Ballet BC: the strength of the group

(Québec) CRITICAL / Three pieces, various registers, but a common element: the strength of the group. The Vancouver-based company Ballet BC arrived in Quebec City on Tuesday with a powerful trio of well-defined choreographic works. Too bad the Salle Louis-Fréchette of the Grand Theater was sparse.

In opening, in 16 + a room, the choreographer and artistic director of the company, Emily Molnar, transported us into a rather abstract world where movements are king. And what movements! The whole body was involved in gestures of arms and legs of great amplitude. The numerous movements on stage kept the eye of the viewer awake. Molnar has worked extensively on the groupings of dancers, sometimes in duos mixing the sexes or in larger swarms, which interlocked cohesively with each other.

The seven men and six women, wearing pointed shoes, were twinned in steps of two to the desired aesthetic. The music, at times shrill, became annoying to the ears.

The sublime of Solo Echo

No problem with the soundtrack of the second work, Solo Echo, which put forward the composer Brahms. The choreographer Crystal Pite has created a small jewel visually in terms of both the decor and the beauty of the gestures. For the creation, first dedicated to the Nederlands Dans Theater, Pite relied on Mark Strand’s poems Lines for Winter, whose stanzas inspired the idea of ​​dropping snowflakes on the stage throughout the room. In spite of its title, Solo Echo brought out the union of the dancers, very present for each other. A sweetness emanated from the whole despite some accents of tension here and there. A magnificent work.

Bill’s madness

The last piece of the evening, Bill, made us take a 180 degree turn. The Isarlian choreographers, Sharon Eyal and Gai Behar, obviously let their madness run free. Dressed in flesh-colored unitards, the dancers moved like birds in audacious, original and dramatic movements. A delicious dessert at the end of a meal of high class.

Ballet BC was in Quebec only for one night.