The future of Cincinnati Ballet is sassy, muscular ... and still evolving at age 60

Cincinnati Ballet’s “60th Celebration” was supposed to be just what the name suggests – a gathering to sing the praises of the company’s first six decades. And it was that. But, whether by design or happenstance, Thursday’s gala ended up being much, much more.

To be expected, there was an abundance of video footage of long-departed artistic directors and dancers, of favorite performances of the past. But this was not an evening weighed down by nostalgia. Yes, it sometimes took on the feeling of a spirited lovefest. But the evening’s greatest strength was the way it showed us just how far the art form itself has come in the past 60 years.

The event quickly kicked into high gear when host Doug Bolton – the president of the Metropolitan Club – introduced “the brilliant, the dazzling, the unforgettable Ms. Victoria Morgan,” the company’s much-loved former artistic director.

But this was an evening about dance, not talk. So Morgan introduced what was to be the heart of the evening – the dancing.

First up was a pas de deux from Morgan’s production of “Romeo and Juliet.” Principal dancers Melissa Gelfin De-Poli and Rafael Quenedit showed us just what can be so remarkable about classical ballet, how it can combine elegance and restraint with unfettered passion.

But within moments, the program turned to 21st-century ballet – an excerpt from “Blake Works II (The Barre Project),” created by William Forsythe and danced by the alluring Katherine Ochoa, and “Someone Else,” by Greek choreographer Andonis Foniadakis.

We’ll get to see the full version of Forsythe’s ballet as part of the company’s “Playlist” performances this weekend, May 10-12, at the Aronoff Center. And we can just hope that we have a chance to see “Someone Else” again. The Greek-born Foniadakis’ reputation has grown markedly in the 20 years since he founded a company in Lyon, France.

But his choreography has gained a greater following in the age of social media, where his exhausting nonstop dances have been seen by millions. Now, his work has been staged by companies all over the world – Australia, Belgium, Spain, New Zealand and now, Cincinnati.

Lit chiefly by a harsh overhead light, the dancers’ faces are in deep shadows almost the entire time. So what we are left with is a blur of arms and legs, of twisting, daredevil movement as the dancers demonstrate more flexibility and muscularity than the ballet dancers of 60 years ago might ever have imagined. At times, it looked almost like an animator had been turned loose with 20 arms and 20 legs and created an organism possessed by dizzying, almost abstract movement. It was fascinating.

In the weeks leading up to the performance, there were rumors that the company might announce its new artistic director last night. But that didn’t happen. What did happen, though, is that interim artistic director Cervilio Miguel Amador took to the stage in a short piece choreographed for him by Belgian choreographer Annabelle Lopez Ochoa.

Before retiring from the stage, Amador was an audience favorite. Indeed, in a video clip of the announcement that he would be retiring, he talked about giving a final performance to thank audiences for their affection during his years onstage.

“I’m looking forward to it – my final bow,” Amador said.

But that final bow never happened. Like so many other things, what would surely have been a memorable onstage sendoff was another victim of the COVID pandemic.

In a small way, he got that opportunity Thursday night, dancing in his new interim artistic director’s costume – a black suit and open-necked white shirt. And as if the idea of the ballet being one big family hadn’t already been clear enough, Amador’s solo was accompanied by a music ensemble that included his two sisters, and he was joined for a short interlude with his wife, former company member Jackie Damico Amador, and his three small children.

Winding up the show was an epic and entertaining piece created by David Morse, principal of the Cincinnati Ballet’s Otto M. Budig Academy’s professional training division. He managed to get more than 175 performers on the stage, from beginning ballet students and students with disabilities to all the members of the Cincinnati Ballet and several dozen former members, some of whose association goes back to the company’s founding 60 years ago.

Spectacular? Definitely. But more than that, it was a reminder of how ballet is not limited to 19th-century European traditions. Though this milestone gala was expected to be a blast from the past, it was more a harbinger of a sassy, muscular, truly 21st-century version of ballet.

It is, in every way, an art form that will continue to evolve in ways that we haven’t yet begun to imagine.

This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Cincinnati Ballet is evolving into a sassy, muscular version of itself