CURATED MUSINGS

Image Courtesy of Patrick Fraser

So when Dan and I came up with a first rate strategy of posting on alternate weeks each to ensure a seamless flow of content here, I was left flummoxed. I had not the faintest idea what sort of material I could touch on that was quick enough for the schedule, and that resonated with me enough not to sound contrived.

I am pleased and infinitely relieved to say that, a solution has been found. This past season in the ballet world has seen the retirement of many a great dancer of our time. To celebrate their legacies, I have decided to feature a great dancer in each post, starting from those who have recently hung up their pointes for good, and perhaps branching out to stalwarts of the past, and other notable but less renowned artistes.

In the course of these posts, I will provide insight into their careers, and where possible, indulge you with some of their work that is available on YouTube. To do justice to their contributions to the noble art of ballet and bring more to appreciate their consummate grace is what I hope to achieve, God willing.

Which brings me to another important question: of all the illustrious personalities to have graced the ballet stage, whom should I select to first showcase? Many prolific dancers achieved their status through different means, all of which merit mention and are strong arguments for the respective individual being first. Longevity in the art form is a solid contender, but so is rank. And in an art where the measure of performance is subject to taste and style, it is all the more difficult to ascertain one's virtuosity, and therefore who should take precedence over another. Should it be the ballerina who has originated the most roles, or the danseur who has served in the finest company?

And so I elected to begin with a danseuse whose career, in my opinion, ended prematurely.


Carla Körbes was a principal dancer with Pacific Northwest Ballet (PNB) in Seattle, Washington until her decision to step down and pursue other ambitions. Her final performance in June 2015 was a bittersweet affair. At 33, Körbes' choice to retire is a sorrowful one when considering her age and talent, but understandable in light of her injuries. Having suffered a knee injuring in 'Tide Harmonic', a work of Christopher Wheeldon, she then discovered a torn meniscus and further issues concerning her patella. That was when she made the decision in late 2014 that the season would be her swansong. The affixed video above documents her dancer profile in PNB.

Körbes, a fair-haired and lithe figure who hails from Porto Alegre, Brazil, began her ballet training at the age of five before attending Ballet Vera Bublitz at eleven. It was there that she caught the eye of Peter Boal, then a principal with the New York City Ballet (NYCB), leading to her enrolment at the affiliated School of American Ballet (SAB). After four years, she graduated into the ranks of the company as part of the corps de ballet in 2000, eventually being promoted to soloist in 2005. How far she might have gone in NYCB we will never know, for in that same year, Boal was named director of PNB, and Körbes followed her mentor there, taking on the rank of principal in 2006. 

Here is a short of her pas de deuz with Justin Peck, a NYCB principal and fellow product of SAB.

-Jac

So last night as I lay in my cushy bed, I indulged in my pre-somnolent custom of scrolling through my Youtube subscriptions like a frantic puppy (I spent the last two days in Ipoh, Malaysia with intermittent Internet access). Whilst trawling through 48 hours worth of visual fodder, my sleepy eyes were, by the mercies of divinity, held open long enough to see that the Royal Ballet had uploaded a series of clips. Glory hallelujah.

One in particular caught my eye, largely because the dancer featured was the ever-sublime Edward Watson, whose calf muscles have more life to them then my entire body. Watson was helping RB resident choreographer Wayne MacGregor demonstrate the latter's upcoming work. I've attached the video below and details are in the info bar, go read up if you have to, I'm not your mother.

    

Let me just say that for a person on the verge of stupor, what more with the attention-span of a fruit-fly, I was utterly mesmerised by Watson. He is one of those dancers of such compelling, captivating quality that prying your eyes away from his form feels unvenial. The way he cuts through space is fluid yet incisive, a mathematical equation slicing clinically through a plane, but with the dynamic, genesis-like touch of gracefulness. Each flourish of the hand is nuanced, the expressiveness of every extension is palpable, the delicate transference of weight and pregnant inertias are stunning. Speed is an element, but never is a moment frantic or frenzied.

Even in the absence of accompaniment he is electrifying, which is truly diametrical to the perception that dance is inherently dependent on music. The dance is the music; a sort of synaesthesia if you will, for those that do not naturally discern it as such. When, or if, acoustics are thrown into the mix, the craft becomes even more enriched, and when the dancer is able to commune with the sensibilities with keen discretion, that dance becomes exceptional. I presume that was how the great works of our past became truly great, and that is the beauty of these often misunderstood movements. 

We have to mention, of course, the genius who conceived such work. Credit to MacGregor for his labour and direction. One wonders how much toil must have gone into cultivating his partnership with Watson: the two combined are such a creative force. I imagine that when the creator and the dancer have formed such a cohesive working relationship, it feeds into the performance and tones it.

I particularly enjoyed how this rehearsal provided an insightful glimpse into the artistry of the choreographer and the way he works. One striking feature of his is the abundant vocalising. It seems a peculiar addition to the room - as if ballet itself has not already been dismissed with its eccentricities - save for the fact that MacGregor's alveolar trills and percussive noises are not the mere products of the clichéd choreographer's idiosyncrasies. Words often fall short of explicating the spirit of movement, and ballet jargon, employed mostly to communicate the sequence of steps, rarely has any say on interpretation. As far as I am concerned, given the limited lexical references, MacGregor's phonating is but a physical translation of how he envisions his ballet in the real world. 

When MacGregor does actually speak in the video, and mind you he does quite a bit of it, he brings several concepts to our attention. The philosophy of transition versus space is a pertinent one. From a purely spectatorial point of view it is the essence of dance as a craft, as opposed to haphazard marriages of distorted angles. The 'ending' of one shape morphing into the 'beginning' of another essentially embodies the natal aspect of dance, whether in the creative or the performative process.

I am also intrigued by the notion of perspective posited by MacGregor. He broaches this from a choreographer's lens, but I believe it would be interesting to investigate this from the audience's vantage point. Spatial awareness is rarely afforded to them because of the way stages are designed, and unsurprisingly the art can often fall victim to being of mere static enjoyment for this sedentary assembly. During the practice, the choreographer's mobility within the same plane as the dancer, and at such intimate proximity, subverts the dimensional artifice of the work at its embryonic stage, giving depth to the creation in an organic fashion. If we were to extend this to the actual recital, where the audience placement is markedly different to those of traditional theatres, that same subversion could occur and enrich the ballet-watching experience. One could say that instead of the dancer moving alone, we could potentially make the world move with him/her. 

Without a shadow of a doubt, if such possibilities were explored, the repercussions for the world of ballet would be unprecedented. One hopes that it will snuff out the prevailing sentiment that ballet is an antiquated, or worse dead, art form with nothing new to offer. I don't claim to know everything about ballet, or art, or staging, but seeing this video was a timely invigoration of my faith that this centuries-old dance tradition could definitely deal a new hand in the game. And even if you know nothing about the world of ballet, I pray this delightful clip will suffice as persuasion of the greatness yet to come. 

-Jacalyn

p.s. We will be commencing a series on SYTYCD: The Best Of. With any luck we'll have it up and running soon, but since I'm currently studying for some tests, I hope you'll pardon any tardiness.