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DanceSeptember 2007 Just the way he was by Laura Jacobs On George Balanchine and "Symphonie Concertante." When George Balanchine’s Symphonie Concertante was revived in 1983, it had not been seen since 1952, the year Balanchine let it drop from the New York City Ballet repertory. It was American Ballet Theatre that brought the work back to the stage, not, as one would expect, the New York City Ballet. And it was a ballet that even in its day divided viewers: you either got it (Edwin Denby: “delicate girlish, flower-freshness”) or you didn’t (John Martin: “perhaps Balanchine’s most boring work”). Because of these facts, the revival of Symphonie Concertante was controversial. Why was the ballet going to ABT, a company that couldn’t hope to perform it as young Balanchine dancers had? And if Balanchine chose to let it go, some argued, why shouldn’t we? After all, he’d choreographed it as a one-off for a single student performance in 1945, a program with the National ... This article is available to subscribers and for individual purchaseSubscribe to TNC (Print and Online editions) Subscribe to TNC (Online only) This article originally appeared in The New Criterion, Volume 26 September 2007, on page 31 Copyright © 2009 The New Criterion | www.newcriterion.com http://www.newcriterion.com/articles.cfm/Just-the-way-he-was-3595
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by Laura Jacobs On the American Ballet Theater, the New York City Ballet & Veronika Part. by Laura Jacobs On Alexei Ratmansky, Rabbit and Rogue at American Ballet Theatre, and Jupiter Symphony at Pennsylvania Ballet. by Laura Jacobs On American Ballet Theatre's Sleeping Beauty at the Metropolitan Opera House, New York.  The New Criterion is now optimized for Mobile Devices 
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