Opening Ballet BC’s 2024/25 season Nov. 7-9 is the world première of Dawn, from French choreographer Pierre Pontvianne. Also featured in the season opener are Heart Drive, from Dutch choreographic duo Imre and Marne van Opstal, with music by Israel-born Amos Ben-Tal, and Frontier, by British Columbia’s own Crystal Pite.
Dawn is Pontvianne’s first work for North American audiences. Known for defying genre and expectation, his movement language is intimate and organic, with a strong capacity for political resonance.
The primal and electric Heart Drive, which had its world première in the 2022/23 Ballet BC season, returns to the stage, inviting audiences to acknowledge the fundamental energies we all possess, energies that allow us to form bonds by entertaining our fantasies of love, commitment and pleasure.
Rounding out the program, Pite’s Frontier is the characterization of dark matter, the personification of shadows. “As a creator, I find a pleasing parallel between what we don’t know about the universe, and what we don’t know about consciousness,” said Pite. “Creation, for me, is about venturing into unknown territory and being in a generative relationship with doubt.” Featuring the full Ballet BC company, this is a rare chance to experience a large-scale work by Pite.
The season continues March 6-8 with an evening featuring a world première by Bogota-born, Montreal-based Andrea Peña, winner of the 2024 Ballet BC Emily Molnar Emerging Choreographer Award; Swedish choreographer and longtime Ballet BC collaborator Johan Inger’s PASSING, set to an original score by Ben-Tal, as well as selections from Erik Enocksson and Moondog, which was commissioned by Ballet BC in the 2022/23 season; and a new commission from Spanish choreographer Fernando Hernando Magadan.
The season closes May 8-10 with a piece created for Ballet BC by Bobbi Jene Smith and Or Schraiber, alums of Israel’s Batsheva Dance Company, founding members of the American Modern Opera Company and current artists-in-residence with LA Dance Project. The duo is known for reflecting everyday experiences through their intense, unexpected and expressive creations, and for their reverence of and collaborations with the world of cinema.
The closing program also features a remount of German choreographer Marco Goecke’s Woke Up Blind, in which seven dancers move through a world of sound highlighted by the guitar licks and vocals of late American musician Jeff Buckley; and a world première by Ballet BC artistic director Medhi Walerski, who is known for movement language that embodies the essence of the human spirit through intimate partnering and dynamic group work.
Royal Winnipeg Ballet returns this season, bringing Nutcracker to Queen Elizabeth Theatre Dec. 13-15 and, for the first time, Surrey’s Bell Performing Arts Centre (Nov. 23-24). And Ballet BC Annex returns, a collaboration with Arts Umbrella and Modus Operandi that tours regionally, bringing performances and workshops to schools across the province. The main company will also tour, performing large ensemble works, such as Pite’s Frontier, Shahar Binyamini’s 50-dancer BOLERO X and Walerski’s Chamber, in cities such as Montreal, Ottawa and Los Angeles. The company will continue its MOVE adult classes, and series in dance, pilates and yoga.
For more information, visit balletbc.com.
– Courtesy Ballet BC