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Watch at CCTV.com Home / News / New Item A backstage look at the Nutcracker December 14, 2014 CCTV.com by CCTV Watch at CCTV.com READ ARTICLE AT SOURCE

Los Angeles Ballet [LAB] Artistic Directors Thordal Christensen and Colleen Neary are thrilled to present New Wave LA which involves four contemporary World Premieres from guest choreographers. Home / News / New Item Four World Premiers in NextWave LA March 8, 2010 LAB Public Relations Guest Choreographers from the Hit Show "So You Think You Can Dance" (Los Angeles, March 8, 2010 ) Los Angeles Ballet [LAB] Artistic Directors Thordal Christensen and Colleen Neary are thrilled to present New Wave LA which involves four contemporary World Premieres from guest choreographers Josie Walsh, and Sonya Tayeh, Mandy Moore and Travis Wall from the hit FOX show “So You Think You Can Dance.” Each choreographer will present an innovative, modern, edgy and world class piece with Los Angeles Ballet dancers. New Wave LA is a ground-breaking program for LAB, commissioning four acclaimed choreographers to create on LAB dancers. This program follows Los Angeles Ballet’s mission of incorporating new creations specifically for LAB dancers throughout its season. The four choreographers Josie Walsh, Sonya Tayeh, Mandy Moore and Travis Wall are all elated to be pre- senting FOUR world premieres in ONE evening which is rarely done in a ballet company. Los Angeles Ballet is also proud to present Transmutation, by LA’s own Josie Walsh, developed from a piece originally commis- sioned by the First Annual LAB Choreographic Workshop. Sonya Tayeh, Mandy Moore and Travis Wall’s World Premiere pieces are still untitled. Josie Walsh is a native of Los Angeles and a former professional dancer with the Joffrey Ballet, Zurich Ballet and Oregon Ballet Theatre. Upon her return to Los Angeles, Walsh integrated her vast background into the commercial world. Walsh founded MYOKYO Renegade Rock Ballets in 2000. She is the director, producer and choreographer for the company, creating an eclectic style of inter-disciplinary cooperation. Sonya Tayeh incorporates her deeply rooted form with the essence of contemporary technique, mixing her own ‘quirky’ style into her choreography. This stylized, free-flowing movement is aggressively formulated through one-on-one physical contact. She is currently a choreographer for “So You Think You Can Dance.” Mandy Moore is an exciting, emerging choreographer and performer whose work has been seen on films and television shows such as “So You Think You Can Dance.” She was one of the choreographers for Celine Dion’s “Taking Chances” World Tour. Travis Wall is a choreographer who choreographed for “So You Think You Can Dance” and was principal dancer for Wade Robson on ABC’s “Dancing with the Stars.” These four outstanding choreographers will exercise their unique style and personality in the World Premieres of New Wave LA. The much-anticipated repertoire will take place at venues across Los Angeles from May 15 to May 30 (please see full performance schedule below). DOWNLOAD PDF

Los Angeles Ballet aimed high with the final program of its inaugural season. In the first of four Southland performances, the company danced three masterworks by George Balanchine at UCLA's Freud Playhouse on Thursday. Home / News / New Item Los Angeles Ballet Braves the Balanchine Test May 26, 2007 Los Angeles Times by Lewis Segal Los Angeles Ballet aimed high with the final program of its inaugural season. In the first of four Southland performances, the company danced three masterworks by George Balanchine at UCLA's Freud Playhouse on Thursday. There's no place to hide in this repertory — you can't charm or fake your way through the steps. And everyone would notice if you tried. Familiar to local ballet audiences, "Apollo," "Serenade" and "Rubies" each requires a different attack — a different mediation between technical and expressive challenges — and many of the dancers on view were new to their roles. Inevitably, the results proved imperfect, but also entertaining, instructive, even redemptive. Certainly Colleen Neary's authoritative staging of "Apollo" made a stronger case for this historic 1928 collaboration between Balanchine and Igor Stravinsky than the wrongheaded, cutesy-poo Joffrey Ballet production recently danced at the Music Center. Oleg Gorboulev hadn't yet pulled together all the facets of the title role on Thursday, but his nobility of bearing and partnering skills sustained him even when interpretive issues became unfocused. Melissa Barak and Erin Rivera-Brennand easily outclassed their Joffrey counterparts as Polyhymnia and Calliope — and, as Terpsichore, Corina Gill scored the first of her two Balanchine/Stravinsky triumphs on Thursday. In staging Balanchine, Neary has to decide which versions of the choreography to adopt, sometimes opting to include passages that Balanchine deleted late in his lifetime (the birth scene in "Apollo," for example), but elsewhere incorporating the revisions he made (as in "Serenade"). Her sense of the dynamic contrasts within a work always yield maximum