CAROLINA BALLET.

CAROLINA BALLET

RALEIGH MEMORIAL AUDITORIUM, RALEIGH, NORTH CAROLINA OCTOBER 22-25, 1998

REVIEWED BY GARY PARKS

There wasn't a moldering sleeping beauty or swan princess in sight. Artistic director Robert Weiss, formerly a principal dancer at New York City Ballet and later the director of Pennsylvania Ballet, introduced his vibrant new Carolina Ballet with a program of five works by George Balanchine. Acknowledging that the master has become the de facto national standard for classical dance in America, Weiss reached back to his roots to thrust this fledgling company into the future.

Serenade (1934) and Duo Concertant (1972) are very different ballets. But each, in the end, resolves the pursuit of a vision. In Serenade, the woman who incarnates that vision is ultimately borne away, forever out of reach. But in Duo Concertant, she is found, and the curtain falls with the seeker fulfilled. Metaphorically, these were apt choices for an inaugural program, as the pursuit of something as elusive and rare as a classical dance company could conclude with either ending.

Balanchine's first work for American dancers, Serenade is performed more often than any other ballet in the United States (except The Nutcracker). One reason is the opportunity it gives the corps de ballet, here supplemented by students from the North Carolina School of the Arts still wet behind their ears. Dancing the Waltz in Serenade, raven-haired Tara Mora and ardent Timour Bourtasenkov brought out the yearning impulse in Tchaikovsky's music, which was sensitively performed by the North Carolina Symphony led by NYCB conductor Maurice Kaplow. Strong, sure Cherilyn Lee was suitably implacable as the angel who guided Edgar Vardanian on his quest.

If Serenade is a ballet for young souls, Duo Concertant looks best on dancers who already know something about life. Melissa Podcasy, who has worked with Weiss since their days together at Pennsylvania Ballet, is a model for the troupe's younger dancers: here is an accomplished performer who moves beyond technique to artistry. Her partner, Bourtasenkov, a good dancer who did yeoman's service filling in for an injured Marin Boieru, has a stagy acting style that was ill suited to the spare aesthetic of Duo Concertant. Playing Stravinsky's score onstage, Barbara Silber (piano) and Brian Reagin (violin) extended inspiring collaboration.

Jaunty Daphne Falcone and handsome Alain Molina made an appealing couple in The Steadfast Tin Soldier (1975), a little gem of a ballet too often dismissed as a mere child's tale. There was real--if fleeting--drama when this paper-doll ballerina mimed rocking a baby and the tin soldier offered her his heart.

In an alternate cast, apprentice Margaret Severin-Hansen and Pablo Javier Perez were less sure of their interpretation and their technique. Yet this young pair looked swell in the "S'Wonderful" duet of Who Cares? (1970), which also provided the best opportunity to see Carolina Ballet function as a genuine ensemble.

The male corps was debonair throughout Who Cares?, with Molina shining as the partner of vivacious Angela Falivena in "That Certain Feeling." Bourtasenkov's forceful manner turned out to be better suited to the born-in-a-Broadway-trunk style of "Liza." And Lilyan Vigo was as able as she was elegant in "My One and Only," turning swift pirouettes that stopped, precisely, on a dime.

If only the principal women weren't saddled with unflattering costumes (imagine: bows at the hips). And what's with the Mayan hieroglyphics on the side curtains? Jeff A. R. Jones's backdrop of the Empire State and Chrysler buildings under a full moon is, however, gorgeous.

Weiss embellished Carolina Ballet's debut with some support of the highest quality. Damian Woetzel, who has signed on as a regular guest artist, partnered fellow NYCB member Alexandra Ansanelli in a spirited Stars and Stripes (1958) pas de deux at each performance. City Ballet principal Miranda Weese answered a last-minute call to dance in Who Cares? with aplomb. Melissa Hayden, Sean Lavery, and Richard Tanner staged the ballets, which were rehearsed by ballet masters Debra Austin and Boieru.

Although North Carolina has seen excellent dance, nothing approaching the level of classical ballet that Weiss is aiming for has been attempted. Money is no object (for the moment), but patience might be. As long as the good burghers of Raleigh realize that the true payoff--a mature company dancing on a national level--won't hit for five or ten years, Carolina Ballet stands an excellent chance of becoming the dance world's southern star.