be MOVED is a mixed-rep ballet. Mixed-rep ballets are several unrelated short ballets with intermissions, similar to a collection of short stories.
1st Ballet: ECLIPTIC – A World Premiere
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ECLIPTIC As one of the most sought-after female choreographers of this century, Annabelle Lopez Ochoa is an award-winning Colombian-Belgian artist that has been enlisted to create new works by dance companies around the globe. Her first full length ballet, A Streetcar Named Desire, received many awards and accolades when it was created in 2012 for the Scottish Ballet. Her views on women in choreography are rooted in the belief that young females ought to be given a chance to have their voices heard by being challenged to do so, to problem solve and think creatively as part of their dance education. Taking inspiration from a series of paintings by New York artist, Kathleen Werner, Ochoa created this world premiere (2019) for BalletMet to fulfill harmony on stage with symmetry and geometric design. This dance for five men and four women to blended music by composers Ludovico Einaudi and Lisa Gerrard, abounds with classical steps interspersed with articulated arms and organic movements to give viewers a pleasing balance of motion on stage. Creatively using gold hoops as another dancer, a female dancer is seen developing her leg through the center of the circle only moments before bravely diving into it, caught by two males who seemingly transport her through time and space. This piece is as hypnotic as the works by which it was inspired, as reflected in original costume designs by Susan Roemer.
2nd Ballet: Red Angels
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RED ANGELS The dance scene in New York City in the 1990’s was one of experimentation, with new works being commissioned by newcomer choreographers that bridged the gap between classical ballet and modern dance. One such choreographer was Ulysses Dove, an Alvin Ailey dancer who was initially encouraged to choreograph by Ailey and whose works are defined as charged with intense, powerful energy and athleticism. Red Angels was a piece choreographed in 1994 with music by Richard Einhorn, accompanied by the electric violinist, Mary Rowell, for the New York City Ballet’s Diamond Project for emerging choreographers (1992- 2006). Red Angels is a study in contrasts, where even the name of the piece and the title of the music, “Maxwell’s Demon”, reveals Dove’s inner conflict between lightness and darkness, good and evil. The high energy from Rowell’s electric violin spurs the four red-clad dancers into explosive forward moving leaps before ceasing movement; stillness on the stage. Parallel leg movements become at-once turned out; asymmetric movement suddenly transform into the classical line of ballet. In the second female solo, she dances a series of leaps in a circle of light, almost as if trying to escape a demon. Einhorn’s frenzy of percussive rhythm is paired equally with Dove’s idiosyncratic movements giving way for the dancers to be angelic demons.
3rd Ballet: CACTI
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CACTI Witty, facetious, and nonsensical at times, Swedish choreographer Alexander Ekman’s Cacti (2010), brings to light a choreographer’s reaction to having received a negative review from a critic. With its rhythmic, tribal beats mixed with classical music from the likes of Schubert, Hayden, and Beethoven, this dance is relentlessly driven by a string quartet. Sixteen dancers in flesh-toned costumes, a metaphor for the exposed feeling a choreographer experiences when being reviewed publicly for the works he creates; the cacti a palpable reminder of the prickly feelings a critic may have about a piece—or the post-review feelings an artist may feel. Cleverly using movement, lighting effects, and the dancers as instruments themselves, Ekman employs his ensemble in a series of kinetic canons. In the more narrative second half of Cacti, the audience is made privy to the inner thoughts a critic could be having. Intentionally poking fun at the agenda critics have, and the result of having influenced readers as to what to believe a work is about. Ekman uses humor to give his audience plenty to consider while attending a performance…and reading reviews.
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