‘Tis the season for MCB’s ‘The Nutcracker’

It wouldn’t be the holiday season without “The Nutcracker.” And Miami City Ballet didn’t disappoint, presenting the George Balanchine version at the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts of Miami-Dade County on Dec. 13-15. Attendance was strong at the Friday opener and packed at the Sunday matinee – and both castings turned in strong performances.

Some North American ballet companies make news with intentions to remake “Nutcracker” productions to reflect their cities’ racial and ethnic mix. MCB has already accomplished a great deal here.

In 2017, celebrated women’s bespoke designer Isabel Toledo and her husband, artist and illustrator Ruben Toledo, revamped the costumes and design elements of the MCB production. Toledo died in August, leaving behind a production that bubbles with embossed fabrics, surprising cuts of coat and dress, and happy juxtapositions of texture.

The costuming identifies Miami as a family of hues. For example, 7-year-old Dev Jones performed a Fritz most parents would fret over. Despite the crowd of Act I students, the purple jacket flaps of his periwinkle suit identified him instantly with the eggplant coat of on-stage father, Rainer Krenstetter (as Dr. Stahlbaum).

For both performances, Mia Zaffaroni charmed as Marie. The hints of gold in her wooly white dress anchored her visually to the gown of on-stage mom, Tricia Albertson (as Mrs. Stahlbaum).

So how were the performances of opening weekend?

The Opus I orchestra under MCB Principal Conductor and Music Director Gary Sheldon made the weekend memorable for music. Especially noteworthy were violinist Mei Mei Luo’s Act I solo and  pianist Francisco Rennó’s celesta in Act II.

Dominick Scherer as the Little Prince mimed a terrific Act II battle scene ending with a closing lunge any fencer would envy.

The dance of the Snowflakes began with shades of difference in spacing, alignment and timing in the groups of four. However, the final presto presented an impressive phalanx of 16 tightly coordinated dancers who sprang in pas de chat, drove forward in emboité, or bourréed into the closing triangle as one.

Miami City Ballet’s “The Nutcracker” continues with performances at the Arsht Center through Dec. 22 and at the Kravis Center on Dec. 27-29. (Photo courtesy of Alexander Iziliaev)

Key to Act II is the Sugar Plum Fairy. Play it too detached and distant, and the point of the Act – her presentation of the dance form’s youngest dancers – vanishes. Mixing older sister sensitivity with watchful teacher mien, Jennifer Lauren fully connected with the role’s double demand for accessible aristocrat and heart-stopping dancer. She worked wonders with the celesta’s uniform staccato, varying the accent of the phrase with the sweep of her arm or the turn of her head and with consistently gorgeous suppleness in the upper body.

On Friday and Sunday, demi-soloists Nicole Stalker and Chase Swatosh set the bar high in the dance of Hot Chocolate. The trumpet line flashed by in eighths and sixteenths, while the bass and cellos moderated beneath. The two dancers gave both registers their due, Swatosh adding flair to his final double tour with softly bent knees.

On Friday, Shimon Ito packed double tours and a pair of well-defined jeté cloche into 60 seconds before vanishing back into Act II’s most gorgeous prop, a black lacquer box stamped with a ruby face.

As lead Shepherdess, Ellen Grocki was spectacular on Friday, hopping in attitude devant and derrière. Both Friday and Sunday, Kleber Rebello brought impressive energy to the dance of the Candy Canes, but no less impressive were the younger dancers who flanked him: Renata Adarvez, Alina Besteman, Ilona Halloran, Sirja Joeveer, Paulina Luis, Sofia Osorio, Valentina Rodriguez and Daniela Yunis.

For both performances, the Dance of the Flowers completely disarmed. In sequence after sequence, the Flowers showed breathtaking coordination whether circling in bourrée or with a kick, reach and fold to the chimes.

Samantha Hope Galler and Emily Bromberg were terrific lieutenants to Ashley Knox, who on Friday dazzled as a gorgeously musical Dew Drop. On Sunday, 16-year-old Taylor Naturkas – a second-year MCB School student – was a surprising choice for Dew Drop, a role second only in importance to the Sugar Plum Fairy. Though she rushed some transitions, Naturkas shined with the precision she brought to the part and showed eye-popping strength in jetés.

