Optimistic Joffrey Ballet returns to Bay Area
Famed company has new dances in tow and big plans for the future
In March 2020, the Joffrey Ballet was in Berkeley as part of a six-year residency program. The company gave its the last live performances at Zellerbach Hall immediately before the pandemic shut down the rest of the Cal Performances season and the entire 2020-21 lineup as well.
Now the dance ensemble will be giving its first post-pandemic live performances outside the company's home base of Chicago. When the Joffrey takes the stage Friday at UC Berkeley's Zellerbach Hall, almost exactly two years later, it will be with a joyous synchronicity celebrating how to survive and thrive despite crippling circumstances.
“What a thrill, we are coming back to the Bay Area!” company artistic director Ashley Wheater said in a phone interview.
The Joffrey Ballet has a long history with Cal Performances, beginning with annual visits in the 1970s that formed a project called Berkeley Ballets. The choreography from that time remains in their repertoire today.
As to how the troupe has fared during the shutdown, Wheater says that at the very beginning, he knew “it was not going to be a short-lived thing. We had lots of internal conversations that we needed to make a plan.” Wheater and the board of directors, chaired by Anne Kaplan, developed strategies to take the company through the next 18 months, committing to keep all the dancers employed, and raising more than $12 million to make that happen.
The artistic director also relates that “we kept all of our Academy classes open online for the first four months. We were able to teach in the studio from September 2020. The protocols we put in place were pretty strict. Everybody really responded and respected all of the guidelines.”
The Academy also has a junior company component in which, Wheater says, “we have an ongoing program called `Winning Works,' which is a platform for ALAANA (African, Latinx, Asian, Arab and Native American) and BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, people of color) artists, now in its 13th year.”
Like many other dance groups that were developing choreography and shooting videos to post online, the Joffrey had to turn to its in-house dance-making talent to create streaming performances that would keep their audience engaged. After restrictions were loosened, two new ballets were presented to a live audience with an overwhelming emotional response. Those two 2021 pieces — “Under the Trees' Voices” and “Bolero” — along with the winner of the Joffrey's internal student choreographic competition will make their West Coast premieres in Berkeley.
Nicolas Blanc, formerly a principal dancer with San Francisco Ballet and currently Joffrey's ballet master, choreographed “Under the Trees' Voices” for 15 dancers. The piece explores the power of community during times of social distancing, accompanied by the late Italian composer Ezio Bosso's symphonic score. Joffrey dancer Yoshihisa Arai, also an aspiring choreographer, created his “Bolero” with Ravel's iconic score as the inspiration and accompaniment.
Chanel DaSilva won Joffrey's 2020 Winning Works Choreographic Competition for her “Swing Low,” set to a cello and electronics score by Bay Area composer-performer Zoë Keating. The spiritual “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot,” inspired this work for five male dancers. It investigates the supernatural majesty of angels and the complexities of what it means to be human.
And because everyone needs some laughter these days, the weekend program includes Israeli choreographer Itzik Galili's delightful trio “The Sofa” (1994), which features music by Tom Waits and takes place entirely on a vinyl-upholstered couch. Rounding out the program is a piece by Joffrey co-founder Gerald Arpino, the classic “Birthday Variations” (1986), set to music by Verdi.
Joffrey Ballet's future, despite all the current limitations and uncertainty, hasn't been neglected. Wheater is optimistic in the face of the continuing uncertainty.
”I've already planned the next five years and presented those plans to our finance committee and executive board and we have the green light,” he says. “There will be new commissions for fulllength works and repertory work, collaborations with other organizations and touring. The next five years for the Joffrey looks incredibly healthy, as well as artistically exciting.”