Nina Ananiashvili Serves Up Seven-Course Ballet Feast at Jacob's Pillow

The State Ballet of Georgia

By: Ken Ross - Jun 25, 2010

Nina Ananiashvili performing with the State Ballet of Georgia. (Photo by Lado Vachnadze)

World famous ballerina Nina Ananiashivili and the State Ballet of Georgia are peforming this week at Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival in Becket. (Photo by Nancy Ellison, courtesy of American Ballet Theatre)

You’re a superstar athlete playing for the biggest, most famous team in your sport. Now imagine leaving the New York Yankees or Manchester United to play and manage a small, unknown team in Argentina or Finland. Sound far fetched?

Basically, that’s exactly what ballerina Nina Ananiashvili did in 2004, when the former Bolshoi ballerina and member of American Ballet Theatre in New York City left to become the artistic director and a dancer in the State Ballet of Georgia, the former Soviet country where Ananiashvili grew up before being sent to an elite ballet school in Moscow. The ballerina is so popular, the group often tours under the name Nina Ananiashvili and the State Ballet of Georgia. That’s how they’re billed this week at Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival in Becket.

But for those who think the ballet company revolves around Ananiashvili, think again. Luckily, Nina does not have a massive ego and has generously made sure that other terrific dancers take center stage as much as her. That was certainly the case on Thursday night at Jacob’s Pillow, when the dance company presented a wide ranging and often entertaining program.

For those accustomed to seeing a single evening length work at the Pillow or other places, it’s always nice sometimes to see a program that features several short pieces. One, amazing work can be an unforgettable experience. (I still remember in awe the first time I saw a dazzling, 4 hour long work by Pina Bausch in New York.) But if you’re stuck with a piece you don’t like, watching dancers perform that one piece for hours can feel like an eternity. (Like another time I saw another Pina Bausch work in New York.)

I say this because if the entire program for the State Ballet of Georgia at the Pillow revolved around just the first piece on the program, it would have been a very, very long night.

The first four pieces performed by State Ballet of Georgia all featured choreography by Frederick Ashton. “Sylvia Pas de Deux” began the show, featuring dancers Anna Muradeli and Otar Khelashvili. Maybe it was the choreography. Maybe it’s because they went first. Whatever the reason, Khelashvili looked stiff the whole time he was dancing. Muradeli was better, especially when the dance occasionally required her to leap in the air. But the couple never really looked like a couple. They looked like two, tense teenagers afraid to touch each other. Which is not what you want to see when two dancers are dancing a love scene together.

Luckily, dancer Nino Ochiauri saved the show in the second piece, “La Chatte.” Dressed in white from head to toe, Ochiauri utterly charmed the audience as she pretended to be a cat cavorting around the stage. The solo sounds silly, but it takes real talent to pull off a humorous, light-hearted solo without descending into kitsch. Ochiauri did just that, saving the show from slipping down a slippery slope.

Then again, the third piece featured Ananiashvili herself, dancing a duet with David Ananeli. Set to Jules Massenet’s lush “Thais,” the piece simply titled “Thais Pas de Deux” reminded people why Nina remains one of the world’s best ballerinas. Like any great artist or world-class athlete, Nina makes the impossible look easy. Her arms and legs hold a line perfectly. She flows from one movement to the next effortlessly. Nothing looks choreographed. She just seems to move naturally from one foot to the next. That’s what all the great ones do. And Nina’s one of them. (Credit should also go to Ananeli for having the smarts to do his job exceptionally well but not try to upstage the dance company’s star.)

The last Ashton piece featured another duet, “Voices of Spring Pas de Deux.” Dressed like ancient Greek peasants frolicking in white in springtime, Lali Kandelaki and Vasil Akhmeteli managed to hold their own after following up the evening’s star attraction. Definitely not a great position to be in, but the pair pulled off because of their light-hearted, easy-going dance style. You could almost imagine the pair frolicking around on stage as Frank Sinatra sings, “You Make Me Feel So Young.” This is how two dancers pretending to be in love are supposed to dance. The illusion disappeared and you believed they were a couple out dancing together and just having a great time.

The next piece, “Duo Concertant” by George Balanchine, features two dancers on stage with a pianist and violinist. Like many of Balanchine’s pieces, it’s a stark, angular work that requires sharp, precise moves. Dancers Nino Gogua and Sebastian Kloborg did just that, executing the piece with a perfection that Balanchine would have loved.

The last two pieces were large ensemble works. The first, “Bizet Variations Pas de Six” by Alexei Ratmansky, was created specifically for the ballet company in 2008. Ratmansky serves as the Artist-In-Residence for American Ballet Theatre. The piece was interesting, but seemed to lack any focus. Then again, most people - like myself - were probably more focused on Ananiashvili dancing in the piece and simply lost track of the other five dancers.

The last piece, “Falling Angels,” was a dramatic, modern departure. Featuring the rhythmic, repetitive music of Steve Reich and propulsive choreography of Jiri Kylian, the eight women dressed in black finished off the night with a powerful, primitive piece that looked like a modern update of the pagan dancing in “The Rite of Spring.” The piece wasn’t my favorite of the night. A bit too repetitive at times. But who’s complaining. There were so many pieces to chose from in this seven-course, evening-long feast of world-class dancing.

www.jacobspillow.org

Ken Ross has been writing professionally about dance since 1998. He lives in Western Massachusetts