Alonzo King's LINES Ballet, on tour from San Francisco, concludes its Joyce Theater run tomorrow, Sunday evening, with an 8pm show. King's company not only proudly reflects the diversity of today's America, it glories in the beauty of the individual dancer--especially the male of the species--rewarding dancers by doing everything possible to make them look very, very good and spotlighting pliancy and virtuosity. King seems to be more about challenging these marvelously capable performers than truly challenging his audiences. When it comes to us, I think he just wants to love us up. He just straps us in and gives us the ride of a lifetime.
I preferred King's Dust and Light, a suite to music of Corelli and Poulenc, over the program's second piece, Rasa, a suite to Zakir Hussain's tabla music. The latter work has none of the gnarly, fast-twitch complexity found in Dust and Light. It looks like it was made by a very different man, one much less fussy or in more of a rush to finish a big, important piece. And, unlike its predecessor, it feels repetitious and every bit as long as it is, and then some. At best, it makes you want to turn your thinker off and just enjoy the hummingbird bodies of the dancers.
Dust and Light's title, music, milieu and shifting relationships possibly suggest something about being a spiritual being having a physical experience--or something like that, maybe. In this piece, King's inventiveness keeps the viewer on mental alert and highly entertained, and dancers like David Harvey, Ricardo Zayas and Corey Scott-Gilbert dazzle, standing out in a mighty impressive crowd.
The economy...sigh! If today's audience was any indication, you should be able to secure tickets for LINES at the Joyce.
Here's a wonderful video excerpt of a pre-concert talk by Alonzo King at the 2008 Stern Grove Festival.
I preferred King's Dust and Light, a suite to music of Corelli and Poulenc, over the program's second piece, Rasa, a suite to Zakir Hussain's tabla music. The latter work has none of the gnarly, fast-twitch complexity found in Dust and Light. It looks like it was made by a very different man, one much less fussy or in more of a rush to finish a big, important piece. And, unlike its predecessor, it feels repetitious and every bit as long as it is, and then some. At best, it makes you want to turn your thinker off and just enjoy the hummingbird bodies of the dancers.
Dust and Light's title, music, milieu and shifting relationships possibly suggest something about being a spiritual being having a physical experience--or something like that, maybe. In this piece, King's inventiveness keeps the viewer on mental alert and highly entertained, and dancers like David Harvey, Ricardo Zayas and Corey Scott-Gilbert dazzle, standing out in a mighty impressive crowd.
The economy...sigh! If today's audience was any indication, you should be able to secure tickets for LINES at the Joyce.
Here's a wonderful video excerpt of a pre-concert talk by Alonzo King at the 2008 Stern Grove Festival.
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