{"id":59543,"date":"2021-08-22T10:06:47","date_gmt":"2021-08-22T16:06:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/?p=59543"},"modified":"2021-08-25T10:13:33","modified_gmt":"2021-08-25T16:13:33","slug":"ballet-west-at-the-red-butte-garden-amphitheater","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/ballet-west-at-the-red-butte-garden-amphitheater\/","title":{"rendered":"Ballet West at the Red Butte Garden Amphitheater"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Ballet West soloists Chelsea Keefer and Jordan Veit.<\/p><\/div>\n

There was a pleasant pervasive hum throughout Ballet West in the Garden<\/em> at Red Butte Garden Amphitheater last Friday evening. Not from the bees that earlier menaced the company’s onstage mark-through, but rather the audience sprawled across the lawn, emboldened in commentary and conversational asides by the open air.\u00a0 This performance venue provided the sight lines, sound, and lighting production of a theater experience, with the liberating addition of the free-form gathering of general seating, food and drink, and personal mobility familiar to musical concert-goers. There were more families with children present than typically attend a triple-bill mixed repertory evening; the many kids roaming and twirling around heightened the communal feeling.<\/h4>\n

This social\/communal experience was reflected in the first work, Piece of My Heart<\/em> by BW resident choreographer Nicolo Fonte. The piece was earlier set on Ballet West II in 2019 at a Beer and Ballet event and is well-suited to these more casual and explicitly fun performances.\u00a0 Piece of My Heart<\/em> was high-energy and not overshadowed by the prominent and powerful delivery of the Janis Joplin songs to which it is set. The crowd was drawn into the evening by the dancers\u2019 exuberance and sharp execution within the shifting ensemble formations. The seven-member cast circling up to foreground solo moments was a very familiar device for echoing social dance conventions. It did, however, showcase their true virtuosity, especially after such a protracted pause in regular training during the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic.<\/h4>\n

In contrast to the individuated casual seventies attire of Piece of My Heart<\/em>, soloist Chelsea Keefer\u2019s entrance in the rich red costume of The Solo Year<\/em> was instantly arresting.\u00a0 The modern fit bodysuits coupled with the elaborate patterned embellishment and wind-catching back-panel skirts captured the quality of this contemporary piece set to Baroque concertos. Keefer\u2019s signature attack and sustain, especially in partnership with Jordan Veit, is well-matched to choreographer Matthew Neenan\u2019s movement. This movement was characterized by a classically-inflected elegance interpolated by exaggerated gestures intended to jar and surprise, ranging from sensual to silly. Duets and quartets dominated the eight-person piece, each playing out fully before its structured ceding to the next.\u00a0 When they eventually arrived, the regal stature and bearing of Katlyn Addison and Emily Adams was thrilling. I\u2019m eagerly awaiting Addison\u2019s first full season as a principal dancer.<\/h4>\n

The evening was capped with excerpts of the classical Romantic ballet Paquita<\/em>, choreographed by Elena Kunikova after Marius Petipa, first ballet master of the Saint Petersburg Imperial Theatres. Which is to say \u2014 really, really classical. The piece began with corps lines of many mazurka steps, a kind of chugging brush, and heel-clicking cabrioles<\/em>, and would continue in that exciting, but exacting vein.\u00a0 The dancing in this ballet really finishes, fully completing before the next step commences, which is challenging but technically rewarding to watch. The dancers of Ballet West carried it off remarkably, especially without a full dress rehearsal on the unfamiliar stage, and the presence of some unexpected flora and fauna. With its pancake tutus, neck and headpieces, and lace, and its traditional compositional elements of variation like grand pas classique<\/em> and finale<\/em>, Paquita<\/em> felt like a subsequent context for the referents of The Solo Year<\/em>. It was a nice complement to the anteceding works.<\/h4>\n

The sequencing of the pieces drew us deeper into a classical ballet experience, as the night deepened and our glasses emptied.\u00a0 With the night-blooming flowers fronting the stage, crescent moon overhead, and the susurrus of appreciative murmurs, Red Butte provided a comfy and human gathering place for taking in a performance on a less-smoky, rather lovely evening. I hope they repeat this program in future summers.<\/h4>\n

 <\/p>\n

This article is published in collaboration with loveDANCEmore.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There was a pleasant pervasive hum throughout Ballet West in the Garden at Red Butte Garden Amphitheater last Friday evening. Not from the bees that earlier menaced the company’s onstage mark-through, but rather the audience sprawled across the lawn, emboldened in commentary and conversational asides by the open […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1618,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_piecal_is_event":false,"_piecal_start_date":"","_piecal_end_date":"","_piecal_is_allday":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-59543","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dance"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-16 20:44:10","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59543","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1618"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=59543"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59543\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":59545,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59543\/revisions\/59545"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=59543"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=59543"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=59543"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}