interest — the playoff between sharp footwork and floating arms in the crucial "Serenade" corps passages being especially artful. This 1935 creation to music by Tchaikovsky also benefited from Lauren Toole's varied, sympathetic portrayal of the central ballerina in distress — yearning for a connection with Gorboulev but preempted by the mysterious Elizabeth Claire Walker. Dancing a buoyant interlude with the technically accomplished guest artist Brooklyn Mack, the fleet, vibrant Kelly Ann Sloan offered further evidence of the company's careful casting and coaching. The playful virtuosity of "Rubies" (more Balanchine/Stravinsky, this time from 1967) found Toole a little too passive as a kind of classical showgirl but Gill positively radiant, untroubled by every hazard in the galvanic pas de deux and solos. Opposite her, Sergey Kheylik again demonstrated his ability to turn choreography into a passionate personal statement, a spontaneous act of affirmation. Sometimes the outcome can look impossibly willful — ragamuffin neoclassicism in this case. But it's never unsure or half-hearted, even when he ends the ballet and the whole evening one count behind everyone else. After the final repeat of this program on June 2, Los Angeles Ballet has scheduled no more performances until "Nutcracker" time nearly half a year from now. Plans for 2008 are pending. This first season has clearly been a learning experience for artistic directors Neary and her husband, Thordal Christensen. The number of performances was cut back from initial announcements, live music abandoned in favor of tape and the use of guest dancers curtailed. But Neary and Christensen delivered consistently fine dancing on every program, with the corps and the principals always matched stylistically (a virtue often missing in long-established, star-laden companies) and the prowess of leads such as Gill, Barak and Gorboulev something to cheer about. They've proved that they can give Los Angeles a classical company worth supporting in its growth from an underfunded 31- dancer ensemble offering sporadic performances to the kind of large-scale, year-round institutions that are the source of local pride in cities such as Houston, Boston, Seattle, Miami and San Francisco. They've done their job and so have the dancers. The rest is up to Los Angeles itself. lewis.segal@latimes.com DOWNLOAD PDF

Like adventurous pioneers, Los Angeles Ballet stepped into uncharted territory Saturday for its season opener, “Modern Moves,” which introduced Aszure Barton’s “Les Chambres des Jacques” and Alejandro Cerrudo’s “Lickety-Split” into the company’s repertory at the Alex Theatre in Glendale. Home / News / New Item Review: LA Ballet season opens with adventurous and flirtatious ‘Modern Moves’ October 7, 2018 LA Times by Christina Compodonico Like adventurous pioneers, Los Angeles Ballet stepped into uncharted territory Saturday for its season opener, “Modern Moves,” which introduced Aszure Barton’s “Les Chambres des Jacques” and Alejandro Cerrudo’s “Lickety-Split” into the company’s repertory at the Alex Theatre in Glendale. George Balanchine’s 1954 classic “Western Symphony” capped off an evening devoted to contemporary and neoclassical works that were flecked with folksy charm. Throughout, Los Angeles Ballet proved not only fluent in the three choreographers’ styles but also in the wide-ranging love language of their dances. Longing and desire emanated from almost every move in Barton’s lusty “Les Chambres,” set to a fusion of Quebecois folk music, klezmer and Vivaldi. Men approached women clad in corsets with sensual sniffs; others attempted to hug the empty air around them. Agape mouths in the shape of silent screams looked like lips yearning to be kissed. And principal dancer Tigran Sargsyan’s desperate crawl after the woman he pines for sends a stab straight to the heart. If “Les Chambres” is an intimate study of unrequited love, then “Lickety-Split” gives us a look into love unbound. In one vignette, principal Bianca Bulle and Sargsyan initially play hard to get. He then offers his hand, and she squeezes out some invisible elixir — an aphrodisiac perhaps — that sends them into a joyous jaunt across the stage. As Devendra Barhart’s raspy voice creaks over the speakers like a well-worn rocker, you can’t help but feel as if you’re on a front porch, watching lovers dance by the light of fireflies. The duet culminates with Bulle ecstatically shaking her hand between her partner’s legs and Sargsyan playfully banging his head upon her rear. While an odd image, it’s immensely satisfying — reminiscent of the comfort that comes from knowing another intimately — and avant-garde like a piece of absurdist theater. Against such an edgy program, Balanchine’s “Western Symphony” felt a tad dated — its corps of clean-cut cowboys gallantly strumming air guitars and feather-hatted saloon gals do-si-do-ing primly a far cry from Cerrudo and Barton’s sensuous styles. Even Hershy Kay’s classic orchestrations of American folk songs felt a touch Disney-fied. But there were plenty of enchanting moments. The versatile Sargsyan pulled off a delightful adagio with principal Petra Conti, and the dance’s iconic finale — endless pirouettes as the curtain falls — was a strong reminder of how modern this piece once was. Like the depths of a boundless love, it insisted on having no end. READ ARTICLE AT SOURCE