For the dance of the Sugarplum Fairy and her Cavalier, lighting designer James Ingalls drenched the scene in cyan blue before shading it with the tones of a ripening mango.

Costumed in pale mint and white, Lauren and Renan Cerdeiro as her Cavalier brought the ballet to a powerful close. During their pas de deux, Cerdeiro provided terrific support in lifts — whether planting Lauren on his shoulder or pressing her overhead. Lauren made unsupported arabesques look effortless, and the Arsht stage seemed snug for Cerdeiro’s circle of jetés.

Miami City Ballet’s “The Nutcracker” continues with performances at the Arsht Center, 1300 Biscayne Blvd., Miami, through Dec. 22 and at the Kravis Center for the Performing Arts, 701 Okeechobee Blvd., West Palm Beach, on Dec. 27-29. For more information or to buy tickets, visit miamicityballet.org/nutcracker.

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Top photo: Miami City Ballet dancers in George Balanchine’s “The Nutcracker.” (Photo courtesy of Alexander Iziliaev)

Dance NOW! Miami goes to the edge in season opener

Wearing black tops and skirts, four dancers walked the diagonal in the Little Haiti Cultural Complex’s bright studio. Allyn Ginns Ayers, Benicka Grant, Isabelle Luu Li Haas and Renee Roberts were accompanied by five 12-year-old girls in jeans and brightly colored shirts from Miami’s Conchita Espinosa Academy. The dancers all reached arms up and out as they sashayed from side to side to a recording of the 1941 Ink Spots hit, “I Don’t Want to Set the World on Fire.”

They were rehearsing for “Women II,” part of Dance NOW! Miami’s Program I, which is set for 8:30 p.m. Dec. 21 at the storied Colony Theatre in Miami Beach, suddenly a hub of renewed dance activity. Program I also will feature “Elemental” and “Those Things … ”

Inspired by the #MeToo movement, “Women II” represents the first new work in 25 years by Daniel Lewis, founder and former dean of dance at Miami’s New World School of the Arts. Ayers, one of the dancers who is a five-year veteran of the company, says the recent activism of young people greatly influenced Lewis.

“The youth energy today around the Parkland [school] shooting and #MeToo reminds Danny of the ’60s,” Ayers says.

The dancers have connected to Lewis’ choreography by including movements and gestures they suggested on the basis of personal experiences related to the movement. “Women II” has a rite of passage vibe, with the young girls growing up through the piece, says Haas, a new dancer in the company.

“Those Things … ” is the work of choreographer Angela Gallo, who is dean of the arts at Coker University in South Carolina.  Where “Women II” examines the gender and generational divide, “Those Things … ” challenges the separation of public personas and private realities.

To a sharp techno-pulse, dancers Matthew Huefner, Anthony Velazquez, Joshua Rosado and David Harris practiced pairing off and testing each other through spins and lunges. In one sequence, Rosado and Harris performed a tug of war of bodies, legs raised behind to sharply offset their centers of gravity.

In another sequence, Harris and Velazquez formed a standing lean. Harris hit the floor and flipped, catching a falling Velazquez with a foot to his chest. They disengaged, with Harris suddenly beginning to spasm and shake with a panic attack.  Velazquez shifted from athletic aggressiveness, comforting him in a half-embrace. The gesture was so intimate that it triggered a reflex to look away and give space.

“Originally, I didn’t understand the piece whatsoever,” Velazquez says. “But in my personal life, I work like 50 jobs. One day, I was in the car when the pressure of it all caught up with me. I pulled over to the side of the road. I was just breathing so hard, and then I thought, ‘Oh, that’s what this piece is about.’”

