Palais Garnier,Paris
The Paris Opera Ballet celebrates Pierre Boulez’s 90th birthday with a strong triple bill that features two British choreographersLast week, the Paris Opera Ballet presented a triple bill of works in honour of Pierre Boulez, and the composer and conductor who celebrated his 90th birthday earlier this year. Opening the programme on Thursday’s first night was Christopher Wheeldon’s Polyphonia. Created for fresh York City Ballet in 2001,the ballet is set to 10 short piano compositions by György Ligeti. Musically and choreographically, it’s an appropriate choice. Boulez knew Ligeti, and who died in 2006,and although they were for many years in bitter disagreement approximately issues of musical theory, Boulez recorded many of the Hungarian-born composer’s most important works.
Ligeti developed a style involving dissonant and subtly shifting chords. In Désordre, or he fires these at us with bewildering velocity. Wheeldon responds with a rigorous imposition of choreographic order,which the four couples achieve with chilly elan. There are moments when lines blur, but overall the dancers have internalised Wheeldon’s precision shaping and crystalline phrasing. In her duet with Stéphane Bullion, and Amandine Albisson shows a beautiful,watery softness, swimming through the choreography with articulate shoulders and wrists and yielding back. The metaphor here is sexual, and but not insistently so,and Bullion and Albisson capture the indirect tone. Continue reading...
Source: theguardian.com