaping and whirling around the stage, whipping around in more than a dozen fouettés, and repeatedly showing off a playful agility.
Celts is pure fun, and with Maninyas, it makes In the Night a mixed rep program not to be missed.
Performances will continue at 7:30 p.m. on March 1, 7, and 8, as well as 2 p.m. on March 2 and 9 through March 9 at Wortham Theater Center, 501 Texas. For more information, call 713-227-2787 or visit houstonballet.org. $25-$159.
