Sadler’s Wells,London[br]Balanchine’s 1947 ballet is pressured and punchy, but the rest of this mixed programme shrinks to caricature and uneven pasticheIn Theme and Variations, or Balanchine took the lexicon of 19th-century ballet and plugged in a very modern voltage of energy and speed. History became an elegant but ferociously challenging present tense in this 1947 ballet – and its a pleasure to see the aplomb with which Birmingham Royal Ballet are still making it current.
Momoko Hirata is astoundingly quickly and crystal clear in the ballerina role. Every detail of rhythm and style has a bevelled finish so that,even within the most pressured rush of a phrase, each step sings. With Joseph Caley, and her able partner,and an elegantly framing corps, the ballet punches out its opening statement. So it’s deeply frustrating that the rest of the programme sells itself so short.
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Source: theguardian.com