Los Angeles Ballet artistic directors Thordal Christensen and Colleen Neary watch dancers rehearse "The Evangelist," which the company will be begin performing later this month. Home / News / New Item Los Angeles Ballet meets “The Evangelist” April 1, 2008 Los Angeles Times by Lynne Heffley Los Angeles Ballet artistic directors Thordal Christensen and Colleen Neary watch dancers rehearse "The Evangelist," which the company will be begin performing later this month. The 2-year-old company readies a program that includes a piece first danced by its artistic directors and inspired by the life of Aimee Semple McPherson. In a warehouse space on a no-frills Westside industrial street, Thordal Christensen, co-artistic director of Los Angeles Ballet, points to a rickety little table. "Welcome to my office," he jokes. "We've been in here four months, so it's still a work in progress." The unfinished but spacious digs are another step forward for 2-year-old LAB, the city's latest hope for home-based premier classical ballet. Half of the interior is a jumble of racks of costumes, stacks of Marley flooring -- a special sprung surface carted to venues for the dancers' use -- and utilitarian furniture. But in the expansive, mirrored studio space on the other side of a partition, with loading dock doors rolled open for ventilation, several of the company's 26 young dancers are warming up in motley practice gear. Christensen and Colleen Neary, his wife and fellow artistic director, are about to revisit a work that was choreographed for them 16 years ago: "The Evangelist," a spiritual duet inspired by 1920s charismatic preacher Aimee Semple McPherson, set to the music of Charles Ives. It will tour to four venues in April and May, beginning Friday and Saturday at UCLA's Freud Playhouse, as part of a varied program that includes "he said/she said," a world premiere by Jennifer Backhaus of the Orange County-based Backhausdance; George Balanchine's "Allegro Brillante"; and August Bournonville's "Napoli/Pas de Six" and "Tarantella." Balanchine's "Who Cares?" will replace the Bournonville pieces for the company's Irvine Barclay Theatre performance May 17. Appearing with the company as guest artist will be Orlando Ballet’s Eddy Tovar. 'The Evangelist' Created by choreographer Lar Lubovitch when Christensen and Neary were principals with Pacific Northwest Ballet, "The Evangelist" was the critical highlight of Lubovitch's ballet "American Gesture" at its 1992 Kennedy Center premiere. A meld of classical form and Grahamesque force, it depicts a male penitent's struggle toward redemption, guided by a powerful female figure. "It's always nice to work on something that you've done yourself," Christensen says. "At the same time, you have to make sure it becomes the dancer's piece, because it's really about getting them to find . . . " "Themselves in it," interjects Neary. "And the spirit of the piece," Christensen finishes. For the next 30 minutes, the couple, dancer-fit themselves, take to the floor by turns to demonstrate a lift or position, coaching the pairs who will alternate in the work (and wear Christensen and Neary's original costumes): Peter Snow and Melissa Barak, and Andrew Brader and Kelly Ann Sloan. The intensity of emotion the dancers must express in arching bends and high lifts, extreme gestures and moments of muscular rigidity is clear when they take a break, panting and dripping with sweat. Christensen and Neary next take five couples through Balanchine's demanding and lyrical "Allegro Brillante," set to Tchaikovsky, correcting a step here, a line there. "We call it a dancer's ballet," Neary says later, "because dancers love to do it. It's a full-length ballet in 17 minutes -- there are that many steps." "Is it fun, or is it death?" Neary asks the breathless company when rehearsal ends. The consensus: "It's fun." Taking the next step With their international careers as dancers behind them, Christensen, former artistic director of the Royal Danish Ballet, and Neary, a New York City Ballet alumna and authoritative Balanchine choreographer, say they don't mind being out of the spotlight. "When you're onstage, it's such an incredible feeling, but being offstage and seeing somebody else do what you're giving them is even more fulfilling," Neary says. Dancing is a short-lived career, Christensen adds, "and we're fortunate to have the opportunity to give it to the next generation." New work is key to the growth of Los Angeles Ballet, he says. The company launched with a familiar repertoire that included Balanchine masterworks and its own "Nutcracker" in order to "excite the audience and create a company style. Now it's important to bring in outside choreographers to show the dancers' range." "In the end, that's going to define who we are," says Neary, noting that the piece commissioned from Backhaus, a Lester Horton Award-winning, cutting-edge contemporary choreographer, is "extremely different" from anything the dancers have done. In the work, created for the full ensemble, "there's more gravity, more weight, more things that are off-balance," Backhaus explains later by phone. "I was toying with the idea of making the dance on pointe, but I wanted to challenge their dynamic sensibility a bit. They're a great group of dancers, and they've been really open to trying new things." Backhaus is enthusiastic about LAB's chances for success in a city where others on the same mission have failed. "They're on the right track," she says. "I think this is the best shot we've had." lynne.heffley@latimes.com DOWNLOAD ARTICLE (PDF)