The company’s “Women II” features, from left, Benicka Grant, Renee Roberts, Isabelle Haas and Allyn Ginns Ayers. (Photo courtesy of Simon Soong)

Audience favorite “Insomnia,” by DNM co-artistic director Hannah Baumgarten, has been revived for Program I as a nod to the company’s 20th anniversary. It opens with dancer Julia Faris (new to the company) clutching an ottoman-sized pillow and thrashing through sequences that anyone who has been bright-eyed at 2 a.m. recognizes too well. The percussion line strengthens and Faris throws herself through turns and sharp pivots, arms swinging at the limit before suddenly coming to sit, chin on palm.

Treading the line between reality and delirium, the Pillow Solo originated in the sleeplessness the choreographer experienced from a hip injury.

“Though it was a painful period, it was also out of body. I would get close to falling asleep only to be shocked awake by the injury,” Baumgarten said.

“Elemental,” a new work by choreographer and DNM co-artistic director Diego Salterini, forms the second half of the December program. Originally the work was inspired by the pressing themes of environmental crisis and resource depletion.

“For the first movement, ‘Gaea,’ I had in mind a battle between human beings, represented by the three men and Earth in the figure of Julia [Faris].”

But Salterini’s passion for Eastern philosophy edged the work from a political plane to one of spiritual struggle, forefronting the energy of volcanic primal forces.

For example, “Gaea” opens with Faris, Huefner, Velazquez and Harris forming a braid of limbs. They stretch away and the men sweep Faris repeatedly overhead. In the sequences that follow, she remains their focal point. At one point, she hits an arabesque and Velazquez catches her head between his hands. Their eyes lock.

Salterini’s four-part work treats the classical division of the elements expansively.  For the final movement — “Heavenly Creatures”– Salterini locates the element of air on a purely spiritual register.

As the choreographer explained: “In it, we shed everything that is physical and we live in pure joy.  After all, once you get to be a spirit, you have to have fun.”

What: Dance NOW! Miami’s Program I, featuring the world premiere of “Elemental” and the company premieres of “Women II” and “Those Things … ”

When: 8:30 p.m. Dec. 21

Where: Colony Theatre, 1040 Lincoln Road, Miami Beach

Tickets: $35 general admission; $15 for students and age 65 and older with ID (at the box office in-person only); regular-price tickets may be purchased in advance online at colonymb.org/dance-now-miami, by phone at 800-211-1414, or at the Colony box office. 

More information: 305-975-8489; dancenowmiami.org

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Top photo: From left, Anthony Velazquez, Matthew Huefner and David Harris in the “Earth” section of “Elemental.” (Photo courtesy of Simon Soong)

Thomas Armour Youth Ballet, New World School of Arts astonish with ‘Nutcracker’  

Thomas Armour Youth Ballet’s 43rd production of the holiday classic “The Nutcracker,” presented Dec. 4-7 with the New World School of the Arts, dazzled with high production values and student dancers whose command of the movements often approached the professional.

During the shows, at the Miami-Dade County Auditorium, terrific costumes were the rule, and lighting designer Joshua Gumbinner transformed the usually drab Biedermeier interiors of the Stahlbaum (in the TAYB production “Silberhaus”) family’s salon with a South Florida tropical palette that energized sets with peacock blue and papaya hues.

The skill of the dancers consistently surprised. During the Dec. 7 show, Michael Cadena and Kasey Thomas were extraordinary as Harlequin Dolls, as they conjured the illusion of robot love with a mechanized game of hide-and-seeky

In the role of Clara, Olivia Yaya on Dec. 6 and Nami Chung-Vastine on Dec. 7 were charmingly absorbed by their Nutcracker doll, opposite Leonardo Alvarez in the role of Herr Drosselmeyer, who captured the ambiguity of the Hoffmann character flashing from vaguely vampiric to favorite uncle.

Nami Chung-Vastine as Clara in the Thomas Armour Youth Ballet and New World of the Arts’ production of “The Nutcracker.” (Photo courtesy of Addyson Fonte)

The production also was well-organized. In one version of the battle between the Nutcracker Prince (ably acted by Cadena) and the King Rat (in an especially acrobatic version by Alexander Sokolov), both the militia and mouse hordes each faced off 20 students strong. Young voices could be heard in both performances expressing disbelief at the Mouse King’s return of his disarmed enemy’s sword.

