Russian dance in the shadow of Balanchine
This year, ballet companies across the US and Europe are celebrating the centennial of choreographer George Balanchine, the father of neoclassical ballet. But the New York City Ballet (NYCB), Balanchine's former home, is not only presenting his works but featuring a world première about him, both to honor his vision and nudge the art form into the 21st century.
At least, that's the intent of Russian ballet master Boris Eifman, who choreographed a ballet about Balanchine's life that emphasizes a strong narrative. That's in direct contrast to Balanchine's abstract ballets, which tended to be about dance for its own sake rather than a story.
Eifman's "Musagète" takes a biographical spin through Balanchine's Russian heritage and journey to the United States - not to mention the ballerinas he encountered on the way - but also suggests the ongoing connections between ballet then and now.
"I will show that Balanchine is not a museum but choreography which can go forward," Eifman said after the recent première of his ballet, which the troupe will take on tour over the next few months.
Balanchine was among the Russian dance émigrés who came to the United States, arriving in 1933, after Anna Pavlova's troupe and the Diaghilev Ballets Russes, and before Rudolph Nureyev, Mikhail Baryshnikov, and others who came after midcentury. Balanchine, who cofounded the School of American Ballet and the NYCB, where he worked until his passing in 1983, was arguably the major influence. But together, he and his compatriots transformed ballet from a plaything of the czars and a pet project of the Soviets into a robust American art form. In doing so, Balanchine not only developed the Russian style but also built a bridge between the 19th and 20th centuries.
"Musagète" was commissioned because Peter Martins, the NYCB's artistic director, had seen Eifman's company when it performed in New York, liked what he saw, and invited him to create a new work for "Balanchine 100," the NYCB centennial celebration of Balanchine's birth.
"Of course, it's a big honor for me to do a work for the company of Balanchine," says Eifman. "This company and my company are very different but many things are very close. Balanchine is from St. Petersburg; I am from St. Petersburg. He graduated from the Conservatory; I graduated from the Conservatory. But it's the music. Music was most important for Balanchine and it's most important for me. Music gives me my idea for choreography," he says.
Eifman wasn't an obvious candidate to choreograph for NYCB. The company is known for Balanchine's signature works, which reveal the crystalline beauty of ballet movement allied with music rather than the expressive qualities of the steps and gestures.
By contrast, Eifman's ballets are based on literature and history and present the agony of the human condition and its effect on the individual. His style includes a mélange of techniques that owe as much to gymnastics and the circus as to the ballet studio.
"I hope I bring more energy, new emotion, and new ideas," says the choreographer. "I bring some blood to this kind of performance. I give something new, a little bit [of] strong emotion," he says.
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