Los Angeles Ballet [LAB] Artistic Directors Thordal Christensen and Colleen Neary are pleased to present three stunning works by George Balanchine this spring. Home / News / New Item Dancing into Spring with Three Glorious Balanchine Pieces January 12, 2010 LAB Public Relations See the Music, Hear the Dance January 12, 2010 -- Los Angeles Ballet [LAB] Artistic Directors Thordal Christensen and Colleen Neary are pleased to present three stunning works by George Balanchine this spring. LAB’s spring program See the Music, Hear the Dance from George Balanchine includes the Los Angeles Ballet premieres of Kammermusik No. 2 and Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 2 , and the return of Serenade . Kammermusik No. 2 is a conceptual work of vast liveliness, momentum and accuracy. The complex eight-man ensemble dances to the composition of the orchestra, while two couples move to the passages of the piano in the counterpart. Balanchine created a role for LAB’s Artistic Director, Colleen Neary in the original cast of Kammermusik No. 2. Principal casting includes Melissa Barak, Grace McLoughlin, Andrew Brader and Drew Grant. Another poignant and dramatic Balanchine piece Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 2 is an existing tribute to Petipa, 'the father of classical ballet,” as well as to Tchaikovsky, Balanchine’s “greatest composer." This piece transmits the strength and splendor of majestic St. Petersburg, and exhibits the classical style and romanticism of Balanchine's early Russian training. Monica Pelfrey and Zheng Hua Li are the principal cast. Serenade is Balanchine’s first original ballet created in America. Originally intended as a stage technique lesson, Balanchine incorporated unanticipated rehearsal events into the work. This beloved ballet articulates the abundant and mystifying score of Tchaikovsky's Serenade for Strings in C. Principal casting for Serenade will be varied. DOWNLOAD PDF

Los Angeles Ballet is excited to appear at Santa Monica's The Broad Stage as part of the theater's Inaugural Season. LAB’s Director's Choice program was presented at the theater March 15 and 16, 2009. Home / News / New Item Los Angeles Ballet at The Broad Stage March 1, 2009 Company News from the Staff at LAB The story is simple. James, a Scottish highlander, dreams of a magical, otherworldly creature, the Sylph, on the very day of his wedding to his beloved Effie. Suddenly incarnate, the Sylph lures James away from the wedding and into the forest. There, she inexplicably appears and disappears at will, always managing to stay just out of his grasp.

Highly pedigreed? You bet. Well-known in the dance world? No question. But Thordal Christensen and Colleen Neary have also passed the acid test: As directors of the Los Angeles Ballet, now in its sixth season, they can take a collective bow for their thoroughly sterling production of “Swan Lake.” Home / News / New Item Los Angeles Ballet's 'Swan Lake' is full of grace March 12, 2012 Glendale News-Press by Donna Perlmutter Highly pedigreed? You bet. Well-known in the dance world? No question. But Thordal Christensen and Colleen Neary have also passed the acid test: As directors of the Los Angeles Ballet, now in its sixth season, they can take a collective bow for their thoroughly sterling production of “Swan Lake.” Just remember, not any old company can stage this icon of classical ballet. Oh, many with lesser artistic resources try. But to put on a show of so fine a caliber normally takes a bigger-than-big budget, dancer bench-depth, masterly and dedicated coaching. What’s more, they mounted their full-length extravaganza with the requisite number of performances. “And that meant we had to find venues all over the city.” says Christensen, who led the eminent Royal Danish Ballet and is steeped in its standards of style and rigorous technique. “We had to travel to the audiences,” he adds, noting that people will venture out to an attraction, so long as it doesn’t mean long drives through congested traffic. So from Westwood to Long Beach, with a stop at the Alex Theatre on March 17, the company is showing off its current jewel, “Swan Lake,” all feathery finery, moonlit mirages, pathos born of misfortune, good-versus-evil conflict. Thus the mountain comes to Muhammad. And it is a mountain, what with the full-scale sets originally built at Pacific Northwest Ballet, Christensen’s last post before he decamped to Los Angeles. “In fact,” says the