The pas de deux of the Snow Queen and her Cavalier, performed by Allyssa Nelson and Joao Silva, was spectacular. Nelson appeared feather-light, whether scooped overhead by Silva or folded onto his shoulder. Also impressive was Nelson’s lovely sequence of pirouettes and Silva’s jeté cloche.

As the Spirit of Christmas, Autumn Rodrigue shone during the “Dance of the Snowflakes,” with a rotated sequence of flawless sissonnes flanked by Snowflakes who presented terrific coordination of the upper body.

The timing of Spanish Chocolates Maggie Mesa, Nichole Perez, Itxaso Sanchez, and Larissa Souki was precise and consistent. During the Dance of Arabian Coffee on Dec. 7, Anya Susan Collins carefully sculpted the music’s adagio tempo through the sinuous play of her arms and upper body.

Marzipan Shepherdesses Amanda Bacallao, Ainsley Grippando, Isabella Lucas, and Allyssa Nelson — wonderfully costumed in white with accents of green and pink — shone with eye-popping group precision, whether springing to arabesque or in the attack and landing of pirouettes.

Thomas Armour Youth Ballet’s Dance of Tea was notable for its 12-foot dragon, held overhead by dancers in stunning burnt orange tunics, accompanied by demi-soloists Grippando with Thomas on Dec. 6 and with Camila Hernandez on Dec. 7, draped from neck to ankle in turquoise and gold.

The roles of Snow Queen and Cavalier were performed by Allyssa Nelson and Joao Silva. (Photo courtesy of Addyson Fonte)

Sporting scarlet Cossack shirts, Michael Lerma, John Mobley, Joshua Moore, Jeremiah Paul and Alexander Sokolov set the crowd marking time as they leap-frogged one another from a push-up, or crouched and helicoptered their legs underneath.

Mother Ginger, sweetly mimed by Kristie LaPlante, flooded the stage with clowns whose infectious cartwheels, flips and pirouettes à la seconde set the auditorium thundering.

With two different versions of Dew Drop, both Bacallao and Destinee Jimenez turned in nicely controlled Italian fouettés and piqué turns that faithfully paced out the 3/4 time.

Former Thomas Armour  student Caroline Betancourt — now with the Royal Danish Ballet — danced the role of the Sugar Plum Fairy, opposite Evgeni Dokoukine as her Cavalier. Betancourt showed a terrific sense of musicality, skipping forward in arabesque or catching the accents in the celeste with a flick of the foot in her piqué turns, while Dokoukine channeled power in his double tours and jetés.

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Top photo: Dew Drop Amanda Bacallao and Flowers perform in Thomas Armour Youth Ballet’s 43rd production of “The Nutcracker,” presented Dec. 4-7 with the New World School of the Arts. (Photo courtesy of Addyson Fonte)

Peter London’s company to bring gift of dance to the community

The room buzzed with activity as members of the Peter London Global Dance Company spent time preparing for “Crossing,” which will be performed Dec. 27-29 at the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts of Miami-Dade County.

Founder and Artistic Director Peter London uses local dancers combined with dancers originally from Miami who are now working professionally in places such as New York City. The returning dancers choreograph as well as participate in the performances. Rehearsals  in Miami are especially valuable. The logistics of organizing rehearsals with dancers in a variety of other cities can be difficult. Much of the prep work is done with video, with steps being learned, choreography created and shared and then watched.

“Many of the artists are dancing with other companies,” London said. “They’re able to come home and share their talents with their families and their teachers. The community gets to see them … It’s like a gift to the community.”

During rehearsals recently, in the studio at the African Heritage Cultural Arts Center in Miami, four small groups – 13 dancers in all – got to work. One group was made up of women, another of men, and two were mixed groups. There also were young boys from the Art Center participating, just as absorbed in the rehearsal process as the adults were. As they watched the older dancers with intense fascination, it was clear to see the youngsters are serious about dance and want to do it well.

London moved from group to group, giving notes, counting phrases and, occasionally, demonstrating the energy and range that he wants to pull from the dancers. His movement was massive, and he easily enveloped the space as he moved. It was a focused, working room.

