A Disappointing LINES Ballet Program

Having had a few encounters with the Alonzo King LINES Ballet performing with the San Francisco Symphony (SFS) in Davies Symphony Hall, I decided that it would be a good idea to see one of the company’s full evening programs. The program consisted of only two ballets separated by an intermission. Ironically, the first selection was a revival of the last LINES performance with SFS, King’s choreography for the full orchestral version of Maurice Ravel’s suite Ma mère l’Oye (Mother Goose). The intermission was then followed by the world premiere of “Ode to Alice Coltrane,” setting choreography to fifteen of the tracks from her albums.

Neither of these made for a satisfying experiences. I had hoped that the Ravel offering would fare better than it did in Davies, given that the dancers now had a full stage at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts at their disposal. However, the ballet’s greatest weakness was its departure from the rich context of narrative that Ravel’s score had provided. All that remained were the titles of the fairy tales (included in last night’s program book); but any connection to any of those titles would probably have been a fortuitous accident. Mind you, the dancers did their best to breathe a bit of life into King’s choreography; but, as I had observed in the SFS performance, that choreography “was so repetitive that felt like it was going on forever.” The best I can say is that the recording King selected for this performance could not have done better justice to Ravel’s score.

Publicity photograph of Alice Coltrane to promote her World Galaxy album (photographer unknown, public domain, from Wikimedia Commons)

Where the Coltrane ballet is concerned, I fear that I was far less prepared. My only recordings of her music date back to when she replaced McCoy Tyner as her husband’s quartet pianist. (For those that do not already know, her husband was saxophonist John Coltrane.) What I thought about her music is not relevant, however, is not particularly relevant, since King never used it for more than rhythm and tempo to support what was little more than elaborate calisthenics. As the old joke goes, this was the sort of ballet that people who like that sort of thing would like; but, after half a century of balletomania, I like to think that I have encountered better things to like!