Symphony in C: The Australian Ballet

Sydney Opera House, April 29. Symphony in C is one of George Balanchine’s grandest and most cherished pronouncements on the classical tradition. It features a strict hierarchy that cascades down from principals and soloists to an all-female corps and ends in exhilarating fashion with more than 40 dancers onstage – a number at the lower…

A new generation rises to the challenge

Sydney Opera House, April 29. THE Australian Ballet’s first staging of Frederick Ashton’s Symphonic Variations alongside revivals of his coolly mysterious Monotones II and lucid, delightful one-act version of A Midsummer Night’s Dream is well overdue. Ashton’s choreography hasn’t surfaced at the AB since 2004 (the last time La Fille mal gardée was presented) and…

Bodytorque.Technique

The Australian Ballet, Sydney Theatre, October 31. THIS year they called the annual choreographic workshop Bodytorque.Technique. It would have been rather closer to the mark to call it Bodytorque.Influences. Five of the six new works paid such homage to established choreographers you’d think royalties would be in order. But for all the sense there wasn’t…