New York City Ballet’s Very 21st-Century Steps

<First published online in the New York Tines on January 27, 2017>

To make ballet contemporary again, modern music and modern sensibilities are needed. And lo! Thursday night at New York City Ballet brought two world premieres, entirely unalike, each to new music, each distinctly reflecting the world we inhabit today: “The Shimmering Asphalt,” choreographed by Pontus Lidberg to a commissioned score by David Lang, and “The Times Are Racing,” by Justin Peck (the company’s resident choreographer since 2014) to recorded music by Dan Deacon. Warm ovations greeted both.

Deservedly. Both are distinct, skilled, arresting. Yet they’re hard to grasp on a single viewing: more immediately striking as authoritative exercises in style than as absorbing worlds to inhabit. Each is sophisticated; there’s plenty of detail and structural complexity here to reward later visits. But are they as accomplished in substance as they are in manner? It’s good that they remain in repertory into February and then return in May.

Mr. Peck’s “The Times Are Racing” (24 minutes long) — an excitingly “now” piece in the way it catches the mood of 21st-century urban protest and the evening’s biggest hit with the audience — is danced in sneakers; its dancers are otherwise dressed (by Humberto Leon) in a motley assortment of urban wear — shorts, jeans, raincoats, T-shirts — as well as a leotard or two. The dance style, with a strong emphasis on currents of motion through the upper body, informal posture and gesture, as well as sequences of tap, makes this work a young relation to such dances as Jerome Robbins’s “N.Y. Export: Opus Jazz” and a number of early pieces by Twyla Tharp (“Deuce Coupe” and “Ocean’s Motion,” for example).

The music — taped, electronic, hard-hitting, insistently pulsating — is “USA I-IV,” from Mr. Deacon’s album “America.” To my ear, this is tiresome, but so is the Tchaikovsky “Allegro Brillante” used in the 1956 Balanchine ballet of that name; what matters is that Balanchine’s choreography makes his score insidious whereas, on first acquaintance, Mr. Peck’s doesn’t. Mr. Peck’s taste in, and response to, contemporary music seem the weakest aspect of his generally formidable talent.

“The Times” features one lead male-female couple (Amar Ramasar and Tiler Peck); two other lead dancers (Robert Fairchild and Mr. Peck himself); a quartet of one man (Sean Suozzi) with three women (Brittany Pollack, Gretchen Smith, Savannah Lowery); as well as a corps of six woman and six men. There’s no hierarchy. Even corps dancers are given individual moments, and the stars are part of a communal climate. The mood of modern protest is evident in groupings (imagery of human microphones, for example), in percussive attack and in hurtling energy.

Brisk tap duets for Mr. Fairchild and Mr. Peck make a terrific impact. Images of wild, untrammeled force from the corps are memorable. The quartet for Mr. Suozzi and his three companions is slow: a welcome change of tempo as well as a vivid statement of equality. I found, however, the duets for Ms. Peck and Mr. Ramasar bland.

The intensity of every dancer — as always with Mr. Peck’s creations for City Ballet — is a thrill. They certainly believe in “The Times Are Racing.” As yet, I’m not sure I do.

By contrast, Mr. Lidberg’s “The Shimmering Asphalt,” 22 minutes long, is an investigation of contemporary ballet classicism, with pointwork and turned-out body language. Its five-part score music (titled “Shade”) is for violin, cello and piano.

The mood is consistently poetic and atmospheric: a 21st-century nocturne in which tensions change. Mr. Lang’s music is a five-part essay in what can be called classical post-minimalism, beautiful in changing sonorities and suggestions of fragmented melody. Mark Stanley’s lighting sets the dance against a night sky in which stars dimly twinkle; he also lights much of the dance from above, which, despite the suggestion of strong moonlight, distances us from the dancers and makes them hard to identify. Rachel Quarmby-Spadaccini’s costumes are in a selection of blues and grays, with men, bare-chested, in short kilts.

You can feel “Asphalt” making experiments as it proceeds. A quintet for Sara Mearns with four men is succeeded by another for Taylor Stanley with four women: issues about gender are examined throughout, with same-sex and other-sex partnering fluently interleaved. Women sometimes steer or support men. Ballet tradition is another theme: George Balanchine’s “Serenade” is specifically evoked.

There are nine principal roles. Rebecca Krohn, Ms. Peck, Chase Finlay and Russell Janzen also register strongly, while Sterling Hyltin, Lauren Lovette, and Gonzalo Garcia each have opportunities. There are six supporting dancers (three men, three women); and, as with Mr. Peck’s premiere, every soloist is often shown as part of an inclusive ensemble. Another question this ballet asks is “How does a ballerina fit in to the group?” Often, here, she stands apart. I enjoy this choreography moment by moment; yet it’s nebulous, running through the mind like water through the fingers.

Mr. Peck’s “Scherzo Fantastique,” new last July in City Ballet’s season in Saratoga, had its New York City premiere on Sunday, as part of an all-Stravinsky premiere. As before, the bright, Fauve colors of costumes (Reid Bartelme and Harriet Jung) and sets (Jules de Balincourt) burst happily on the eyes. As yet, Mr. Peck’s choreography and its performances haven’t settled on the Koch stage; but this — Mr. Peck’s first creation to Stravinsky — is already buzzy.

@New York Times, 2017