THE VERSATILITY OF THE SMUIN BALLET
                    With Seiwart's New Country-Western Work 
<>                                              By Paul Hertelendy 
        artssf.com, the independent observer of San Francisco Bay Area music and dance 
                                                                 Week of Sept. 25-Oct. 2, 2011
                                                                  Vol. 14, No. 10
            The Smuin Ballet may indeed be the most commercial of our dance companies stylistically. But how well they do it!---The spirit, the animation,  the pop flavor, all coming from the same performers who did real ballet along with serious, reflective pieces on the same program.
            So, four years after the death of the mercurial founder-choreographer Michael Smuin, his troupe retains his vision of a multi-versatility ensemble that can change its spots as fast as you change a CD in your player, under the artistic direction of Celia Fushille.
            In its current Palace of Fine Arts home-town run (Sept. 23-Oct. 1), the Smuin Ballet is offering a tango exhibition, a new pop entertainment by Amy Seiwart, the hauntingly beautiful “Stabat Mater” and the sexy duo “Eternal Idol.”
            The only non-Smuin opus, Seiwart’s “Dear Miss Cline,” uses the candid country-western songs of love and heartbreak by Patsy Cline, in the style of Grand Ole Opry. The cavorting of just-plain-folks in bright costumes is captivating, capped by the giant heartthrob Jonathan Dummer and his occasionally high-flying  foil Jane Rehm. The clever songs on love, sex, frustration  and infidelity accompany hoe-downs, reels and toe-tappers danced by an ingratiating young cast.
            The other works---all Smuin’s---are capped by the somber eloquence of the memorial piece “Stabat Mater,” where the falling women  convey the sense of loss and resulting mass grieving. Here the most expressive of the Smuin dancers, Erin Yarborough-Stewart, emerges as the embodiment of the emotion, an ardent free spirit in a romantic work set to Dvorak’s liturgical music. With the macho partner John Speed Orr, who reminds you of certain Soviet émigrés of the past, she plays out the revival from tragedy with the balm of love, albeit with considerable risk. She is held on high, then tumbles toward the floor,  caught at the last moment by Orr darting out from behind a crowd. Stunning.
            “Tango Palace” is social dancing, but also with risk----you figure, any minute a male swain might be impaled by a spike heel kicked up by the ladies with wide open dresses, allowing full mobility (and view) of the legs. And at intermission, the lobby underlined the Argentine/bandoneon experience with added tango exhibitions.
            (Unless you are a true night owl, don’t go to Buenos Aires to catch tango in the clubs; they don’t get even started until 1 a.m.!)
            “Eternal Idol,” inspired by Rodin’s sculpture “The Kiss,”  is a sexy, lurid interplay of a couple in body stockings, a bit like two crustaceans making love at the bottom of the ocean.
            All the music is prerecorded.
            Smuin  Ballet in works by Seiwart (new) and Smuin, through Oct. 1. Palace of Fine Arts, San Francisco. For info: (415) 556-5000, or go online. 

        ©Paul Hertelendy 2011
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           Paul Hertelendy has been covering the dance and modern-music scene in the San Francisco Bay Area with relish -- and a certain amount of salsa -- for years.
    These critiques appearing weekly (or sometimes semi-weekly, but never weakly) will focus on dance and new musical creativity in performance, with forays into books (by authors of the region), theater and recordings by local artists as well.
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