A new twist on classics
By Casey Gillis on May. 24, 2007
With its latest show, “Ballet Today,” Dance Theatre of Lynchburg is putting a modern spin on traditional ballet.
“That’s what ‘Ballet Today’ is all about: expressing today’s views on different things, interpreting music in a completely different way,” says Keith Lee, Dance Theatre’s artistic director. “We’re really going into the laboratory, trying to come up with new stuff.”
The performance, the school’s season ender, is scheduled for 7 p.m. June 1 and 2 and 3 p.m. June 3.
It will feature four pieces, all choreographed by Lee, plus a tap piece called “Honeysuckle Rose,” which will be performed in a separate studio during intermission.
“The Garden” is set to the music of Felix Mendelssohn’s “Without Words.”
“It’s one of his most beautiful works,” Lee says.
The dance itself is “all about the seeds, and how you’re putting things in the earth,” he says. “That’s really how I look at it. … These kids are the seeds of future dance.”
“Ritual in Dance” is set to the music of George Gershwin and was first performed at Dance Theatre’s annual Leaps and Bounds show earlier this year.
“Choral Dances,” set to Franz Schubert’s “Songs for Male Chorus,” has already been performed by the Maryland Ballet Theatre, but is having its Lynchburg debut at “Ballet Today.”
The piece, which Lee choreographed last summer, is all about celebrating springtime.
“The radio was on, it was a beautiful day, and I went, ‘Oh, spring is here,’” he says of the day he was inspired to come up with it.
The last piece is called “American Cheese,” and Lee says it’s outrageous and hysterical.
“It’s the only way I can really describe it,” he says. “It’s like a comic romp set to 1960s black-and-white television classics,” like “Astro Boy,” “The Danny Thomas Show,” “Roger Ramjet” and “Tennessee Tuxedo and His Tales.”
“I just love that (theme) music,” he says. “What I did as a kid, I used to hum it all the time. I’d go around and pretend I was one of the characters.”
And that’s what he’s done, this time with Dance Theatre students, for “American Cheese.”
“It’s like the kid are playing these characters,” Lee says. “That way, it keeps it very, very honest, and it’s so funny. It’s rib-tickling.”
“I love that kind of stuff,” he adds. “It’s like, ‘Come on, let’s laugh.’”
If You’re Going
WHAT: Ballet Today
WHEN: 7 p.m. June 1 and 2 and 3 p.m. June 3
WHERE: Dance Theatre of Lynchburg, 722 Commerce St.
TICKETS: $10 for adults and $7.50 for students and seniors
INFO: (434) 846-6272
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