Ballet Review

On the night of September 24th I didn’t know what to expect going into my first ballet at the National Opera & Ballet in Amsterdam. The program, Hollandse Meesters (which translates to Dutch Masters in English), was rather long – with 4 performances – but absolutely brilliant.

 

The first performance, “Episodes Van Fragmenten” (which translates to “Episodes of Fragments” in English), was a mesmerizing composition with two duos. A duo of ballet dancers, male & female, moved fluidly yet intimately with one other. Another duo of musicians, pianist & violinist, played somewhat erratically albeit with magnificent skill. The display was serenely amorous. The beautiful Violin in this piece was surely a result of its creator, Eugène Ysaÿe, who was crowned “The King of the Violin” in his day and made this piece in 1921. The combination of music and dance bred a tranquil aura of mystical romance that awed the audience as the Ballet gracefully began.

 

In any and all of the four performances, one could easily listen solely to the Orchestra, seated under the front of the stage, and find themselves thoroughly impressed; the music of the Orchestra greatly accentuated the beauty of the Ballet. It could also be deemed distracting, however: during the next piece, “Vier Letze Lieder” (which translates to “Four Last Songs in English”), as the Ballet almost became an Opera for 22 minutes. Rather than the Orchestra accentuating the Ballet, the Ballet seemed to accentuate the Orchestra! Accompanied by a female soloist singer throughout its entire duration, the talent of this singer actually forced my eyes off of the stage, and unto her, for the majority of the act. While the Orchestra always accompanied the dancers movements in the Ballet it seems that, in this instance, the Orchestra proved capable of stealing the spotlight from the ballet dancers. Richard Strauss created this musical piece in 1948 and, although the Ballet beautifully accentuated the music and vice-versa, one could easily discern that the Orchestra was actually the focal point in the second performance.

 

In the third performance, Adagio Hammerklaiver, the Orchestra played a piece by the acclaimed Beethoven while three couples of ballet dancers, each male & female, took the spotlight. Often there would be incredible symmetry between the male and females in each couple as if they were merely shadows of one another. The Orchestra accentuated the performance of the ballet dancers rather than the other way around. Both the music and the ballet were peaceful.

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Most of the performances prior to the fourth were calm and had a minimal amount of ballet dancers. However the fourth performance, Requiem, was a very fast paced and chaotic display of a multitude of dancers and some horrifying footage of poaching. As the Orchestra played the beloved Mozart the performance was very splendidly choreographed and wholly spectacular but one would usually expect this piece to have been in the middle. It seems, instead, that the most evoking and climactic performance of the ballet would come at the end.