Momentum for Milwaukee Ballet’s Second Company

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Milwaukee Ballet’s Second Company—MBII for short—is a step between school and professional work for a select group of 18-22 year-old dancers. Milwaukee Ballet Artistic Director Michael Pink likes to say that no one in the entire Milwaukee Ballet organization works as hard as the MBII artists. In addition to roles in the main company’s mainstage shows, they perform and lead workshops for schools, senior centers, community centers, and organizations such as Children’s Hospital.

“It can be a seven-days a week job, if they want to make it so,” Pink says. “It’s a great way to learn your craft, to learn how to work together as a team, and to learn about humility. Every single little part of it contributes to the success of our organization.”

Under the title “Momentum,” MBII also offers an annual showcase for the general public. As MBII Artistic Director Mireille Favarel explains, “They need a show that features them alone, where they can shine without the main company, with pieces created really for them, and a classical repertoire that they can touch and work on for their personal goals.”

This year’s-90-minute show will be performed on Saturday, Feb. 25, at 4 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. and again on Saturday, March 4 at 4 p.m. at the company’s performance studio in the Historic Third Ward. Three dances set to original music will have their world premieres. They’ll be joined by Aurora’s Wedding, the finale of Tchaikovsky’s The Sleeping Beauty, with the classical choreography passed down from Marius Petipa’s original 19th century production recreated under Favarel’s guidance.

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Amanda Lewis is a second-year MBII dancer. At her request, Favarel let her choreograph a short piece for last year’s MBII graduation program and was so taken with the result that she asked Lewis to create a dance for “Momentum.” 

‘Unspoken’ Violence

Lewis’ new piece is titled Unspoken. “I explored the concept of domestic violence,” she says. “This piece was very personal, but I’m at a point in my life where I’m stable enough and open enough to talk about it. The fun part about choreographing is that you can put things you’ve explored yourself into dance in a different way and get something else out of it. I have amazing dancers whom I trust. They’re my peers and I knew they’d explore this freely with me.”

The music is by Milwaukee violinist/composer Allen Russell, who’ll perform it live. “Allan is amazing,” Lewis continues. “I have him start a lot of the music on a dancer’s cue. Finding a language to get across what I wanted to say, but also letting him have artistic freedom with the music, was a process. But we got there, and it’s beautiful, and the dancers love it.”

Calvin Hilpert is MBII’s Rehearsal Director and a teacher in Milwaukee Ballet’s several training programs. He choreographed for last year’s “Momentum” and is doing so again. His new work, Grief and Rage, he says, “is about a theft of innocence. It follows a man at a very low time in his life, an Everyman, and he essentially dives into this other dimension where he confronts these emotions. The piece started as a pure investigation of the emotions with two women dancers. My goal was to create pure movement from those states. These are young artists, new in their careers. I wanted to provide them an opportunity to really go deep in front of an audience.”

Then Favarel suggested that he add a resolution. “So I introduced a third section,” he continues. “It evolved into a story with three dancers. My hope is that the movement is evocative enough that audiences can really feel it in their own bodies and feel open and vulnerable enough to place their own story on the dancers. I wrote a text that’s recorded, and the music of the third section is all my doing, and I weaved in music from other creators throughout.”

Power of Ensemble

Light, Dark, and In-between, the third premiere, marks the return of Kristopher Estes-Brown, a former MBII dancer who’s choreographed many MBII pieces. According to Favarel, his new one “explores the power of the ensemble and the space each individual must carve out though the chaos.”

Rehearsal director Hilbert describes it this way: “It explores the idea of work before and after the pandemic, and how work has changed in our bodies. How before the pandemic we were in this constant hamster wheel rat race, and how we’re approaching things differently now. It showcases all twenty-one dancers. It’s incredibly powerful and vibrant, with all-new music composed by him.”

Aurora’s Wedding also features every dancer. Favarel calls it, “a pure, beautiful, fairy tale classical ballet gem with Fairies, Puss ‘N Boots, Bluebird, the Precious Stones, and the famous Grand Pas de Deux for the wedding couple.”

Performances are at the Baumgartner Center for Dance, 128 N. Jackson St. Visit milwaukeeballet.org or call the Milwaukee Ballet Box Office at 414-902-2103.

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