{"id":9578,"date":"2013-02-05T13:26:57","date_gmt":"2013-02-05T17:26:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.musicalamerica.com\/mablogs\/?p=9578"},"modified":"2013-02-17T22:17:44","modified_gmt":"2013-02-18T02:17:44","slug":"year-of-the-rabbit-justin-peck-makes-ballet-run","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.musicalamerica.com\/mablogs\/?p=9578","title":{"rendered":"“Year of the Rabbit”: Justin Peck Makes Ballet Run"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Rachel Straus<\/p>\n

Justin Peck\u2019s \u201cYear of the Rabbit\u201d begins with a whirligig virtuoso solo by Ashley Bouder. The principal New York City Ballet dancer performs her multiple turns into off-kilter leaps with playful abandon. The total effect is that of \u201cRoad Runner\u201d cartoon: Here comes Bouder. Beep Beep! The company that George Balanchine developed is known for moving speedily. But Justin Peck, a 25-year-old corps dancer who has now made three works for NYCB (this is his second), gets his dancers to move even faster than the company\u2019s founding choreographer. About half way through Peck\u2019s 2012 piece\u2014to Michael P. Atkinson\u2019s orchestration of Sufjan Stevens’ electronica album \u201cEnjoy Your Rabbit\u201d (2001)\u2014one had to wonder what all the hurry was about.<\/p>\n

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Ashley Bouder and New York City Ballet in Year of the Rabbit. \u00a9 Paul Kolnik<\/p><\/div>\n

Peck is the first choreographer who Ballet Master in Chief Peter Martins has supported that grew up firmly in the Internet age. While Christopher Wheeldon (age 39) and Alexei Ratmansky (age 44) surely have the latest gadgets, and Martins\u2019 support, it is Peck\u2019s fastidiously fast choreography that evokes the furrowed brow of our new century.<\/p>\n

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New York City Ballet in Year of the Rabbit. \u00a9 Paul Kolnik<\/p><\/div>\n

Back in the 1980s, it was Twyla Tharp who upped the ante on choreographic tempi. She taught aerobics as part of her company\u2019s training. With \u201cIn the Upper Room\u201d (1986), she featured dancers in tennis shoes and tracksuits, jogging up and down as though they were on a Stairmaster to heaven. But while Tharp\u2019s \u201cUpper Room\u201d evokes the timelessness of Zen, via repetition of speedily performed choreographic leitmotifs, Peck\u2019s interest in speed feels like young man\u2019s game–with a smidgeon of ADD.<\/p>\n

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Robert Fairchild in Year of the Rabbit. \u00a9 Paul Kolnik<\/p><\/div>\n

Though speed feels like the subject of \u201cYear of the Rabbit,\u201d it also concerns contemporary ballet and its values. In the center of the work, there is a romantic pas deux for the wonderfully expressive dancers Teresa Reichlen and Robert Fairchild. The pair appears to be questing for each other\u2019s love: they dance in separate fiefdoms of the stage, created by boundaries formed out of dancers from the opposite sex. Yet as soon as Fairchild and Reichlen touch, they go their separate ways. The pas de deux\u2019s erotic potency lies with the pair\u2019s physical separation. Actual intimacy isn\u2019t the point, just as Facebook concerns looking and commenting at friends and loved ones from the safety of one\u2019s digital screen.<\/p>\n

Peck\u2019s musicality, in which he corresponds, sidles, and departs from Atkinson\u2019s melodic lines, demonstrates that he is astute. His choreography for the corps is also notable. \u00a0He continuously weaves the corps through six soloists\u2019 dancing, thus blurring (and democratizing) the typical separation between leading and supporting dancers. All of this movement takes place place swiftly and efficiently, making “Rabbit” an indicator of our times.<\/p>\n