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La La La Human Steps Steps Into The OC
Talia Evtushenko and William Lee Smith of La La La Human Steps. Photo courtesy of the company.
The Canadian company La La La Human Steps brings the U.S. premiere of its newest evening-length work, New Work, down to the Barclay Theatre in the OC on Thursday night. Choreographed by much heralded company artistic director Edouard Lock, this new post-modern ballet is inspired by classic Greco-Roman love stories and is set to a score by renowned composers Gavin Bryars and Blake Hargreaves.Created in honor of the company’s 30th anniversary, Lock’s rapid-fire movement, exceptional performers and, what promotional materials refer to as “hyper-dynamic choreography,” re-envisions the ageless narrative sources from whence the ideas gelled (Dido and Aeneas and Orfeo and Eurydice).
La La La Human Steps has been seen in L.A. fairly regularly over the past 30 years, though with lots of space between the events. Lock’s ballets are technical and abstract, eye-popping in their speed and the dancers’ dexterity. There are lots of women (and sometimes men) en pointe, wizardly corporeal invention and gesture taken to its physical extremes.
A European review of New Work refers to its “great depth, subtlety, range of movement and emotional resonance” and says the 90-minute piece “could well be Lock’s finest creation.” Accompanied by a score performed live by a quartet of piano, viola, cello and saxophone, it bears serious attention.
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