I saw New York City Ballet’s penultimate performance of Balanchine’s Orpheus. Penultimate for this season, that is. It was the second time I’d seen it this season. I hope they bring it back. One of the reasons the audience doesn’t love it is that they don’t see it enough.
Certainly it was a smash hit at the 1948 premiere, when audiences were immersed in a different ideology of ballet, much more accepting of pantomime and acculturated to narrative. As much as you want to gratify the audience, you have to keep educating it as well. It’s great if you can do both at the same e time, but you can’t always.
There were two casts this season but I saw the same cast both performances. Gonzalo Garcia was Orpheus, Sterling Hyltin was Eurydice, Peter Walker Dark Angel, Unity Phelan as Leader of the Bacchantes, and Lars Nelson as Apollo. Hallowed roles created by, respectively, Magallanes, Tallchief, Moncion, Le Clercq, and Bliss. And this season’s cast lived up to those legendary names and presences.