ABT 2017 - Don Quixote

Last Friday was my first ballet of the season!  Oh, happy day of days!  My regular subscription day is Monday, but I had a work thing last Monday.  I wasn't disappointed to exchange my ticket, though, because Friday featured one of my favorite gents, Herman Cornejo, in Don Quixote!  I'm so glad I got to see him dance Basilio, because he has flair and verve and Latin wonderfulness to the nth degree.  Unfortunately, I also saw the sad side of being a ballet dancer...

This is the third or fourth time I've seen Don Quixote - it's a pretty silly ballet, really, with lots of group pantomiming and an extremely minimal plot, but it has tons of gorgeous dancing in it.  Solos, pas de deux, and charming ensemble dancing.  I always have a grand time watching the ballet, though it's not one of the story evenings that engages me the most.  I do look forward to seeing Kitri do the crazy jete in the first act, and then seeing the wedding pas deux in the final act.  Even though I had a great time, I didn't get to see either of the things I most looked forward to, due to...I don't know. Dancer fate.

this is the leap I was waiting for (this is another ABT dancer)

Maria Kochetkova was dancing Kitri and she was mainly lovely.  Maybe not spirited enough in the beginning, but her footwork was lovely and her spins strong and secure. She didn't do the crazy jete, though.  I have to admit I was disappointed.  I guess it's a choice of the ballerina whether or not to do it? I don't know.  But I did miss it.  The photo at right is from the internet and it was what I was looking for.  Oh well. Herman Cornejo was on fire, though, from the very moment he appeared on stage. So virile, with exquisite jumps and turns.  The audience gasped several times at his virtuosity, which never seems showy, but always in tune with the character he's playing.  His miming was fun as well, and he got quite a few laughs throughout the evening.  

Sarah Lane and Luciana Paris were delightful as the flower girls, and Devon Teuscher and Blaine Hoven were terrific as Mercedes and Espada (the matador), though I did find Hoven to be a little extreme in his backbends, which made some of his poses look less like "Spanish" dancing and more like gymnastics.  But that's a quibble.  Zhiyao Zhang was fantastic as the lead gypsy dancer (but, seriously, ABT has to get rid of those Van Halen music video wigs and crop tops on the male gypsy dancers, they're ridiculous).

Devon Teuscher was also lovely as the Queen of the Dryads and made those really difficult Italian fouettes look easy and light.  Skylar Brandt sparkled AGAIN as Amour.  I tell you, that girl can SPARKLE!  She's just a delight.  The dancing was really first-rate throughout the evening (the toreadors were terrific!), though there was one gal who must've had family in the audience, because she did everything just a little bit bigger than everyone and she kept getting just a little bit closer to the lead dancers.  I will admit she distracted me a couple of times.  And then there was the end of the ballet.



The third act is the wedding, so usually Kitri and Basilio dance their very famous pas de deux and coda, which is just thrilling.  Well, the first part of the their pas de deux went well, though the first one-armed lift was a bit wobbly.  The second lift was much more secure. Maria and Herman finished this first part of the dance seemingly in fine shape, though I did notice that Herman left the stage slowly. After they danced, Sarah Lane as one of the flower girls came out and did a lovely solo.  After she exited the stage...nothing.  No music, no dancer, nothing.  Everyone kind of looked around, waiting to see what would happen, then Maria (as Kitri) peeked out of the wings with her fan and waved at the conductor.  The conductor then instructed the orchestra to skip ahead, and Maria came out to do her fan solo.  It was quite nice, with beautiful turns, but she did seem a bit rattled.  After she accepted her very nice applause, she left the stage and Luciana Paris came out as the second flower girl to do her solo.  Then, Maria came back out to finish the show, but not with Herman.  Blaine Hoven (still in his Espada the matador costume) came out and gallantly finished the pas de deux with her.  It was now obvious that Herman had injured himself somehow and couldn't finish the ballet.  A bit of Maria's spark was gone, but they did finish with as much flourish as they could muster.

The curtain call was a little subdued, and Herman didn't even come out for that.  Maria took her bows with Hoven, which was nice of him, but I think you can see from my picture above that she was very serious during curtain call.  I'm thinking she was worried about Herman, because he's her regular partner, I believe.  I spent much of the weekend looking online to see if I could find out what happened to him.  I finally saw that he injured his calf, but he doesn't think it's serious.  I hope not!  I have tickets to see him later this season!  Oh, and I felt so sorry for the little girls sitting behind me!  When the ballet was over, they asked their mom, I thought the girl loved the guy in white!  Why did she end up with the matador?!  Poor little things.  Anyway, hurray for ballet season!  Boo for injured dancers!  Hurray for more ballet coming up soon! Let's hope Herman gets well soon! :)