June 2021 has the world, at least the western world, sitting on a cusp as we move from isolation to reopening. Restaurants may be filling up but theatrical houses won’t start seeing people occupying their seats until the Fall. The transition is proving to be both surprisingly quick and agonizingly slow; which means a lot of entertainment still resides chiefly in the digital realm.
With George Balanchine’s Vienna Waltzes, America’s venerable New York City Ballet (NYCB) began airing its last free digital performance Thursday, June 10th. Considered the father of modern ballet, it’s almost impossible to talk about ballet in America without mentioning Balanchine’s name. Russian born in 1904, the year Teddy Roosevelt won his first term as president, Balanchine is said to have come to ballet reluctantly. Eventually, his natural gifts for dance and a highly successful dance career would make him a master of his craft. Incomprehensible perfection has been the hallmark of the Russian ballet tradition and it’s the pursuit of that unwavering ideal that took Balanchine first to London; and then to the US, where he co-founded and became the legendary artistic director of the New York City Ballet.
The waltzes showing this month on the ballet company’s Youtube channel carry Balanchine’s signature approach to choreography. As is his custom, there is no narrative or story being told in the dances. Instead, music drives and inspires how he orchestrates the dancer’s movements. In The Vienna Waltzes, he reaches back to draw on the talents of Johann Strauss, the Waltz King, to create a world so romanticized and ethereal that, in our traumatized present, it could easily be called escapist. In one of the five dances, The Gold and Silver Waltz, Franz Lehar gets credit for composing the score.
Balanchine originally choreographed the waltzes in 1977. The recorded program now online was danced in 2013. Except for the bubbling with humor Explosions, and the more traditional but lighthearted dance for two, Frulingsstimmen (Spring Voices), the prevailing mood of The Vienna Waltzes is one of posh refinement and elegance.
Flawless, the formal waltzes exist on a different plane. Ethereal, removed and idealized, they represent something from another age and exemplify much of what you would expect of ballet at the highest caliber. Ironically what they don’t, or can’t, portray is athletic exuberance; or the kind of movement you unconsciously crave from ballet. Extensions that defy the laws of physics and leaps that rebuke gravity are simply not possible in gowns with trains. Freedom is left only in the upper torso and arms. Through them Balanchine poured in grace and permeated the waltzes with a relentless elegance of flow. By the finale of Der Rosenkavalier, with a mass of dancers in black formal wear and white gowns sweeping across the stage, it looked as if an army of wedding cake figures were swirling in ecstasy before a towering wall of mirrors.
Rooted deeply in its classical European tradition, ballet has long been embroiled in controversy for its reticence in opening its ranks to artists of color. The number of black, brown or Asian dancers in the highest rung companies has never been more than a thin smattering. Some black ballet lovers have stopped attending NYCB and other ballet company performances for this reason. Ballet may never approach the inclusive paradise of Shonda Rhimes Bridgerton, but it could certainly improve on its lackluster record thus far.
Beauty, however, has no limitations on who enjoys it. When approached with this understanding, the waltzes Mr. Balanchine created are a kaleidoscope of visual pleasure; despite their limited ability to deliver a bounty of dance virtuosity.
The Vienna Waltzes
New York City Ballet
Streaming through June 17th
https://www.nycballet.com/discover/ballet-repertory/vienna-waltzes/
