CITIE BALLET NOW BALLET EDMONTON
Company takes on new name, partnership, director
So long Citie Ballet.
Hello Ballet Edmonton. The city’s oldest contemporary ballet company has re-positioned itself with a new name and several new professional associations.
As the former Citie Ballet – now Ballet Edmonton – takes a name change, the company will also start a new partnership with the Fine Arts & Communications Faculty at MacEwan University involving a performance space and other possible collaborations.
Finally, Ballet Edmonton has announced that one of Canada’s most acclaimed choreographers Wen Wei Wang will take over as its new artistic director for the 2018-2019 season. Details of several shows for that season were also part of a recent announcement.
On the name change, the company’s executive director Sheri Sommerville explained that the old name had inspired a bit of confusion over the years.
“As I’ve made more friends in the ballet community across the country, I realized people were always asking me where we were from so this has been percolating for a while. We want to proudly say to the city, ‘We are your ballet company,’ and with all these other changes it seemed like the right time to change the name itself.”
The proximity of the new MacEwan arts building Allard Hall in the downtown area was part of the inspiration for Ballet Edmonton’s new partnership with the university. Located on 104 Avenue, MacEwan’s Allard Hall is just a few blocks from the company’s rehearsal studios in the Ruth Carse Centre for Dance on 107 Avenue.
Sommerville touched on a possible association with MacEwan last year in conversations with Allan Gilliland, dean of the university’s Fine Arts and Communications Faculty. As she explained, the partnership means there’s a new permanent performance space for Ballet Edmonton in Allard Hall’s new 415-seat Triffo Theatre, but there’s much more to the agreement.
“We want to explore original music and design and ways to incorporate more of the arts into the ballet, and what better way to do it than with the young, brave artists at MacEwan. In return, we want to contribute to the arts community at the university.”
Their close proximity will ease the logistics for possible workshops or collaborations tied to the dance company’s presentations, which might include original lighting, sound and set design, original music scores, graphics, workshops in choreography or possibly even a full ballet narrative. A short series of works by the dancers themselves will take place in Allard Hall’s black box theatre lab.
“One of the beautiful things about contemporary ballet is that we’re not constrained by any model. We can do whatever we want. That’s the most exciting thing. It’s all possible and we hope to build relationships with MacEwan’s staff so that they can use us as a tool in their programs.”
Sommerville points out that dance is also being recognized around the world as part of wider physical health programs for both children and seniors in particular. Movement classes for seniors or individuals with cognitive movement issues are another possibility.
“We will be working with MacEwan to get that message out to the broader public,” said Sommerville.
For his part as dean of MacEwan’s Fine Arts and Communications Faculty, Gilliland is happy to welcome the partnership with Ballet Edmonton.
“Since the arts faculty moved downtown we’ve been looking for more ways that the university could interact with the community,” Gilliland explained.
“This seemed like a natural opportunity that presents some very interesting opportunities for collaboration.”
In its previous guise as Grant MacEwan College the school once offered dance training at the Jasper Place Campus but that program closed in 2005.
Gilliland says a variety of initiatives are under consideration as the new partnership evolves.
“There could be collaborations between the dance company and students in theatre production or possibly in training music students to be piano accompanists for dance, just for a start. There are a few possibilities that are still in the developing stages.”
Several new shows are scheduled starting with Where We Are, Nov. 2-4, followed by I’m Still Here in March 2019, and Now I Know in May 2019.
The opening program Where We Are will introduce a series of works by incoming artistic director and chief choreographer Wen Wei Wang.
Wang became a professional dancer in his native China back in 1978 and eventually immigrated to Canada in 1991. He joined the Judith Marcuse Dance Company, Les Grand Ballet Canadiens, and Ballet BC before forming his own company Wen Wei Dance in 2003. Since then his original shows have toured across Canada and internationally, while the choreographer has also worked with the San Francisco Opera on Nixon In China, and with several top theatre and dance companies in China.
Sommerville first met up with Wang last year and invited him to present a program of his works with Edmonton Ballet. Once the company ’s previous creative head Jorden Morris announced his intention to move on, she wondered if the Vancouver-based choreographer would consider a more extended position here. Wang will continue to live on the West Coast but he’s ready to split his time with Edmonton Ballet. To enable all this, Edmonton Ballet will also introduce two new positions, rehearsal director Karissa Barry and guest teacher Emily Noton.
Further details on Edmonton Ballet’s upcoming season can be found at the company’s newly retooled website balletedmonton.ca.
Citie Ballet started out as what Sommerville calls a “pre-professional” company in 1998, meaning that its dancers were paid a small honorarium. The company moved to full, professional nonprofit status with paid salaries in 2012, shortly after Trudy Callaghan (now chair of the company ’s board) took over from original founding president Lynn Mandel.
“They both agreed it was time that such an arts-based city had its own ballet company,” explains Sommerville. “People don’t always understand what that involves but in a professional company, for the artists, that means ‘this is your job.’ We are providing jobs so that Canadian dancers can stay in Canada. They all have to meet a certain criteria but if we can find Alberta dancers, we are especially happy.”
Heading into its next season Ballet Edmonton will host eight dancers, four men and four women.