“It’s Miami, there’s lots of big water,” London said, prompting the dancers with a laugh. “Get your back into it. It must mean something.”

The group of men wore colorful African harem pants that billowed as they rehearsed “Black Men Stories,” one of London’s world premieres. The piece honors the vision of men who have tried to move this country forward, including Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X and Abraham Lincoln. All of the male dancers will be in the work, including the young men.

Going through a sequence, London broke down each move and had the dancers repeat the steps over and over, searching for a larger body movement range while maintaining formations. The steps got increasingly better.

“Here, we’re giving thanks to our ancestors,” London said, as the dancers kneeled and shook their shoulders.  “It’s the use of energy and dynamics.”

“Wings,” choreographed by London and company, will showcase the women. It features medieval music composed in the 12th century by Hildegard von Bingen, who eventually became known as Saint Hildegard.

“Since we’re celebrating women – the writers and composers – I started a women’s voices series, and this is one of the installments,” London said. “Von Bingen was a consultant to kings and popes. I think she was put in a convent at the early age of 14, and she became this phenomenally inspired composer. She used to hear the voices of God and would transcribe that to music.”

There also will be two other world premieres: “Heart Rivers,” choreographed by London, and “Days Together,” choreographed by Ballet BC dancer Justin Rapaport.

The final tribute, performed by the full company, will be London’s high-energy piece, “Yoruba Yard,” a fusion of West African, Afro Jazz, Afro Caribbean and Contemporary dance.

“[In Trinidad], I grew up with all the deities. There was a type of celebration pulling different energies from the universe to assist people with their daily life, paying respect and celebrating their ancestors,” London said. “I can remember when one woman in her 70s or 80s became possessed and got up to dance. They put a huge ram on her back and she danced with the ram on her back. I couldn’t do that! ‘Yoruba’ is that kind of energy.”

What: Peter London Global Dance Company in “Crossing”

When: 8 p.m. Dec. 27; 2 and 8 p.m. Dec. 28; 4 p.m. Dec. 29

Where: Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts of Miami-Dade County, 1300 Biscayne Blvd., Miami

Cost: $25 for 2 p.m. Dec. 28 show; $40 all other performances

More information: 305-949-6722; arshtcenter.org; plgdc.org

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Top photo: Founder and Artistic Director Peter London uses local dancers combined with dancers originally from Miami who are now working professionally in places such as New York City. Pictured here are dancers performing London’s “Seoul Soul.” (Photo courtesy of Gregory Reed)

After 30 years, Miami City Ballet returns to The Colony

In November 1989, George H.W. Bush was president; joyous crowds straddled the Berlin Wall; stirrup pants were big; and Miami City Ballet performed its last program at Lincoln Road’s iconic art deco landmark, the Colony Theatre on Miami Beach.

On Nov. 23-24, the company returned to the 417-seat hall for an hourlong program of works that included the third movement of Justin Peck’s “Rodeo: Four Dance Episodes,” as well as Christopher Wheeldon’s “This Bitter Earth,” and Twyla Tharp’s “Nine Sinatra Songs.”

With a column of roses and spirals framing the proscenium, the setting was rich in history and spectacularly intimate. But it left one wondering how the fledgling company could have squeezed even 20 dancers onto the theater’s petite stage.

For the Sunday performance, Miami City Ballet solved this problem by presenting a program of mainly pas de deux that was thought-provoking. A program of nine pas de deux performed by couples of the opposite sex on Miami Beach, with its vibrant LGBTQIA community, seemed intended to generate dialogue about the acceptance on the part of contemporary classical dance choreographers of the art form’s traditional representation of romantic love.

First up was the pas de deux from the 2015 “Rodeo: Four Dance Episodes,” set to Aaron Copland’s iconic, “Rodeo.” It featured principals Jennifer Lauren and Renan Cerdeiro against a backdrop suffused with pale rose light.

Jordan-Elizabeth Long and Chase Swatosh in Twyla Tharp’s “Nine Sinatra Songs.” (Photo courtesy of Alexander Iziliaev)

The Colony offered an up-close experience, and for this pas de deux, the proximity made Peck’s choreography shine.

