READ TODAY'S STORIES AND E-EDITION SUBSCRIBE |  CONTACT US |  SIGN IN

Print story only Print story with comments Email Twitter Facebook Pinterest
REVIEW: Rioult
Published: 4/14/2010 5:55 PM
Last Modified: 4/14/2010 5:55 PM

The dance company Rioult Tuesday night at the Tulsa PAC performed "The Great Mass," choreographed by the company's namesake and artistic director Pascal Rioult, and set to the music of Mozart's Mass in C Minor.

Rioult – the choreographer – created this work as an homage to his late mother, a piano teacher and choir director who instilled in her son a love of music.

Yet one would think – given the impetus behind the work and the grandiose music to which it is set – that "The Great Mass" would be a ballet packing a tremendous emotional wallop.

But it doesn't. It has moments of startling beauty and episodes of obvious but still effective drama. But it remains too episodic, too abstract, to work as a whole.

Every ballet doesn't need to tell a story, but when something is billed as an "evening-length work" – implying that what one is about to see is a single, continuous piece – it helps if there is some kind of thread for the audience to follow, some element that carries them through to the end.

That doesn't appear in "The Great Mass" until the second half, when dancer Jane Sato appears above one of the strips of fabric stretched across the back of the stage, her arms wrapped in a long strip of silky fabric. It gives the impression of an angel hovering over the other six dancers on stage, and during the sequences that follow, Sato moves independently among the others, seeming to guide and encourage them in a kind of joyous yet chaste courtship.

This is the most affecting part of "The Great Mass," because it seems purposeful, that it is working toward … well, toward something.

In comparison, the first half of the piece – set to the "Kyrie" and "Gloria" sections of the Mass – was more a collection of isolated vignettes. The long silky piece of fabric appeared at the outset, first stretched over the supine bodies of the other dancers, then used to wrap Sato into a kind of shroud.

The "Gloria" began with the company engaging in much ecstatic dancing to exultant music, but the tone turned darker, with dancers writhing in a boiling pile of bodies, reaching skyward but always being dragged back down; Sato and Marianna Tsartolia contorting themselves around Robert Robinson who manages to keep a headlock on each of them; and a scene with the dancers walking in slow motion toward the edge of the stage as one female dancer dashes among them, trying to keep them from falling and ultimately failing.

Rioult's choreography in this piece is remarkably grounded – the few times dancers leap off the floor are almost startling in their rarity. And he's not concerned with a smoothly uniform, perfectly balanced look to his stage compositions. Almost as rare as leaps were the moments when the dancers moved in perfect sync. Sometimes this was a deliberate part of the choreography, other times it seemed as if the dancers were just adding a bit of their own flourishes to certain steps. And sometimes, Rioult's desire to embody various vocal lines in movement created not visual harmony but discord.

The audience Tuesday night was greatly impressed by "The Great Mass," giving Rioult and the dancers a standing ovation.


Reader Comments


To post comments on tulsaworld.com, you must be an active Tulsa World print or digital subscriber and signed into your account.

ARTS

James D. Watts Jr. has lived in Oklahoma for most his life, even though he still has people saying to him, "Don't sound like you're from around these parts." A University of Oklahoma Phi Beta Kappa graduate, Watts has received the Governor Arts Award, Harwelden Award and the National Conference of Christians and Jews Beth Macklin Award for his writing. Before coming to the Tulsa World, Watts worked for the Tulsa Tribune.

Contact him at (918) 581-8478.

Subscribe to this blog


Archive

 
James D. Watts Jr's Blog Archive:

2/2013  1/2013  12/2012  11/2012  10/2012  9/2012  
8/2012  7/2012  6/2012  5/2012  4/2012  3/2012  
2/2012  1/2012  12/2011  11/2011  10/2011  9/2011  
8/2011  7/2011  6/2011  5/2011  4/2011  3/2011  
2/2011  1/2011  12/2010  11/2010  10/2010  9/2010  
8/2010  7/2010  6/2010  5/2010  4/2010  3/2010  
2/2010  1/2010  12/2009  11/2009  10/2009  9/2009  
8/2009  7/2009  6/2009  5/2009  4/2009  3/2009  
2/2009  1/2009  12/2008  11/2008  10/2008  9/2008  
8/2008  7/2008  6/2008  5/2008  4/2008  








Home | Contact Us | Search | Subscribe | Customer Service | About | Advertise | Privacy
Copyright © 2013, World Publishing Co. All rights reserved.