Danish-born danseur, “when you think about it, it’s madness, dealing with four separate acts. We’ve had to extend intermission lengths just to do the set changes,” and that took the crew a week of practice just to learn how to move things along faster, he added. But the décor is eminently beautiful, old-school poetic without looking old — or worn — and it accommodates to any standard proscenium. The costumes, too, are delicate pastels, setting off the pristine-white lakeside scenes. What catches attention, though, apart from these details, is the totality of the spectacle — the dancers’ total immersion in the action and feeling states, be they coryphees, peasants, courtiers, royalty. As to the coaching, well, it is meticulous — in contrast, even, to some A-circuit “Swan Lake” productions, like the last one American Ballet Theatre brought on tour to L.A., where we saw casts that suffered rehearsal deficits. In their prime, both Christensen and Neary danced the lead roles many times. With his deep background in Bournonville, not to mention her prominence as a member of the Balanchine Trust, it’s no surprise that the choreography they adapted from the Petipa/Ivanov model is wonderfully evocative and rational. So, too, is the mime clear, uncluttered and natural — a feat in itself for American dancers seldom exposed to courtly behavior. But then the troupe’s roster now stands higher than ever in its level of virtuosity — thanks mostly to Neary’s recruitment of dancers from companies on which she has set Balanchine works, among them ABT and Russia’s Mariinsky, formerly the Kirov. Still, holding on to them is difficult. “We lose roughly a third each year,” says LAB executive director Julie Whittaker. “But that’s par for the course with all companies.” Corina Gill was stolen by the Boston Ballet, she recalls. And some leave because of the low salaries. “Most of our dancers stay, though. The trick is to keep them performing and not laid off for any substantial period of time.” So far, artistry runs the gamut at Los Angeles Ballet. It also keeps the wheel turning. And this “Swan Lake” does the trick. DONNA PERLMUTTER is an ASCAP-Award winning music/dance critic and journalist whose work has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times and many other publications. She is also the author of “Shadowplay: The Life of Antony Tudor.” Email her at donna.perlmutter@gmail.com . DOWNLOAD PDF

Unlike certain 20th-century artists who found themselves miserable in Hollywood — F. Scott Fitzgerald comes to mind — George Balanchine was fond of the place in the 1930s. Home / News / New Item Balanchine's Palm-Fringed Muse May 17, 2013 New York Times by Victoria Looseleaf LOS ANGELES — Unlike certain 20th-century artists who found themselves miserable in Hollywood — F. Scott Fitzgerald comes to mind — George Balanchine was fond of the place in the 1930s. He loved the orange groves, Romanoff’s glamorous boîte and choreographing dances for movies. But after founding New York City Ballet with Lincoln Kirstein in 1948, the man who changed America’s dancescape became synonymous with the East Coast. Now, 30 years after his death, Mr. Balanchine is having another West Coast moment, through the prism of different ballet troupes. The Balanchine repertory is standard fare for the Los Angeles Ballet, founded in 2006 by the husband-and-wife team of Colleen Neary and Thordal Christensen. Yet this year, having grown to 35 dancers from 21, with an annual operating budget to $2.5 million, the directors felt the time was right for a full-fledged Balanchine Festival. The festival, which opened in March, is presenting seven works over four months. The remaining performances in the second and final installment, featuring “La Valse,” “Agon” and “Rubies,” will be presented at three theaters in May and June. The latter two works, set to Stravinsky, are also part of the program for July in Grand Park, in line with the Los Angeles Music Center’s yearlong Stravinsky celebration “Balanchine loved this city,” Ms. Neary said in an interview, “and it is my wish that the passion he felt in his work is given to L.A. in these programs.” Ms. Neary, 60, first met Balanchine as an 8-year-old student at the School of American Ballet, the official school of New York City Ballet. She joined City Ballet in 1969 and was a soloist from 1975 to 1979. In 1985 the George Balanchine Trust authorized her to teach and stage his ballets. Ms. Neary says she feels a responsibility to the choreographer, who created more than 400 works. “It’s my job to help dancers get to know him,” she said during a rehearsal break at the company’s Westside headquarters. “It’s not only teaching steps he taught us, and the intention, but also the ballets’ different styles. One thing I always say he told us is, ‘You shouldn’t save anything — you should give all your energies to what you’re doing now.’ ” On a recent afternoon in the Los Angeles Ballet’s 12,000-square-foot studios, Ms. Neary scrutinized her dancers, who range in age from 19 to 31, as they rehearsed the fiendishly difficult steps of “La Valse,” a 1951 ballet about death set to Ravel’s work.