A Season of Discontent.

City Ballet's golden anniversary was not always a festive occasion.

New York City Ballet celebrated its 50th anniversary with the brand of overkill that has become a tradition since its first Stravinsky Festival, in 1972, when it was delivered of twenty-one world premieres in one week. Ballet master in chief Peter Martins did not promise a similar burst of creativity--a mere six premieres, along with his new production of Swan Lake [see page 80]--but the company would nevertheless salute the occasion in the usual NYCB manner: it would perform a total of 100 ballets during its winter and spring seasons. Would any other company in the world have attempted such a feat, in two eight-week bursts? Could any other company have brought it off as well? Probably not, but a third fewer works would have allowed the dancers more rehearsal time and made performances more consistently festive for the audience. This hectic season's most welcome novelty was having several guest conductors try out for a permanent post. Neal Stulberg and Kristjan Jarvi were impressive; so was concertmaster Guillermo Figueroa--but I hope this excellent violinist stays in the ranks, where he has been a godsend.

To bring order to this flux, Martins relegated works to various "festivals" or "celebrations" saluting Balanchine, Robbins, Tchaikovsky, and Stravinsky; a catchall category, "Celebrating Five Decades of Repertory," returned some beloved classics--notably, Liebeslieder Walzer (1960), stunningly re-created by Karin von Aroldingen--but also such unwelcome resuscitations as Eliot Feld's Unanswered Question (1988) and William Forsythe's Herman Schmerman (1992). Most unsettling of all was the three-week "American Music Festival" threatened for June. Yes, Balanchine and Robbins had been inspired by American composers. Martins's 1988 Barber Violin Concerto, made for Merrill Ashley toward the end of her long career, is now a serviceable vehicle for Darci Kistler and Kyra Nichols as injuries and time gradually erode their grandeur, gallantry, and generosity. But as I contemplated weeks of choreography by Martins, Feld, Forsythe, Richard Tanner, Garth Fagan, and Ulysses Dove set to Charles Wuorinen, John Adams, Philip Glass, Wynton Marsalis, Michael Torke, or John Cage, I felt like Peter O'Toole in Lawrence of Arabia, preparing to cross the Nafud. During this trek, Who Cares? or Fancy Free or Stars and Stripes was as welcome as an oasis. It looked like that season from Hell that Balanchine and Robbins admirers had been dreading for years.

Experienced ballet goers had no difficulty spotting signs of stress as the season progressed. Six men had just been promoted to soloist, but only Benjamin Millepied was frequently seen in new roles (on one evening, he flashed through major debuts in Goldberg Variations and Vienna Waltzes). Because of limited rehearsal time, soloists Edward Liang, James Fayette, Christopher Wheeldon, Sebastien Marcovici, Robert Lyon, and Arch Higgins were often stuck in the corps, frolicking sur le plage for In G Major or shucking in and out of three sets of costumes for Waltzes.

Even less-experienced ballet goers must have noticed the strain of readying so many ballets for so few appearances. Frequently, a first performance tended to be rather rough and approximate--like a dress rehearsal, perhaps. Agon was a notable victim in the "Balanchine Black + White" (read: practice clothes) section. Upon learning that my neighbor in a press seat was a visitor from London, I was impelled to say that what we had just witnessed was "not the best Agon I've ever seen." After a hearty Reginald Owen-style guffaw, he said, "Well, it's quite the best one I've ever seen." Fortunately, subsequent refinement was the rule. When it returned in the spring season, Agon looked cool and sleek instead of frowzy, with Peter Boal back from an injury, Maria Kowroski devouring the space about her, and Jock Soto flawlessly manipulating Wendy Whelan or Monique Meunier through the nail-puzzle intricacies of the pas de deux. But frustrated patrons at the first performance of it--and many other masterworks--could take little satisfaction from that.

Two notable guest artists were inconvenienced by this season's headlong pace. Isabelle Guerin, on leave from the Paris Opera Ballet, was reportedly distressed by her first try at the Intermezzo in Brahms-Schoenberg Quartet; by the second, she looked triumphant under Fayette's silken partnering. A press seat off to the side enabled me to see Stuttgart Ballet principal Robert Tewsley, a true danseur noble, almost make a false entrance in Tschaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 2--before going on to partner a glittering Miranda Weese superbly, I should add.

NYCB regulars persevered under these less-than-ideal conditions. An overbooked Damian Woetzel remained at the peak of his considerable virtuosity. Soto, Philip Neal, and Charles Askegard were stalwart, graceful partners. Tom Gold danced up a storm. Nichols, when injury free, kept the precious Farrell legacy vital. The roster is currently graced with women--Weese, Meunier, and Whelan; Alexandra Ansanelli, Helene Alexopoulos, Jennie Somogyi, and Jenifer Ringer--one is eager to see in major roles. Recent School of American Ballet graduates Jared Angle, Adam Hendrickson, and Janie Taylor shone with assurance.

The sad fact is, however, that during this season the company often looked its strongest--looked absolutely terrific--in well-rehearsed world premieres and during those stretches of the American Music Festival, when stamina and technique -were tested much more than mere artistry. One triumphant premiere, Wheeldon's Scenes de Ballet, although first done at the State Theater during the Stravinsky festival, was actually made on SAB pupils. The setting is a Moscow classroom; the stage, split diagonally by the barre, represents both the real world and its reflection. Wheeldon's clever twist on this familiar device is to have the "mirror" at one point show a little girl's "reflection" of herself as a ballerina. Stravinsky's astringent score counterbalances the inevitable cuteness of the students in Holly Hynes's costumes. Scenes should be in big demand by ballet school directors the world over, but if they don't duplicate Ian Falconer's breathtaking backdrop, with its looming view of Red Square, they will be making a big mistake.

Martins's two new works were long on mood, short on interest. Walton Cello Concerto, a facile menage a trois for Woetzel, Weese, and Ansanelli, would have been livelier had there been a corps to flesh out Walton's exotic tonal colors. (Could the corps have been busy somewhere else?) Them Twos, a series of pas de deux, portended an alarming return to Martins's surly, sling-your-partner apache-disco style; fortunately, it subsided into a murky pairing of Soto and Kistler that recalled Balanchine's Meditation. An amorphous score by Marsalis, heralded in the playbill as his "first full orchestral composition to be performed publicly," contained no sound that would have astonished anyone after 1924.

The Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, performing onstage under David Berger, supplied electricity to spare for Duke!, three short romps set to Duke Ellington by Fagan, Robert La Fosse, and Susan Stroman. La Fosse's "Rockin' in Rhythm" would have resembled the wildest hepcat number in a 1940s Donald O'Connor-Peggy Ryan movie had it been less demanding. The Froman twins, Kurt and Kyle, stole the show with a tap dance. Stroman in "Blossom Got Kissed" turned Kowroski into a delightful comedienne, a gal so square she wore a blue tutu to a jazz club; once she stripped it away, she ruled the stage. When Balanchine's A Midsummer Night's Dream returned in the final week of the season to ennoble the repertory, NYCB's 50th anniversary season was dominated by tap shoes and a discarded tutu.

Harris Green is associate editor for features of Dance Magazine.