"As One / Rushes - Fragments of a Lost Story / Infra"

On Friday, 5 February, I attended a performance in the heart of Covent Garden, at the 150 year old Royal Opera House.  Because the immensely popular Yo Yo Ma / Emmanuel Ax concert sold out less than one hour after the tickets went on sale, we opted to see a ballet.  My classical music professor, Sabrina, was able to grab some 13.00 pound tickets at the last minute and we were set to go.

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Now to be clear, going into the performance, I had no idea what to expect. I'm not particularly into ballet, but I wasn't about to turn down a free show at the Royal Opera House.  All I knew was that the show was decidedly modern and brand new to the ballet world.  The verbose title can be explained very simply. There are three acts tied together with two 30 minute intermissions. Each act gets its own name and thus, the title becomes pretty inelegant when rattled off in mid-conversation. "As One / Rushes - Fragments of a Lost Story / Infra."

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I'm not going to detail the whole performance, but I will say that each act was very different. The first act was predictably modern, incredibly sophisticated and a little unsettling at times.  The music was very choppy, the time signatures kept changing and the dancers were never in sync.  This was clearly intentional, but it made it really difficult to watch because I never felt like I was able to comprehend everything that was happening.  At any point, anywhere on stage, there was always something my brain told me was important and that I should be looking at, but I just couldn't cram it all in my head.  The result was a brilliant display of technical ability by the dancers and one confused Andrew.  My professor, as well as other members of the class had similar reactions.

The second act couldn't have been more different from the first.  It illustrated a couple locked in a never-ending domestic dispute and the music was slower and much more emotional than the first piece.

After another 30 minute intermission, the third act began.  It was definitely my favorite because it was the easiest to watch. It still had very modern elements, this time the LED screen that formed the back wall of the stage behind the dancers portrayed people walking across a street, the dancing was much more in sync, the lighting was incredible and the music was an interesting mix of orchestral sound and fuzzy, electronic, robotic, bizarre music.

Overall, I feel like the ballet isn't really something to write home about.  Ironically, I am blogging about it haha, but it isn't something I would see on a regular basis.  I loved "As One / Rushes - Fragments of a Lost Story / Infra" mostly because of how different it was. The set struck a great balance between retro and contemporary.  The contrast between the old, lavish and incredibly ostentatious theatre (see above) and the in-your-face modern, minimalist set was almost funny. The storyline deals with very relevant issues that reflect modern society: kids having a house party in the first act, a couple locked in a domestic dispute in the second and a workaholic/solitary woman in the third.

It wasn't what I was expecting by any stretch of the imagination, I'm sure a lot of "purists" were turned off by it and that is exactly what made it so great.  It's edgy, sophisticated and definitely fit for 2010.