Prelude To Spring

I went to see a trio of modern dances put on by the National Ballet: 24 Preludes by Chopin, A Suite of Dances, and Kudelka's Four Seasons.

24 Preludes by Chopin is choreographed by Marie Chouinard to Chopin's 24 preludes. However, they are not played in order and some are omitted as some of the movements are done in silence. It is definitely the most modern of the pieces and didn't seem to go over as well with the silver-haired set. There were odd, jerky dance movements, even some slapstick at times. My favourite piece involved a female dancer who tries to tell us something, but she can only speak in "do re mi"s. A troop of dancers would march by and she would fall in line with them, only to rush back to speak even more frantically. A comment on society's push for conformity? Behind her, a male dancer (her inner voice? artistic vision?) spins, twirls, and leaps with ever more speed as the female dancer returns again and again.

A Suite of Dances was originally a Baryshnikov piece choreographed by Jerome Robbins. The main conceit is that a female cellist is playing Bach's six unaccompanied cello suites. The male dancer, inspired by the playing, practices his dance steps and tries out choreography. In other words, it aims to show what's going on "behind-the-scenes" in the creative process. Of course, it is not improvisational at least on stage. It was a playful piece. I would like to see it where the dance is truly improvised.

James Kudelka's The Four Seasons uses Vivaldi's music to illustrate the progression of a man from youth to old age and death. In each season, he meets people who dance out some activity or behaviour reminiscent of that period. He also meets a woman for each season: exuberant spring, sensual summer, mature autumn and maternal winter. He also changes himself and finally succumbs to death. What was most interesting for me, compared to other modern dance pieces I've seen elsewhere, is that this ballet is thoroughly modern but uses the dance vocabulary of classical ballet.

Not being an attentive listener of classical music, the evening also gave me exposure to a lot of good music that I'll have to track down. The cello suites were great, some of the preludes really connected with me, and although bits of Vivaldi's The Four Seasons are ubiquitous (e.g., the opening few bars to Spring), I've never heard the entire piece.