Dance:

...The ballet celebrates youth, infatuation, and playfulness with the sophistication and warmth that characterize Ashton's work at its most felicitous level...

...Susan Jaffe, quite clearly one of the company's most promising young dancers, was paired with Christine Spizzo to lead the corps in this lushly romantic ballet...

...The divertissements in "Raymonda" have less of the choreographic cohesion of "Jardin Anime" but again one was struck by the superlative work of the corps...

...Baryshnikov danced extraordinarily well throughout the season, demonstrating that his additional duties have not diminished the quality of his performance...

...Throughout the season they met the demands placed on them and are obviously being shaped to resemble the type of corps dancing that prevailed at the Kirov, which is the model Baryshnikov presumably wishes to emulate...

...It remains strong at the principal level, has pushed forward soloists such as Warren Conover, Miss Wright, and Miss Yeager, and brought out corps members, most notably Miss Jaffe...

...The twentieth century revivals have on the whole had far the better of it...

...Swan Lake" now has its emphasis focused on the conflict between the innocent Prince Siegfried and the evil magician Von Rotbart almost as a mano a mano confrontation rather than the by-product of the Prince's love for the bewitched Swan Queen...

...At times the company has emphasized its "Americanness...

...La Fille Mai Gardee" (Pas de deux from Act I) is a vehicle for display dancing and worked well for Rebecca Wright and George de la Pena as did the "Pas de Trois" for Cheryl Yeager, Peter Fonseca, and Lisa de Ribere...

...The work demands clarity and precision and was beautifully danced...

...However, the cohesiveness and strength of the group is what dominates the scene and makes the most lasting impression...

...The company's stock of nineteenth century ballets, "Giselle," "Sleeping Beauty," and "Swan Lake," have all been re-examined with an eye toward decreasing mime passages and emphasizing their pure danced elements...

...Afternoon of a Faun'' is the only one of Nijinsky's three ballets to survive and deserves a place in active repertory...

...The task of preparing others of the works presented may have precluded mounting the full production and only time will tell whether the approach will have any success with this classic...

...Ashton's "Les Rendezvous" flutters along with social butterfly gracefulness...

...This has included both nineteenth and twentieth century works with the balance being determined somewhat arbitrarily...

...This shift in approach is associated with the development of ballet in the twentieth century and Fokine's "Les Sylphides" is its first clear and powerful example...

...DON McDONAGH...

...There is no question that they now move along with a greater impetus, in much the way that Baryshnikov's own three-act ballet, "Don Quixote" does, but much of their resonance and harmonic development required the more leisurely and, at times, diversionary pacing...

...In an effort to give us the essence of these productions Baryshnikov has come close to the distorting reductions that the "heart of the symphony" recordings once represented...

...Presently it is undergoing another self-appraisal under the direction of its new artistic head, Mikhail Baryshnikov...

...Sleeping Beauty" is represented only by its culminating last act which is a series of divertissements lacking the dramatic setting of the rest of the ballet...

...The original Bakst decor is well known and one would have thought that it would be a simple matter to recreate this in its original dazzling brightness...

...Among the nineteenth century divertissements "Jardin Anime" was by far and away the most successful...

...The ' nineteenth century works however were conceived under the older dispensation and look strangely denuded, shorn of these elements...

...The Prodigal Son" has reacquired its rough-hewn athletic vigor and "La Sonambula'' is saturated with the gothic density of horror that is its special aura...

...Taylor's "Airs" is a suite of dances for four women and three men that was originally designed for his own modern dance company but which translates wonderfully well for the balletically trained corps and soloists of American Ballet Theater...

...Its present production, however, lacks the intensity of other stagings and visually is quite muted...

...In "Giselle" the naturalistic Act I followed by the surreal, romantic Act II has lost much of its drama to begin with and much of the mystery that concludes it...

...Both of Balanchine's ballets have been restaged with their original values restored...

...At this point the only weakness is a feel for character dancing which is demanded by these excerpts...

...Future seasons will reveal the overall design...

...The repertory is still being re-examined and it is this process which has recorded mixed successes...

...It is a good variation but then so was the old one, and the substitution made little difference to the overall pacing of thev work which is too weighty for its gossamer mood...

...Of all the choreographers represented, Tudor has been least well served by the new emphasis on pure danced values since his ballets require a density of gestural nuance for full effect and this unfortunately was missing...

...The corps members carry garlands of flowers which they deploy in a variety of pleasing formations through which the soloists pass repeatedly...

...Cynthia Gregory's classic line remains one of the glories of the company as does the purity of Martine Van Hamel and Gelsey Kirkland...

...Natalia Makarova's romantic phrasing is still riveting as is the crystalline movement of Fernando Bujones...

...In recent years the corps has been strengthened, and it is apparent that Baryshnikov regards them as the bedrock upon which the whole company must stand...

...In all cases, narrative and dramatic elements have been de-emphasized in the direction of the danced, "abstract" ballet...

...It is a time of transition for the company...

...BARYSHNIKOV'S TURN A TIME OF TRANSITION DURING ITS four-decade history the American Ballet Theater has never confined itself to a single esthetic but has rather sought to present the best examples of a variety of artistic approaches...

...This past season was the first given according to his programming priorities and featured revivals of twentieth century classics such as George Balanchine's "The Prodigal Son" and "La Sonambula," Sir Frederick Ashton's "Les Rendezvous" and Paul Taylor's "Airs," as well as a revised version of Michel Fokine's "Les Sylphides," and Nijinsky's "Afternoon of a Faun...

...To these have been added divertissements, again pure danced passages, from August Bournonville's "Pas de Trois" from "The Guards at Amager," first seen in this country during the Royal Danish Ballet's appearance in 1976, Petipa's "Jardin Anime" from "Le Corsaire," divertissements from Act II and III of "Raymonda," and a duet from "La Fille Mai Gardee" presumably based on Petipa's production...

...It seems especially sad since Tudor, designated as "Choreographer Emeritus" in the program, is one of the founding masters of the company and of the development of the psychological ballet...

...In addition to these productions repertory staples such as deMille's "Rodeo," Twyla Tharp's "Push Comes To Shove," Tudor's "Lilac Garden," and Robbins's "Interplay" filled out the season...

...at others it has borne a distinct "Russian'' or' 'French'' look in repertory...

...Les Sylphides" has been in repertory since the early forties when Fokine himself staged it...

...In recent years it has tended to drag a little and Baryshnikov inserted a new male variation that he knew from his days as a member of {he Kirov Ballet in an effort to add some sparkle...

...All of these artists were offered numerous challenges throughout the season and responded well...