“Don’t bounce, glide,” Ms. Neary urged Allyssa Bross, the female lead in white, while Mr. Christensen, 47, leapt onto a chair to observe the unsettling funereal circling in the finale. Ms. Neary and Mr. Christensen’s 28-year partnership has included dancing with City Ballet, and their exchanges in the studio veer from detail-oriented simpatico to the occasionally prickly. “She’s been my boss, and I’ve been hers,” he said, “but because we know each other so well, there’s a certain aesthetic we try to pull from the dancers together.” Renae Williams Niles, the Music Center’s vice president for programming, suggested in an interview that promoting Balanchine’s legacy is strategically smart for a young dance company seeking a bigger profile. “When I think of Balanchine here, I think of Colleen, one of our local treasures,” she said. Preconcert talks are also part of the Balanchine Festival, and they help to shed light on the time he spent in Southern California. Audiences learn that Balanchine adored the climate, food markets and movie culture of Los Angeles, where he choreographed five films, all featuring Vera Zorina, then his wife, from 1938 to 1944. For the first, “The Goldwyn Follies” (1938), he worked with the composer Vernon Duke, a friend who wrote music for the “Water Nymph Ballet,” a Botticelli-esque sequence in which Ms. Zorina rose from a pool. The sequence is said to have been beloved by Samuel Goldwyn, the film’s producer. Hollywood also proved congenial for Mr. Balanchine’s collaborations with Stravinsky, with whom he worked on some 40 pieces over the years. Conversing in their native Russian over many a meal, the pair worked on masterpieces like “Orpheus,” which had its premiere in 1948 with Maria Tallchief. Another Los Angeles troupe seeking to lay claim to part of Balanchine’s legacy is the American Contemporary Ballet, now in its second season. The 10-member company is directed by the choreographer Lincoln Jones, a native Angeleno who returned here in 2010 after spending seven years performing and teaching in New York. While laying the groundwork for forming the company, he spent hours devouring all things Balanchine at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center. “Dance is fairly limited as a storytelling medium, but as a musical one that works in a visual realm, it’s unlimited,” Mr.Jones said in an interview. “It was Balanchine’s realization of this — and his development of its musical vocabulary, aside from the works themselves — that was his greatest contribution.” Mr. Jones said he was drawn back to Los Angeles by its widening classical music scene. He took along his muse, the ballerina Theresa Farrell, who is now the company’s associate director; seeking to expand the audience for dance, they soon paired with Da Camera Society, a group that was founded four decades ago and performs chamber music at historic sites. Its top musicians accompanied American Contemporary Ballet last year when it gave its first concerts — two instrumental works interspersed with a pair of dances — in a warehouse in the city’s mid-Wilshire area. Next month four more concerts are scheduled over two nights. “The fact that they’re so good and just getting started, I feel I owe it to the art of dance to help build whatever I can,” said Martin Chalifour, the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s principal concertmaster, who donates his time to performing with the troupe. “Lincoln caters to the complexities of the musical score and, like Balanchine, that’s his inspiration. Music transports you, and when you augment that with beautiful dance, it becomes a unique sensory experience.” Another troupe with Balanchine ties is the Barak Ballet, founded by Melissa Barak, a Los Angeles native who danced with New York City Ballet for nine years. For now, no Balanchine works are planned for the ballet’s inaugural concert in October, she said, “but my choreography is influenced by him, and I’d like to think he may have seen something special in me.” While Los Angeles has metamorphosed into a sprawl-to-the-wall metropolis since Balanchine walked its palm treelined streets, his spirit lives on here for these choreographers. “When we’re teaching and talking about him, Mr. B is with us,” Ms. Neary said. “I believe that.” DOWNLOAD PDF

Dancers who were new to every role gave the challenging three-part program by Los Angeles Ballet on Saturday the thrills of a high-wire act without a net. Would anyone fall? Home / News / New Item Balanchine Casts a Spell March 13, 2017 Los Angeles Times by Lewis Segal Dancers who were new to every role gave the challenging three-part program by Los Angeles Ballet on Saturday the thrills of a high-wire act without a net. Would anyone fall? (Yes, once.) Would anyone succeed brilliantly? (Yes, more than once.) Emergency casting added another edge to the experience at the Alex Theatre in Glendale. An injury to principal dancer Allyssa Bross caused the company to fly in Lia Cirio to take on major roles in two ballets. A principal with Boston Ballet, Cirio not only displayed refined technique but an ability to give herself to the music that