Ailey Opens Tonight!

November 27, 2012

The curtain goes up on Ailey’s season at New York City Center tonight—an exciting gala evening that’s just a taste of what’s to come. During the next month or so, the company, in its second season under Robert Battle, will perform a smattering of premieres and beloved works.

 

We can’t wait to see the Ailey dancers tackle Petite Mort, the company’s first acquired work by the masterful Jirí Kylián (and according to this fabulous Time Out New York interview, our 2011 “25 to Watch” Yannick Lebrun can’t wait to dance it either). We’re also very much looking forward to Kyle Abraham’s premiere Another Night (see our December issue, out now, for Siobhan Burke’s interview with this terrific/prolific choreographer) and Garth Fagan’s From Before—Ailey will be the first company to dance this beautiful piece other than Fagan’s own. Works by Battle, Ohad Naharin, Camille A. Brown, Paul Taylor, and, of course, Ailey are also scheduled. And there are special evenings planned for two women who have been instrumental to the Ailey family—Sharon Gersten Luckman, the company’s longtime executive director who steps down this year, will be feted on Dec. 4, and Ailey prima Renee Robinson, in her final season, will be celebrated on Dec. 9. (We’ll have our own party for Robinson next Monday, when we honor her with a Dance Magazine Award.)

 

See the full schedule of Ailey’s performances here. And enter here to win a pair of tickets to the Dec. 11 performance of Ailey’s Streams, Ulysses Dove’s Vespers, Battle’s In/Side and The Hunt, and the unveiling of the company’s new production of Ronald K. Brown’s Grace.

 

Jermaine Terry and Yannick Lebrun in Ailey’s
Memoria. Photo by Andrew Eccles, Courtesy Ailey.