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Dance Review

From Memphis to Arizona to Seattle, Navigating Dreams and Blues

Ballet Across America II, featuring members of Ballet Arizona in “Diversions,” at the Kennedy Center Opera House in Washington on Thursday. Credit...Brendan Smialowski for The New York Times

WASHINGTON — The questions often arise: “What is American about American ballet? What is peculiar to American ballet?” They arose formally at the Kennedy Center Opera House on Thursday evening in a post-performance discussion after Ballet Memphis, Ballet Arizona and Pacific Northwest Ballet each presented a ballet as part of the Ballet Across America season.

Peter Boal, artistic director of Pacific Northwest Ballet, could not attend because of an injury, but Dorothy Gunther Pugh and Ib Andersen, artistic directors of the Memphis and Arizona companies, both spoke, admirably. Coming from different backgrounds, they were complementary.

Ms. Pugh, who spoke modestly and objectively, concentrated on the Memphis musical traditions from which she was drawing. While acknowledging ballet’s European origins, she declined to make any sweeping statements about the characteristics of American ballet. But she encouraged Mr. Andersen, who was trained in Denmark and starred in New York before running the Arizona company, to speak on the subject.

One of his points was how technical standards in ballet have risen around the country since the 1980s, when he began to make guest appearances with various companies around America because few companies had stars of particular strength. Another was simply that whereas in Europe companies have budgets and government support and can present works with handsome scenery and costumes, “In America they can’t afford anything.” In consequence, he said, European ballet tends to be about several aspects of theatrical production.

But in America, he said, “It’s all about choreography,” He quickly added: “I don’t mind that. I think it’s nice to see dancing.”

I do too. The evening’s three ballets — “In Dreams” (2007) by Trey McIntyre, “Diversions” (2010) by Mr. Andersen and “3 Movements” (2008) by Benjamin Millepied — were indeed all about choreography, at a high level of accomplishment. Since New York has seen relatively little work by Mr. McIntyre and less by Mr. Andersen, it was particularly good to have this opportunity to watch their contrasting offerings.

“In Dreams” is set to Roy Orbison songs. Since Orbison recorded his first album in Memphis, he is part of the musical tradition that Ms. Pugh hopes to tap for her company. Calling him “the Plácido Domingo of country music,” she likened his singing to “the sound of the human heart breaking.”

Part of the interest of Mr. McIntyre’s work is that it catches fragments of that heartbreak while never trying to illustrate the songs’ words literally. The lyrics say one thing, the dance says another, but they stay in close connection both in mood and in details of phrasing. And so he negotiates the difficulty of choreographing to music so generally appealing that it might easily overwhelm most dances.

Though “In Dreams” makes its dancers look good, it’s not concerned with technical skill. It starts with, and often returns to, a striking formation whereby its five dancers travel, softly and close together, around the stage: this has a dreamlike quality. Then the way one or more dancers separate themselves from the group makes them seem characters in (or dreamers of) the dream. Even when they’re looking out front, they appear to be sightless.

A passage of footwork may suddenly tie in to a figure in the musical accompaniment, a sudden lift may catch a salient note in Orbison’s singing, a dancer may arch back on a closing chord, but much of the choreography floats around the music. In solos, duets and trios, different images of need emerge; but even though the duets are intense, it’s as if they’re happening in the traumatized unconscious. “In Dreams” — which I imagine would make more impact in a smaller theater — is distinctive, touching, and ambiguous.

Mr. Andersen’s “Diversions,” the work in this program that most employs the particular rigors of ballet, is set to Benjamin Britten’s “Diversions for Piano (Left-Hand) and Orchestra” (Op. 21). Responding to the fascinatingly changing colors of the music’s theme-and-variations structure, the choreography is formal, sophisticated, cool, with passages of brilliance for groups of male dancers and some male-female duets that occasionally disclose a surprisingly tender expansiveness. In terms of patterns, arresting images, varied use of stage space, constant changes of tone and musical attentiveness, this — using 20 dancers — is remarkably skilled dance-making.

(One brief passage irritated: a dance for six women that began with cutely perky in-and-out arm movements. The perkiness is there in that section of the music, too, but I wish Mr. Andersen hadn’t drawn my attention to it.)

Individual images stay valuably in the mind, as when a ballerina, tilted diagonally with her arms raised, traces a soft path on point around her partner. (This returns with a second couple.)

On one viewing, I’m by no means sure what expressive coherence “Diversions” has, or how satisfying it would be as a structure on repeated viewings. Are the moments of drama and poetry in the duets part of a longer thread? Or are they mere effects? But even if the answer were to disappoint on a second viewing, there’s more than enough dance content here to keep any viewer alert moment by moment, wanting to know what will happen next.

Most of the Ballet Arizona dancers here made quite different impressions from those they made in a Balanchine triple bill last weekend on their Arizona home terrain. The general standard of male dancing is higher than I had realized, for example; but it appears that Mr. Andersen’s choreography only releases his dancers’ individuality (especially that of the women) to a limited extent.

The varied tones and hues of Michael Korsch’s lighting admirably support the various moods of the ballet, but (quite unlike the Balanchine program) too seldom let us see the dancers as sharply as they deserve. It’s hard to enter the world of “Diversions” or to find how much goes on beneath its surface, but its wide range of both choreographic finesse and dance display makes me very curious to see more of this choreographer’s work.

If I say least of Mr. Millepied’s “3 Movements” — set to Steve Reich’s “Three Movements for Orchestra,” it features black, gray and white décor (by the choreographer) and costumes (by Isabella Boylston) — that’s because the Seattle-based Pacific Northwest Ballet’s performance was seen in New York in January at the Joyce Theater. It remains among the finest pieces of Mr. Millepied’s work, and confirms that his masterly handling of large groups in changing geometries is something rare.

A second viewing, though it certainly discloses more links between music and dance, doesn’t disclose any further depths in his view of human energies. But this ballet is entirely chic and never less than charming.

Ballet Across America II continues through Sunday at the Kennedy Center in Washington; (800) 444-1324; kennedy-center.org

A version of this article appears in print on  , Section C, Page 3 of the New York edition with the headline: From Memphis to Arizona to Seattle, Navigating Dreams and Blues. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

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