Program
Masters at Work: Balanchine & Robbins I
APR 19, 20, 21, 23 mat, 26
Performance Dates
Steeped in Tradition, Rich with Invention: Two Masterpieces by NYCB’s Originating Choreographers
Ballets from the Company’s founding choreographers make for a unique pairing. Balanchine’s enchanting Serenade, famously the first ballet he created in America, danced to an all-strings composition from Tschaikovsky, has long been a staple of the international repertory. The Goldberg Variations, created by Robbins in 1971, uses the full Bach piano score of the title to illustrate the potentially infinite variety of classical choreography, in a two-part ballet that bridges the baroque and the contemporary, the high-spirited and the formal, the romantic and the mysterious.
Ballets on this Program
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Serenade
The first ballet Balanchine choreographed in America is a romantic work of immense sweep, set to a transcendent Tschaikovsky score.
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The Goldberg Variations
A testament to Robbins’ unceasing invention, The Goldberg Variations is a choreographic tour de force that pays homage to Bach’s epic score by unifying the traditions of classical and modern movements in one monumental ballet.