Saturday, November 7, to feature dance from around the world

By NJB on Monday, September 14 2009

The season opener at The Community Theatre will be a virtual world tour of dance, which will take New Jersey Ballet to China, Cuba, Brazil, France, Russia and the United States.

 

Highlights include the world premiere of The Three Riddles of Turandot, a new ballet by acclaimed Chinese-American choreographer Nai Ni Chen. The new work will explore the classic tale of a princess, her would-be suitor and the riddles that hold the key to her heart. 

 

Also on the program, the revival Guajira by Cuban-born choreographer Pedro Ruiz brings back echoes of last season’s Ballet with a Latin Beat evening. Ruiz weaves together memories of childhood visits to his grandfather‘s farm with his own experience of life in the Cuban countryside and sets the whole in motion to a medley of Afro-Cuban and Latin music.  After the NJ premiere with NJB in 2008, the Star-Ledger cheered “Viva ballet Latino!”

 

Introduced at the very end of last season, James Kinney’s March will step up to a wider audience. The high-energy, high-stepping all-American work originally debuted at Lincoln Center’s Clark Theater and received its New Jersey premiere at New Jersey Ballet’s spring performance at bergenPAC. March peers into the lives of busy New Yorkers whose chance encounters transform a walk in the park into an adventure.

 

Rounding out the world tour will be a return of Para Dois, the popular high octane duet is based on traditional Brazilian street dances and performed by dancer/choreographer Junio Teixeira and Ana Luiza Luizi, and Le Corsaire pas de deux which manages to include two different countries of origin:  the French original by Joseph Mazilier with music by Adolf Adam and the Russian re-working  by the prolific dance maker Marius Petipa.  

 

Curtain is at 8:00 p.m .