Sequences between Lauren and Cerdeiro were fast-paced and playful. In one, Cerdeiro looped his arms around Lauren’s waist. Lauren ducked beneath only to catch his hand and stretch back into arabesque, springing forward into a waist-high lift, holding her arm behind her head like a ’50s pin-up girl. The furious game of catch-and-release ended when Lauren suddenly flashed her leg into arabesque and then froze, the dancers locking gazes. More than one person in the hall had to feel an involuntary sob at the sweetness of that moment.

Next was “This Bitter Earth,” a pas de deux excerpted from the choreographer’s “Five Movements, Three Repeats,” originally performed by New York City Ballet in 2012 and scored to R&B singer Dinah Washington’s 1960 hit, “This Bitter Earth,” and Max Richter’s 2004 plaintive composition for strings, “On the Nature of Daylight.”

Katia Carranza and Kleber Rebello — two of MCB’s most physically powerful dancers  — smartly maximized the tight space.  And they were powerful here, squaring off in a shallow lunge, elbows clasped, foreheads caressing, or Rebello floating Carranza across the floor in waist-high splits, her feet brushing en pointe.

The program closed with “Nine Sinatra Songs,” gesturing toward the beach’s storied history as a one-time playground for Sinatra and the Rat Pack in the 1950s and ’60s.  The ballet premiered with MCB in 2004 and, with costumes by Oscar de la Renta, “Sinatra Songs” has been a consistent audience favorite ever since. The couples navigated the tight space brilliantly, especially during the two group sequences.

Jennifer Lauren and Renan Cerdeiro in “Rodeo: Four Dance Episodes,” choreographed by Justin Peck. (Photo courtesy of Alexander Iziliaev)

Composed of seven pas de deux and two group dances, “Sinatra Songs” opened with a mirror ball showering light onto Cerdeiro in a tux and Ashley Knox in full-length pale pink gown laying down a soft shoe to Sinatra’s “Softly as I Leave You.”  They slathered the dance with romance, lifts with Knox in splits ended with her swooning from deep backbend to enmeshed embrace.

Julia Cinquemani and Carlos Quenedit were hilarious in “One for My Baby,” as a cautionary tale for the challenges that basic motions and the fact of gravity pose for the very smashed, while Shimon Ito opposite a sweetly earnest Lauren uncomfortably reminded at least one person that night of a former partner’s ultimatum they take dance lessons.

Also lovely were Nicole Stalker and Alexander Peters in “Forget Domani.” Peters snapped out wicked fast pirouettes as Stalker, brimming with energy and terrific timing, diverted attention from the nightmare frilliness of her over-the-top fuchsia dress.

But prize for the simply elegant went to Aaron Hilton and Emily Bromberg. Hilton’s partner-focused precision was clearly spot on for anyone with an eye for ballroom dance, while Bromberg in slate blue dress with sequined flower gathered at the hip was just a knock-out.

The intimacy of the Colony proved a great space for “Sinatra Songs” and, at the close of “My Way,” the audience took to its feet.

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Review: Dimensions Dance had audience on its feet with ‘Ballet Sculpture & Serenity’

Dimensions Dance Theatre of Miami opened its season Nov. 16 with “Ballet Sculpture & Serenity” to a mostly full house at the South Miami-Dade Cultural Arts Center. Two company premieres and a world premiere headlined a program of works focused on the theme of metamorphosis in a company itself transformed by key departures and new additions.

First up was Tara Lee’s “Under the Olive Tree” for only its second full-length performance since the company’s debut in November 2016. The ballet is visually lavish even if its libretto – the Greek gods descend from heaven to experience human passions – was impossible to decipher from the performances.

Still, approached as a purely abstract work, “Olive Tree” works. It opened to Vivaldi’s “Four Seasons” with women in green and black leotards shaping the trunk, branches and leaves of a huge tree, framed by a column of yellow light.

