Atlanta Ballet, May 6, 2006, Ferst Center for the Arts

It's a little strange that a ballet company would feel the need to present new works at the end of the season in a small auditorium on a college campus, but that's apparently the way Atlanta Ballet chooses to do it. The show consisted of three works, two of which were world premieres, the other being a company premiere. I saw Atlanta Ballet perform the first time I was in Atlanta way back in 1999 when Mr. Silvershoes and I lived way out in the boonies in central New York, and ANY ballet was hard to come by. I recall at the time thinking that they were good - not great, but definitely a serious ballet company. Having spent the last 5 years watching the Houston Ballet, I'm coming at it from a different perspective.

The show opened with a piece set to various works of Rossini, aptly titled Inouï Rossini. (Did I mention that all the music was recorded?) Inouï is French for "extraordinary," which might be slightly too grand a title for this work. It was a piece for a lead couple, two female demi-soloists, and four supporting couples. This was ballet at its most classical; the women were in white tutus trimmed with gold, and the men were in matching jackets and their best white tights. The choreography was pleasant but sometimes not quite attuned to the tempo of the music. Very slow sissonnes look academic, not stately. What was most remarkable about this piece was that it was choreographed by the 73-year-old Violette Verdy, who took a bow with the company. She was a principal dancer with New York City Ballet for 20 years and seems to have retained quite a bit of spunk.

Since this was a college auditorium, I got to sit much closer to the stage than I do in the Brown Theater. At that short distance, it was all too easy to see the technical shortcomings in the dancing. Much of the partnering work was shaky. The male lead, Christian Clark, is a nice dancer, but had to put his hand on the floor to keep from falling over at the end of his solo. The women's pointe shoes were unforgivably squeaky, which was a surprise, because I've always been told that you shouldn't use rosin on a marley floor. Better to squeak than to fall down, though.

The second piece on the program showed up the company's strengths. While they lack depth in technicality, they have plenty in interpreting a more modern style. Lauri Stalling's Shoo Pah Minor, for fourteen dancers and set to music by Vivaldi, reminded me of works of Jiri Kylian and the style of the person who choreographed the first work in DWDT's Contemporary Baroque, who is, it turns out, Lauri Stallings. (I knew that name sounded familiar!) The similitude to Kylian is not terribly surprising, as Ms. Stallings has performed his choreography in the past. I greatly admire his work (seen when ABT came to town) and would probably also pick up some elements of his style if I had the opportunity to study it. Shoo Pah Minor had the same quirky intensity as Kylian's Petite Mort. The costumes were made of kelly green spandex, with the women sporting tutus created by a hoop in the hem of their short dresses.

The final work on the program was Lila York's Celts. I saw Houston Ballet perform this piece in their "Gee, we managed to find three female choreographers and put them on the same program" production from the fall of 2004. (Atlanta Ballet managed to do the same without making a big deal about it. I'm ambivalent about whether or not it should be pointed out.) I remember Mireille Hassenboehler as the woman in brown and Sara Webb as the woman in red, and that's a hard memory to top. With Kristine Necessary and Christine Winkler in those two roles, respectively, Atlanta Ballet did a creditable job, but the only standout performer was John Welker (man in red).

My dad loved the chromaticity of Violette Verdy's name, which translates to "violet green."