The sheer joy of Balanchine’s “Donizetti Variations,” set to melodic, buoyant ballet music from Gaetano Donizetti’s opera “Dom Sébastien,” hooks you from the moment it begins. So does the wit of the choreography, which has the intensely satisfying quality of seeming to reveal the score in all its detail, while not taking it terribly seriously.
Much of the ballet features different permutations of the ensemble of nine dancers, usually arranged in threes. In one section, three women bob up and down on pointe in arabesque; two are up when the third is down, and vice versa. The counterpoint is funny and brings attention to the accents in the music.
A romantic touch with Sarasota Ballet
The Sarasota Ballet revisits two popular works from past seasons with its fifth digital program this weekend. Ballet lovers can experience “Amorosa,” a 2019 piece by principal dancer and resident choreographer Ricardo Graziano that is being performed for the first time since its premiere. It is set to Antonio Vivaldi’s “Cello Concertos.” Also on the program is George Balanchine’s 1960 ballet “Donizetti Variations,” which is danced to music from Gaetano Donizetti’s opera “Don Sebastian.” The program is available Friday through Tuesday for $35. For more information: sarasotaballet.org/events/digital-program-5
Art museum offers pay what you can
The first program, at 6 p.m. March 5-7, will feature the Sarasota Ballet Studio Company and trainees of the Margaret Barbieri Conservatory. They will perform a revival of resident choreographer Ricardo Graziano’s “Feira de Castro,” which has not been seen since its premiere in 2013. The program also will feature excerpts from “Coppelia,” “Swan Lake” and other pieces to be announced.
The second production, offered at 6 p.m. April 29-May 1, will feature ballets created and choreographed by the women of The Sarasota Ballet and the Sarasota Ballet Studio Company and will be performed by dancers from both groups. Details on whose work will be featured will be announced later.
Everybody else was expecting more from Graziano.
“People were writing to me and saying, ‘I can’t wait to hear about all this stuff you’re creating at home.’ But I wasn’t creating anything at home,” he said. “When I decided to give myself time for body healing and mental healing, I didn’t force myself to create anything. I didn’t feel I had to do anything and then things started flowing.”
That’s the way he prefers to let new choreography develop. “I always have so many random ideas and eventually I did start thinking and planning a ballet,” he said, but he initially had no dancers to work out his vision.
Marina Harss, Correspondent
Since last October, the Sarasota Ballet has been offering virtual performances at the rate of about one per month. It’s an impressive showing, one that attests to the richness of the repertory the troupe has amassed over its 30-year existence.
Another attribute of the company is its ability to adapt to the styles of different choreographers. The dancers are un-mannered and malleable, a quality that is less common than one might imagine. The current digital program (Program 4), is a case in point: a double bill of works by the modern-dance choreographer Paul Taylor, who died in 2018.