Thursday, October 28, 2021
On Stage: A New Pittsburgh Ballet Emerges
onStage Pittsburgh: This past weekend, Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre had more to celebrate than any other company that I’ve come across. In its season opener the company connected with the past in a tribute to former artistic director Patricia Wilde, who passed away in August, and the future with the long-anticipated reveal and the dawn of another era under the newest artistic director Susan Jaffe. Oh yes, it was also the company’s first performance at the Benedum Center in about one-and-a-half years, marking the company’s triumphant emergence after its COVID-imposed exile.
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The ballet is back in Pittsburgh to glowing reviews! This is the first time since the pandemic that they’ve been onstage, and it seems to have been a spectacle to watch. I’m especially excited to see that there were a lot of female choreographers showcased in this, because the gender diversity on the other side of the table in ballet has long been overlooked. Addressing the actual performance, the solo and duet work seemed to be the highlights of the show. The solos pushed the boundaries of ballet in contemporary pieces, executed gracefully by the leading dancers of the ballet, with group numbers highlighting the themes of community and unity that we have so dearly missed. I think the main theme connecting everything here is having a fresh start. The ballet is using new dance styles, diverse choreographers, and new people to use the pandemic as a cultural reset for the company. It seems that is exactly what they needed.
As much as I had been worried that theater may not come back in the early stages of the pandemic, I was particularly more worried about opera, ballet, and other dance companies coming back. It is easy to assume that many dance companies in our country do not have enormous budgets to work with and may have to pinch a penny here and there, so for them to survive the pandemic must have been an immense challenge. To see that the Pittsburgh ballet is not only back, but is thriving as well is incredibly exciting news. My hope is that many people will run to support the arts now that so many places are re-opening because they had the opportunity to watch online/recordings of ballets, plays, and operas during the pandemic and want to experience them live in person now. I think it would be amazing if people who had never intended in-person before became fans over lockdown and now will start a new generation of theater/opera/ballet goers.
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