Ballet de Lorraine

Instantly Forever

Season 2023/2024

Instantly forever…

The art of dance, the great laboratory of time and space, should be allowed its inherent moving and reshaping to be unfixed. We should not expect dance to fit into a preconceived aesthetic, thereby dulling its’ ephemeral nature and its signifying power as an art form – the just lived moment. Allow for change, allow for a consistent platform for creation.

Dance is often seen as the ephemeral artform. But wait a minute… we are still here and still practicing every day. This means that the instant moment, the ephemerality of the artform becomes in every practicing dancer’s body, its opposite – permanent; continuously reviving and carrying it to the future. The exclusivity of this fragile, not weak, form of transmission of an artform, needs to be supported!

Instantly - remain in the moment ask the questions that need to be asked today.
Forever - stand the test of time, by presenting possibilities for the future.

These dynamic words placed together allow for a situation where we can engage with the past, present and future at the same time. With this in mind, we have commissioned no fewer than five new works. Our guests come from near and far with another mother tongue and with it another culture and maybe, a different way of seeing or evaluating what dance can be and what importance the choreographic arts continue to play in our society. But, all have that one common project… the enchanting pursuit of all the fascinating things that can be created for the stage.

Tickets

Program 1

An evening that will take us to the other side of the Alps, to discover the work of two choreographers from Italy (and more!). Marco Berrettini, an Italian born in Germany and now working in Switzerland, will present Songlines, a piece that asks questions about our relationship to sedentism: why is Man the most restless and dissatisfied of animals? Why do nomads view the world as perfect, while settled people are constantly trying to change it? Songlines is a piece that will try to find answers, through choreography. A dance performed in a magical space, consisting of force fields, sacred places and points of light, in which our outer and inner lives are One.

Michele Di Stefano’s SIERRAS - Atmospheric dances shows us his vision of dance as a happy accident, a coincidence that can arise in the midst of constraints. Rather than pre-written moves, the choreographer will try to create an atmosphere that could modify itself through the actions of a group of dancers, seen as an organism with its own intelligence, and capable of reinventing itself. A dance made of probabilities more than certainties, opening up new horizons to remind us that everything is possible.

SIERRAS Atmospheric dances ^(creation)

Choreography: Michele Di Stefano
Music: Lorenzo Bianchi Hoesch

Songlines ^(creation)

Choreography: Marco Berrettini
Music: Daniel Brandt

Wednesday, November 8, 2023 at 8:00PM
Thursday, November 9, 2023 at 8:00PM
Friday, November 10, 2023 at 8:00PM
Sunday, November 12, 2023 at 3:00PM

Opéra national de Lorraine (Nancy)

Songlines - creation

Choreography : Marco Berrettini Music : Daniel Brandt

SIERRAS - Atmospheric dances - creation

Choreography : Michele di Stefano Music : Lorenzo Bianchi Hoesch

Program 2

In Instantly Forever, Petter Jacobsson and Thomas Caley explore the idea that provides the theme for the whole season: how do we stay in the present while looking to the future?
Influenced by its contrasting musical choices, Igor Stravinsky’s first movement from Symphony in three movements from 1946 and the movement Pulses from Music for 18 musicians, by Steve Reich, the dance Instantly forever yearns to occupy the sensation of anticipation, inhabiting an atmosphere of constant unpredictable change. A scene, a situation is created from fragmented images, a sort of reflection on a bygone era and overlapping temporalities. This wealth of accumulated and inherited gestures leads the piece to our saturated present, where we see the urge and push toward the ever-expanding idea of evolution, where choices are in abundance, but where an overwhelming anxiety, and hope for the future exists.

Next, with a Folia, Marco da Silva Ferreira will try to explore the notions of ecstasy, joy and trance that can materialize from a moment of dance shared by a group. La folia is a fast, exuberant Portuguese folk dance that dates back to the 15^th century and was originally danced by shepherds. Historical sources all describe a festive atmosphere where everyone lets go completely, freed of social conventions linked to gender or class. It is this idea that interests the Portuguese choreographer, who will try to interpret it by mirroring the Portuguese folia with contemporary nightclub dancing.

Instantly Forever ^(creation)

Choreography: Petter Jacobsson and Thomas Caley
Music: Igor Stravinsky, Steve Reich

a Folia ^(creation)

Choreography: Marco da Silva Ferreira
Music : Luis Pestana

Thursday, March 7, 2024 at 8:00PM
Friday, March 8, 2024 at 8:00PM
Sunday, March 10, 2024 at 3:00PM
Tuesday, March 12, 2024 at 8:00PM

Opéra national de Lorraine (Nancy)

Instantly Forever - creation

a Folia - création

Choreography : Marco da Silva Ferreira

Program 3

And finally, we pass through Argentina, before returning to France.

Ayelen Parolin, a choreographer from Buenos Aires now based in Brussels, will create Malón, a piece for the whole CCN – Ballet de Lorraine company that will attempt to integrate precision, rigor, enjoyment and letting go. In Argentine Spanish, the term malón refers to the arrival of a group of people that creates disorder. The choreographer will try to amplify and multiply movement and energy to excess, in a sort of rave party, like a tornado of absolutely joyous violence!

We then return to France with a revival of Static Shot by Maud Le Pladec. Buoyed by the success of their many performances on tour, the dancers will lead you with strength and spirit into the permanent ecstasy of this burgeoning piece in which movement never stops.