Pacific Northwest Ballet began the season with a bang Friday, presenting one of Balanchine’s most iconic works, the three-part, evening-length ballet named Jewels. What makes this a particularly memorable revival is that PNB, with the help of a generous patron, invited to coach PNB dancers five of the legendary ballet dancers who premiered this work back in 1967: Violette Verdy and Mimi Paul who danced the lead women in “Emeralds,” Edward Villella who danced the male lead in “Rubies,” and Suzanne Farrell and Jacques d’Amboise, who led in “Diamonds.” Two dancers went to New York to work with Farrell but the others all came here.
I wish I could say that the performance Friday was equally memorable, but while the company is in general dancing on a very high level these days, it is short of star quality ballerinas with only Carla Korbes, who retires at the end of this season, a wonderful dancer to stir the blood.
Young Leta Biasucci, promoted to soloist Friday after a mere three years with the company has considerable potential. With Jonathan Porretta, a superb dancer who invests every role with drama from the inside, Biasucci danced the couple in “Rubies,” the jazziest, sassiest part of Jewels, set to music of Stravinsky. Biasucci has faultless technique and a fine musical sense. She moves beautifully, but as yet she is like an ice maiden, without the emotion which comes from inside that Porretta has in spades. She reminds me of Kaori Nakamura, the company’s great ballerina who retired last summer, in that when Nakamura arrived at PNB in the mid-1990s, she was another impeccable dancer but emotionally like a steel magnolia. She never ceased to grow and bloom through all her years here, becoming a dancer with power to convey any emotion she wanted, whether a sense of dizzy fun as Swanilda in Coppelia to the passion of Juliet in Romeo et Juliette. Let’s hope Biasucci can grow to do this also. Laura Tisserand danced the other major role in “Rubies,” perfect for her as she has such a fine sense of timing for anything syncopated.
The first of the three parts of Jewels, “Emeralds” is the hardest to dance and to put across. It is slower, set to gentler music by Faure. The group choreography is the loveliest, but the many solos and duets failed to light a spark, thought William Lin-Yee came closest and did a fine job of partnering.
Korbes with Batkhurel Bold brought her usual magic to “Diamonds,” the grandest of the three set to music of Tchaikovsky. It’s hard to think that this is the last year for this expressive dancer with exquisite technique, but she has had many injuries over the years. Bold made an excellent partner and brought his own bravura to his solos.
The performance started with a tribute to the PNB orchestra, now entering its 25th anniversary. It was built to its current eminence as the best ballet orchestra in the country (not my comment but that of New York critics) by conductor Stewart Kershaw and continues at that level under Emil de Cou. Before each performance this season, there will be an orchestral prelude. Friday’s was the finale from Tchaikovsky’s Suite No. 3 in G.
