ArtsSF

Just when you thought they’d gone out of vogue—swans, mouse-kings, sylphs and all, with pantomime—story ballets are back this month, accounting for half of the six new works to date at the S.F. Ballet. Only now, it’s without all those kookie oldie characters. It’s not the kiddies’ tales of old any more. Sorry, no gnomes, just tomes of modern-ballet story-telling. And now, it’s not enough to dance; the cast must also act. The latest one—–No. five of the rare cornucopia…

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For the ballet’s 90th-season celebration, if you were looking for “A nice new white ballet,” forget it. The San Francisco Ballet came out with guns blazing, firing artistic six-shooters exuberantly in the air, and delving into deep drama where dance troupes often fear to tread. This was the new regime, loaded down with new thought-provoking works under new leadership, breaking with preconceived convention. It presented two story ballets as stormy as our the whirlwind winter  weather among the three world premieres….

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In its 29th season, the 16-member Smuin Contemporary Ballet is joyous, youthful and exuberant, meticulously rehearsed in fast-moving sequences that enkindle audiences again and again. And its post-Covid rebirth is grounds for celebration. For that dance critic who once said, I won’t go any more, they are too commercial, all one can say is phooey. With new personnel, the troupe continues to enkindle the vitality and eclectic dance diversity of founder Michael Smuin, who had already passed on 15 years…

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When a sports team plays with its third string, the results may be miserable. In ballet, not so much. “Swan Lake” is such a long, demanding drama that the Swan Queen and certain others need a couple of nights off, minimum, after performing. So at the third S.F. Ballet performance, such as last Sunday, you might get the No. 3 Swan Queen (newcomer Wona Park), No. 3 hero Siegfried (Wei Wang), and so on. And the evil eagle-like sorcerer Rothbart…

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Diversity of movement comes with modern ballet, far more than in classical counterparts. Such was the lesson from the San Francisco Ballet’s most recent program of moderns, invigorating works peppered with world premieres. It featured as choreographers the veteran Helgi Tomasson and two of the hot younger innovators he had snagged, Dwight Rhoden and the Englishman Christopher Wheeldon—-as different as night and day. Wheeldon stashed all the toe shoes in his jolly-up piece “Finale Finale,” a true joy joy (sic)…

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Going from total sanity to insanity, all in a matter of minutes? The San Francisco Ballet achieved just that in Program 5. Sanity was provided by the reliable Helgi Tomasson, retiring as artistic director after 37 years, in his creative works. Followed by the enigmas and insanities of the painter Magritte from a century ago, transferred to the ballet stage by the zany idea man, choreographer Yuri Possokhov. Which of the two you prefer depends a lot on which side…

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OAKLAND—With more lives than the proverbial cat, the Oakland Ballet sprang back to life once more with a diverting mini-concert in its inaugural Dancing Moons Festival. Its Asian program came out like dim sum, with manifold sweets and suites—piano solos, South Indian dance, a significant revival, a balancing act and—oh yes, ballet too. And the fearless dancers made a go of it despite a small hall that is more auditorium than performance venue. Leaving a lasting impression was the ambitious…

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A veteran ballet dancer in her late 70s still stealing the show as the malevolent Witch casting spells and curses? My apologies to the ever-youthful roster of S.F. Ballet performers, but this “La Sylphide” show and its whole bubbling cauldron of vermin belong to Anita Paciotti, hook, line and sinker. I had first encountered her as the sole leading lady of the newborn Oakland Ballet’s precarious venture “Hansel und Gretel” in 1964, 58 years ago—-then playing Gretel rather than the…

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The new ballet “Blake Works I” appeals most strongly to those in teens and twenties. Its James Blake songs are stripped down and quirky, and the moves are in very modern ballet, with a lot of hip wiggling and squiggling rarely encountered at the San Francisco Ballet. To say nothing of marionette-like parading. But this opus is far more, with the angular, novel and nimble nonstop of hands and arms, as fast as the eye can follow and sometimes knotted…

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