took you deeply into the choreography. Since all of the choreography was created by George Balanchine, the stakes were high indeed. It was a shrewd programming ploy to include on the same bill Balanchine’s 1956 “Divertimento No. 15” and his 1970 “Who Cares?” Though radically different in style, these plotless showpieces share structural similarities and, especially, a string of complex, effervescent women’s solos. “Divertimento” is danced to Mozart and seems to belong in an 18th-century royal court; “Who Cares?” is danced to Gershwin and seems to belong on a 20th-century Broadway stage. Cirio appeared perfectly at home in both environments — as did the regal Bianca Bulle and the lyrical Julia Cinquemani. A company premiere, “Divertimento” will need more performances to erase the sense of strain periodically evident on Saturday. But Madison McDonough brought ease and refinement to some exceptionally difficult steps in her variation. What’s more, the staging by company co-director Colleen Neary kept the fabled musicality of the ballet firmly in focus. Although the company has programmed “Who Cares?” before, the new cast and Neary’s staging enforced elegance as well as pizzazz. As the resident dreamboat wooing all the principal women, Tigran Sargsyan was clearly working through some of the intricate partnering issues, but eventually his remarkable generosity as a dancer came into view. He had a tough night: Along with Kenta Shimizu and Dustin True, he also danced strongly in “Divertimento” and “Prodigal Son.” True’s stellar breakthrough came earlier this season in “Stravinsky Violin Concerto,” and on Saturday his cautious diligence occasionally yielded to moments where he again really inhabited the choreography and made it personal. As for Shimizu, he remained faultless as a cavalier in “Divertimento” (no surprise there) but displayed unexpected dramatic powers in the title role of “Prodigal Son.” Impeccably staged by Patricia Neary (Colleen Neary’s sister), this 1929 story ballet set to music by Prokofiev had a cohesion and surety on Saturday that made you relax and fall under its spell. Debut performances? Who could guess, when Shimizu claimed the role at full intensity? There’s a dimension of ironic comedy here that remains to be discovered — and perhaps Shimizu externalized the character’s pain too overtly in the final scene. But his interaction with the impossibly glamorous Elizabeth Claire Walker as the Siren overcame a minefield of technical hazards with no loss to his character’s helpless confusion or her over-the-top hauteur. The seductive, greedy Siren was always as much a living cliché as the stern but forgiving Father (Zheng Hua Li). But Balanchine used these stereotypes to define in the shortest possible time the prodigal’s all-too-human arc from rebellion to contrition. And the dancers exploited their opportunities skillfully. In the 1920s, the Russian ballet world considered Balanchine a radical, and “Prodigal Son” has plenty of evidence: experimental gymnastics, realistic pantomime, bizarre character dancing and plenty of sex. The academic classical vocabulary for which he’s celebrated can be found if you look for it, but a couple years shy of its 90th birthday, the work still looks newly minted — and now one of the great Los Angeles Ballet triumphs. ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ Los Angeles Ballet’s ‘Balanchine — Master of the Dance’ When: 7:30 p.m. March 18 at Redondo Beach Performing Arts Center, 1935 Manhattan Beach Blvd., Redondo Beach. Also 2 p.m. March 26 at Royce Hall, UCLA, 340 Royce Drive Tickets: $31-$99 Information: (310) 998-7782, www.losangelesballet.org Follow The Times’ arts team @culturemonster. ALSO Spring preview: What to see in dance, theater, art, classical and more Alvin Ailey translates MLK speeches into dance 'Runway' finalist’s costumes create character for Jessica Lang Dance Movement as bleak theater, with some terrific Pharrell music too READ ARTICLE AT SOURCE

Los Angeles Ballet Co-Artistic Directors Thordal Christensen and Colleen Neary present classical and contemporary productions and honor the legacies of August Bournonville and George Balanchine for LAB’s eleventh season. Home / News / New Item 11th Season Opening September 1, 2016 LAB Public Relations Productions include Modernists/Ballet Visionaries, The Nutcracker and Balanchine/Master of the Dance Pre-performance Discussions to enhance the Season Los Angeles, September 7, 2016 - Los Angeles Ballet Co-Artistic Directors Thordal Christensen and Colleen Neary present classical and contemporary productions and honor the legacies of August Bournonville and George Balanchine for LAB’s eleventh season. 