Dance Shoe 2010 (2010點子鞋) was one of the strongest yet of Kaohsiung City Ballet’s (高雄城市芭蕾舞團) annual choreographic showcases. Saturday night’s performance at the Experimental Theater showed that both the choreographers and dancers are growing in strength
and confidence.
It was especially interesting to see the new works
by Dance Shoe veterans Wang Kuo-chuen (王國權) and
Tsai Po-cheng (蔡博丞), which opened and closed the
show, respectively.
Wang’s Little Britain (小英帝國), a duet danced by Wang himself and Yeh Li-chuen (葉麗娟), was no romantic pas de deux, but an intense duel by a couple whose passion for each other has burned out and corroded them. Yet they still can’t help but push each other’s buttons.
Tsai’s Lunar Eclipse (月蝕) was all dark elegance and long lines, set to an interesting sound track that mixed the haunting violin of Lebanese Claude Chaloub with the jazzier, percussive rhythms of Canadian electronica musician Aaron Funk, who is better known by his performing moniker, Venetian Snares. The six women were coolly distant in simple black leotards with net mesh shoulders and sleeves, crisscrossing a floor patterned to resemble a moonlit forest. Though the theme was an eclipse, I found the overall lighting was just a shade too dark.
Hsu Cheng-wei (�?Q) is a young choreographer, but his A Little Bit (一點點) was an enjoyable piece, set on three men and two women, all clad in dancer’s black briefs and short black jackets — plus sports bras for the women. It started out simply enough with the three men striding and gliding on white lines, and turned into a interesting combination of duets and pas de trios, with some cartwheel-style turns over a partner’s shoulder or back that looked quite tricky but came off quite easily.
I really liked Yeh Ming-hwa’s (葉名樺) Ponytail (馬尾巴), a very girly ballet for three women, an umbrella, short stepladder and a bucket, set to a beautiful selection of ballet adagios and segments from The Magic Flute, all conducted by Richard Bonynge.
The music was classic ballet and Yeh created an enchanting story that could have come straight from the full-length romantic ballets, mixed with a quirky humor all her own. It’s hard to appear graceful when you’re dancing with a plastic bucket on your head or foot, but Yeh’s dancers carried it off. The deceptive simplicity of the piece showed how much Yeh has grown as a choreographer since last year’s Tightrope Walker (走索人).
Kaohsiung City Ballet fans down south will have a chance to see the show next month, when the company performs in its hometown on March 6 and March 7 and then gives two shows on March 13 in Tainan City.
However, the real highlight of the evening for me was meeting up with Wang Tzer-shing (王澤馨) at the intermission, who said that despite all the frustration caused by staging last year’s International Ballet Gala and her vows never to do it again, she had been convinced to give it another go. She’s been in contact with the National Theater about trying to find a date. Last year’s gala was a delight from start to finish and hearing that there could be a fourth in the series was like getting a Lunar New Year’s gift a week early.
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