KANSAS CITY BALLET.

HEARTLAND SALUTES STRAVINSKY WITH BALANCHINE KANSAS CITY BALLET LYRIC THEATRE KANSAS CITY, MISSOURI FEBRUARY 15-18, 2001

The Kansas City Stravinsky Festival 2001 offered a three-month feast for the senses. From January through March, the Kansas City Symphony, Lyric Opera of Kansas City, University of Missouri-Kansas City Conservatory of Music, and Kansas City Ballet celebrated the great Russian-born composer's life (1882-1971) with a gala kickoff party, lectures, and performances.

Kansas City Ballet, under the direction of William Whitener, came to the festival with an all-Balanchine program featuring a company premiere of the 1957 Agon and the reconstruction of the "lost" ballet Renard (which had a short run in Boston after its City Ballet premiere), both set to scores by Stravinsky. Balanchine and Stravinsky maintained a close relationship throughout their long careers, with Balanchine setting nearly forty works to Stravinsky's music.

The culmination of their collaborative talents reached its zenith in Agon, an abstract, plotless work for twelve dancers, to a still modern-sounding twelve-tone score composed for Balanchine's New York City Ballet. The score is challenging, with the meters changing from one measure to the next, making it difficult for the dancers to count. The success of the piece rests not only in the flawlessness of the dancers' technique, but also in their ability to execute the acerbic steps with a sense of musicality.

On opening night, the Kansas City Ballet dancers captured, for the most part, Agon's concise, calculated rhythms and angular movements. (In the final performance of the five-show run, the dancers appeared more confident and moved on top of the counts.) Agon is one of Balanchine's "black-and-white" ballets, with the dancers clad in simple black leotards and white tights, brutally revealing every nuance of movement. While the men in the male quartet that opens and closes the dance and the dancers in the larger group sections did not move consistently in unison, the pas de deux between Aisling Hill-Conner and Pads Wilcox was remarkable for its timing. Wilcox assuredly partnered Hill-Conner for her extended balances, splits, and turning lifts.

Renard is a comic story ballet that Balanchine based on a Russian folk tale. The Ballets Russes premiered the work in 1922, and Balanchine choreographed it in 1947, but it has been presented only a handful of times since then. Todd Bolender, Kansas City Ballet artistic director emeritus, reconstructed Balanchine's version from memory over the last three years, with the assistance of James Jordan, company ballet master. As a principal dancer with New York City Ballet for more than twenty years, Bolender had been in the 1947 production of Renard, playing the role of the Fox, danced here with wonderful elasticity by Christopher Barksdale. Nancy Reynolds, director of research for the George Balanchine Foundation, persuaded Bolender to revive the work and the entire production was taped by the Foundation's Archive of Lost Choreography.

Four vocalists situated in the pit sang of the adventure of four animals--Fox, Rooster, Cat, and Ram--and how the Fox tries one too many times to attack the Rooster (Sean Duus, suitably cast as the lanky, feathered character). Balanchine predominantly used mime and demi-caractere steps in Renard, but there were also some very strong petit allegro sections handsomely performed by Duus, Wilcox, and the up-and-coming apprentice Anthony Krutzkamp. The dance, while not a critical success when it premiered, was an entertaining romp, save for the sections where the Fox (with very little to do in the way of real dance steps) implores the Rooster to come down from his perch. Supertitles would have made the English lyrics clearer. Esteban Frances's resplendent costume and mask designs, recreated by Vincent Scassellati and Carol Cisler, respectively, brought a visual richness to the stage, as did the surrealist backdrop from the 1975 Lew Christensen San Francisco Ballet production, retrieved from the company's storage bays.

Kansas City Ballet also presented Balanchine's romantic 1960 dance Tschaikovsky Pas de Deux (which received a vivacious rendering on opening night by Kimberly Cowen) and the 1960 Donizetti Variations, which sported a sparkling duet the afternoon of February 18 by Jennifer Owen and Grant Dettling.