FORT WORTH -- Texas Dance Theatre ended its inaugural season Friday at the Scott Theatre with its best work yet.
Six dances paid homage to classic ballet, some with edgy twists. The emotion of the work, though, was often ambiguous. We were asked to feel for a couple or follow a narrative -- often inconclusively.
The concert -- by company choreographers and guest Mark Sean Panzarino from Miami City Ballet -- made plain the new company's vision for contemporary ballet.
Panzarino's Adam and Eve and God retold the Garden of Eden story with Dan Westfield and Josie Baldree. A pool of red light substituted for an apple; party balloons and wadded paper littered the floor to denote one heck of a morning after.
Emotion was stark; Baldree moved from supplication to terror; the pair bounced on tiptoe, as if manipulated like marionettes. Stage curtains rose, and the house lights came on as if to reveal the workings of the world; George Crumb's music shivered and shrieked.
Other dances implied the same emotional heaviness. Dreamers had lovely moments of partnering between Emily Hunter and Westfield. Lifts were airy but athletic; her gestures strong yet pliant. But the meaning eluded me -- was this couple happy or sad?
Hollis Hock had a wonderful turn in Duet by Elizabeth Gillaspy; her partner in a tango by Piazzolla was the ballet bar itself, a serious take on a dancer's dedication. In Krista Jennings Langford's Returning Away, three ballerinas challenged a fourth. Intricate patterns were interrupted by a repeated gesture -- palms up at the waist, then brought up to the face. Did it mean shame, sustenance or reverence?
Wil McKnight, Texas Dance Theatre's founder and artistic director, contributed Webern Variations. Its four movements were filled with ballet's basic positions, balance pristine and arms elegantly extended. The neoclassical music added sharpness to the movement, bodies moving in graceful, unhurried unison.
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