One by one, they sprang apart, leaving Ryan Nicolas (new this year) alone to solo to the violin, spinning in pirouettes that ended in powerful lunges forward or to the side.  Group sequences followed with Trisha Carter, Meisy Laffitte, Yaima Mendez, Miranda Montes de Oca, Selah Oliver and Calista Olson.

In smaller groupings Carter, Mendez and Oliver were electric, but timing was a challenge in the large group sequences.

The strongest performances of “Olive Tree” were its two pas de deux, danced by Nicolas and Chloe Freytag and Natanael Leal and Mayrel Martinez. Nicolas partnered Freytag well, snap re-directions of her turns unfolding into surprising, mind-teasing lifts. Their dance contrasted wonderfully with the playful feints and sinewy game of catch performed between Leal and Martinez.

The audience showed its appreciation for “Olive Tree” with many on their feet.

Next up were the evening’s two strongest pieces: “Shogun”, a company premiere by Brazilian-Japanese choreographer Ivonice Satie, followed by “Apollo & Daphne,” a world premiere by Emmy Award-winning choreographer, Ben Needham-Wood of Smuin Ballet.

“Shogun” showcased two of DDTM’s most accomplished male dancers, Kevin Hernandez and Yanis Eric Pikieris, in full-length, pleated, red hakamas knotted at the waist. Drenched in a Persian blue light, sequences invoked the relation of master and disciple, with Hernandez striking a lunge imitated by Pikieris as both scissored into full splits then popped back to standing.

Dancers Claudia Lezcano and Kevin Hernández perform the “Genus” choreography by Yanis Eric Pikieris (Photo courtesy of Luis Corona)

Other segments externalized the inner conflict of acquiring a spiritual discipline as Pikieris at the center spun furiously, leg swinging off center in contrast to Hernandez, who paced slowly behind him, rooted and meditative.  Throughout the piece, both dancers performed with spectacular precision and energy.

“Apollo & Daphne” featured the genius pairing of Claudia Lezcano with Fabian Morales and happily added onstage pianist Inesa Gegprifti and violinist Anthony Seepersad for a heart-shredding performance of Arvo Pärt.

The piece began with Morales dwarfing the petite Lezcano in an opening that recalled DDTM’s “Space Between Words.” Morales moved magisterially, more like a force of nature than a love-sick god, suspending Lezcano through a succession of lifts or sweeping her off her feet as if scooping up a kitten. Lezcano was lovely throughout and showed terrific theatricality, unable to prevail externally so withdrawing into reverie, whether standing alone or being mastered physically by Morales.

And this is where Needham-Wood’s take on the myth offered something new, presenting a Daphne who had escaped within, where not even a god could reach her. There was so, so much to like in this piece.

The evening closed with the world premiere of Yanis Eric Pikieris’ “Genus.” Loosely organized around an evolutionary vibe, “Genus” opened with two opposing groups of dancers, one in black and the other in nude-colored shorts and tops, the stage lit from both sides with bright cones of light.

Notable here was a pas de deux performed between Morales and Freytag – with Freytag supported at the waist and spun by Morales into a deep penché or floated across the stage in a split lift.  When Mendez (notably gorgeous here) joined them, the two women played for his eye as Freytag impatiently bourréed at his side, while Morales supported Mendez through a head-high kick that plunged into a deep forward bend.

Pikieris’ sequences for the women teased and surprised. Classical pirouettes suddenly snapped into an elastic hip roll, one arm lifted to accent the S-curve of the waist. The men generally supported and shadowed the women, rarely breaking out on their own.

Oliver was breath-taking in her pairings with Stephan Fons. Her attention to the upper body, wrists and fingers made the accents in the violin pop. She showed considerable strength, holding her frame steady but supple through lifts.

The ballet progressed by reconciling contrasts into increasingly complex groupings that toward the end grew repetitious. Still, the ballet closed deliciously, the back wall lit in washes of pomegranate and sapphire blue for a final tribal dance that included the entire cast.

With the drop of the curtain, the audience was back on its feet.

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Top photo: Dimensions Dance featured the genius pairing of Claudia Lezcano and Fabián Morales. (Photo courtesy of Julian Duque Photography)