A flock of swans
By Kevin Ng
Special to The St. Petersburg Times
This year’s Mariinsky Theater Ballet Festival, running through Sunday, has proved very meager indeed compared with the rich and diverse fare offered by the seven previous festivals.
Six of the ten performances are “Swan Lake.”
This would be understandable for an overseas tour due to limited rehearsal time. But surely in its home theater, the Mariinsky Ballet should be more than capable of presenting a different program almost every night, as in previous years.
This safe and predictable programming is justifiable if the Mariinsky can still dance this Petipa 1895 classic “Swan Lake” with all its legendary greatness. But can it?
After the first two performances last weekend, the answer is yes and no. Yes, the Mariinsky’s corps de ballet is still the greatest in the world and surpasses any other ballet company’s in terms of upper-body uniformity. But it must be mentioned that the Mariinsky corps was greater still a decade or two ago, and the present one cannot yet attain that peak. And yes, the Mariinsky’s character dancers are still unsurpassed in the national dances of Act III. But then again, there was even more grandeur and stylishness in these national dances in the past.
The choreographic text of this 1950 Konstantin Sergeyev production is not as authentic as the London Royal Ballet’s current 1986 production by Anthony Dowell.
Still, any production of “Swan Lake” needs to be illuminated by a true classical ballerina, such as the Mariinsky star Diana Vishneva, much acclaimed in New York lately, who danced the opening “Swan Lake.” Vishneva, a supremely musical dancer, danced the white swan duet immaculately as if in one long phrase. Vishneva’s pure and pellucid dancing achieved a rare state of sanctity, as if bestowing a spiritual blessing. Her sublime performance in this “white” act was a revelation. Her black swan was also gloriously danced. Igor Kolb strongly partnered Vishneva and gave a performance full of dramatic depth and virtuosic power.
The second-cast Swan Queen the following night wasn’t in the same class. Gillian Murphy, a principal of the American Ballet Theater, was more conventional and not as distinguished as Vishneva, though her black swan was technically formidable. She was fortunate to have a prince as noble as Andrian Fadeyev. Fadeyev, a fine classical dancer, danced with much romantic passion. Ilya Kuznetsov was powerful as the evil Rothbart, one of his best roles. And Vasily Shcherbakov impressed in the Act 1 trio.
This year’s Mariinsky Ballet Festival however opened on March 13 with a downer: a premiere of an insubstantial two-act ballet by Kirill Simonov, who had choreographed the Mariinsky’s 2001 Shemyakin production of “The Nutcracker.” It lasts only slightly over an hour excluding the long interval. Compared to last year’s festival, which opened with Sergei Vikharev’s masterly reconstruction of Petipa’s gem “Le Reveil de Flore,” and the 2006 festival which opened with Pierre Lacotte’s reconstruction of “Ondine,” this two-act Simonov ballet,”Glass Heart,” is nowhere as significant. The Mariinsky would have done better to stage instead Balanchine’s Stravinsky masterpiece “Agon,” which has been planned since last year but has unfortunately been delayed again.
“Glass Heart” consists of five scenes, and is set to music by Alexander von Zemlinsky, a contemporary of the famous Viennese composer Gustav Mahler. It is based on the real life of Zemlinsky who is in love with Mahler’s wife Alma. This central love triangle is depicted in a series of duets and trios. A contrast to this threesome is a secondary couple — the gardener and his wife — which represents pure love. The most dramatically successful scene in Act I is the third, with Alexander shooting Alma by mistake instead of Gustav. The first scene in Act II consists of some rather pleasant pure-dance divertissements for an ensemble. The short final scene depicts, none too effectively, Alexander’s obsession with a puppet of Alma after his descent into madness.
Simonov’s choreography employs a lot of undulating upper-body movements, punctuated by plenty of circling and rotation of the arms, which curiously remind one of the style of the American modern-dance choreographer Trisha Brown. However, Simonov’s vocabulary is very narrow and becomes repetitive after a while. The major weakness is that there is not enough differentiation between the main characters, who often execute similar interchangeable steps. The best part of this uneven ballet is the impassioned duets between Zemlinsky and Alma.
The leading dancers were outstanding. Islom Baimuradov danced authoritatively and was entirely compelling as Gustav Mahler. Yekaterina Kondaurova was most glamorous and alluring as his wife Alma. Maxim Zyuzin danced powerfully as Alexander, revealing a dramatic intensity not seen before in his dancing. Svetlana Ivanova was delightful in her solo.
