April 22-28, 2004

dance

Pennsylvania Ballet

by Janet Anderson

"Rhythm & Blues" was the name, but what was onstage was a mature, confident Pennsylvania Ballet dancing three high-spirited short works exploding classical ballet’s perimeters, even its dancer-ranking system. After all, the choreographic highlight of the evening, "The Crossed Line," was created by corps member Matt Neenan, who also turned up dancing terrifically in Peter Martins’ wickedly fast "Fearful Symmetries." So being a choreographer hasn’t kept Neenan from doing great in his corps job, nor anyone else for that matter. Talent knows no rank at PAB right now.

For "The Crossed Line," Neenan uses Chopin's crisp cadences to shape complex and musically responsive vignettes for a choice selection of his dancer colleagues. Neenan is chock full of ideas, comfortably melding a dance vocabulary that plays with ballet's body line, much like Balanchine, by breaking it with an upturned foot or knocked knees. He also likes the body-thumping endemic to the moderns right now, where the dancer references his body by banging on his own chest or arm. And Neenan throws in wiggy things: Tara Keating walking around sucking her thumb or Heidi Cruz shushing Meredith Rainey with a finger to her lips. He took Martha Chamberlain, whose talents often hide under costume ballets, and set her loose. A scrim covered the back of the stage and dancers stood behind it like shadows later appearing up front. Chamberlain went one better: She lifted the scrim up and scampered out to demonstrate she was a postmodern ballerina of the first rank. Chamberlain also designed the easy-to-move-in costumes, which looked like nifty bathing suits in subtle dark hues.

"Symmetries," gaspingly paced to John Adams' pounding score, actually opened the evening. An excellent cast hurled themselves through Martins' tortuous leaps and body juxtaposition. Riolama Lorenzo brings presence to everything she does, and danced beautifully with Meredith Rainey. Corps member Meredith Reffner was poised and ready for the limelight. Philip Colucci not only pulled off the bravura stuff, he was a fine partner (which is an entirely different talent) for Martha Chamberlain, who was having a great night.

Trey McIntyre's "Blue Until June" closed things out, a bluesy number designed to show off the dancers as one wonderful Etta James song after another rolls out. And show off they did, all eight of them. The "Blues" cast was a true ensemble of matched high talent, and as they stood lined up taking their well-deserved applause, they looked like the best advertisement in the world for the Pennsylvania Ballet.

Rhythm & Blues

Pennsylvania Ballet

April 14

Merriam Theater