2016-2017 includes two mixed bill programs, Modernists/Ballet Visionaries and Balanchine/Master of the Dance , and of course the holiday favorite, The Nutcracker . Season 11 will also reintroduce pre-performance discussions, hosted by LAB’s Co-Artistic Directors Thordal Christensen and Colleen Neary and their guests (at select performances). After a history-making tenth season that included Los Angeles Ballet being the first American company to present famed choreographer’s Frederick Ashton’s Romeo and Juliet , plus sold-out productions and critical acclaim, Los Angeles Ballet’s eleventh season celebrates the masters, and introduces LA to a new choreographer that is changing the dance landscape. LAB opens the season with Modernists/Ballet Visionaries (October 2016) featuring works of three icons of their time: August Bournonville, 1805-79, creator of the Danish Bournonville style of ballet, still vibrant today; George Balanchine, 1904-82, Master choreographer who transformed American dance and created modern American ballet; Aszure Barton, contemporary choreographer who is leading ballet into rich, new territory. The program includes Bournonville’s Napoli Pas de Six and Tarantella , Balanchine’s Stravinsky Violin Concerto and the Los Angeles Ballet Premiere of Barton’s Untouched (2010) . LAB has a strong history with Bournonville and Balanchine - Christensen is the only artistic director (and dancer) in Los Angeles who is an authority on the Bournonville style, and Neary was personally selected by Balanchine to teach his choreography to major companies all over the world as a Repetiteur for The George Balanchine Trust. The holidays welcome back LAB’s popular The Nutcracker (December 2016), set in 1913 Los Angeles. This year LAB offers special Christmas Eve matinees, providing more opportunities to see this family favorite and to enjoy Tchaikovsky’s beloved music. To close the season, Los Angeles Ballet presents Balanchine/Master of the Dance (March 2017). In a Los Angeles Ballet premiere Balanchine captures Mozart in the crystalline Divertimento No. 15 . The program also includes the hauntingly beautiful Prodigal Son (Prokofiev) and the playful Who Cares? (Gershwin). “We are proud to present such a diverse program this season,” said Christensen and Neary, LAB’s Co- Artistic Directors. “With masters Balanchine and Bournonville, the holiday favorite The Nutcracker , and introducing our audience to Barton, a contemporary choreographer, we offer a smorgasbord of delights.” Continuing LAB’s mission to offer world-class professional ballet to greater Los Angeles, its programs are performed at LAB’s home theaters: UCLA’s Royce Hall, Glendale’s Alex Theatre, Redondo Beach Performing Arts Center, and the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood. About Los Angeles Ballet - Founded in 2004 by Artistic Directors Thordal Christensen and Colleen Neary, and Executive Director Julie Whittaker, Los Angeles Ballet is known for its superb stagings of the Balanchine repertory, stylistically meticulous classical ballets, and its commitment to new works. LAB has become recognized as a world-class ballet company in ten seasons, presenting 32 productions encompassing 54 works, including 15 commissioned world premieres. Los Angeles Ballet ‘tours’ throughout LA County, regularly appearing at four venues. Since its inception in 2006, LAB’s Power of Performance (POP!) program has provided thousands of free tickets to underserved or disadvantaged children, seniors, veterans, and their families. LAB's A Chance to Dance Community Days outreach program was launched in October 2012. About Thordal Christensen - Among Thordal Christensen’s many credentials are an impressive performing career, successful leadership of one of the world's major ballet companies, critically applauded original choreography, and a proven commitment to dance education. Born in Copenhagen, Denmark, Christensen received his ballet training at The Royal Danish Ballet School and at the School of American Ballet in New York City before a performance career that included the Royal Danish Ballet, New York City Ballet, and Pacific Northwest Ballet. Christensen then returned to Denmark where he was Artistic Director of the Royal Danish Ballet. This blend of Bournonville and Balanchine tradition is one of the defining themes of his career, and has shaped the unique artistic vision that Christensen, along with his wife Colleen Neary, bring to Los Angeles Ballet. In 2002, he was made Knight of the Dannebrog by Queen Margrethe II of Denmark. About Colleen Neary - Colleen Neary brings to Los Angeles Ballet the benefits of her vast experience as one of George Balanchine's quintessential ballerinas. In her experience as a dancer, teacher, and ballet mistress, she also worked closely with other luminaries of 20th century dance, including Rudolf Nureyev, Maurice Béjart, and Jiří Kylián. Born in Miami, Florida and trained at The School of American Ballet, Neary danced in New York City Ballet under the direction of George Balanchine, then for Maurice Béjart's Ballet du XXième Siecle , and Pacific Northwest Ballet. Neary was personally selected by Balanchine to teach his choreography to major companies all over the world as a repetiteur for The George Balanchine Trust. DOWNLOAD PDF

Nearly 9,000 Angelenos applauded LAB's The Nutcracker last month at 9 performances at UCLA's Royce Hall, Glendale's historic Alex Theatre, and Redondo Beach Performing Arts Center. Home / News / New Item Los Angeles embraces Los Angeles Ballet's The Nutcracker January 1, 2008 Company News from the Staff at LAB