The Three Winners of Milwaukee Ballet’s ‘Genesis’ Competition

Each competing choreographer was summoned by her or his cast to join them in glory. It was truly a wonderful concert.

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Dance

I’m used to audiences cheering at Milwaukee Ballet performances, but I don’t think I’ve ever heard huzzahs and whoops as long and loud as those during the bows at the close of each of the three one-act dances vying for first place in “Genesis 2026.” Each competing choreographer was summoned by her or his cast to join them in glory. It was truly a wonderful concert.

A “Genesis” win is a great addition to a resumé, and the winner will return to make a world premiere here next year. Only professional choreographers currently working with respected professional dance companies somewhere in the world can apply to compete. More than 60 applied this season. Artistic Director Michael Pink’s choices, as always, were wise.

I know that a lot of the audience’s cheers were for the performers. Oh, my goodness, they were good! Of course, the choreographer also deserves credit when a cast can shine the way each group of four male and four female artists did on opening night. The ability to recognize, serve, and showcase the best in your dancers would be a factor for judges in determining the winner, and each competitor rose to that challenge. Every dancer/athlete gave their all to help their choreographer win this dance Olympic. Jason Fassl’s lighting and Mary Piering’s costumes also served each ballet beautifully.

Which Was Best?

So, which piece was best? I don’t envy the judges.

Lauren Flower currently dances and choreographs for Oregon Ballet Theatre. Her dance, Inner Symphony, addresses “the complexities, layers, and memories that shape us,” as she writes in her program note. Her dancers were a primary inspiration, as she came to know them in the short but intensely focused rehearsal period. Her full-bodied contemporary ballet choreography had them dancing as distinct individuals, meeting soul-to-soul, exploring partnerships, male-female and female-female, in almost constant physical contact. Lifts were lovingly performed. Partnerships formed and dissolved, as they do in life.  There were solos, quiet or rhapsodic, all set to wonderful piano music, including a haunting update of Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata. There was humanity in every movement. It ended mysteriously with a single woman dancing in the fading light. There might have been a story there.

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Australian-born Loughlan Prior danced and choreographed for Royal New Zealand Ballet for a decade. Now a Londoner, he choreographs internationally. His dance, Tear the Petals, was inspired by the literal petal plucking of “loves me, loves me not,” and the metaphoric “performers pulling ourselves apart on the stage,” as he writes in his program note, adding, “The shifting weight of desire, love, control and lust … are echoed by the dancers and their relationships.” The opening image of a man rolling in a pile of red petals on the floor was heavenly. As the dance progressed, those petals spread to cover the stage. This was a highly theatrical piece with lots of hot stuff, set to powerful, passionate music by Prior’s Dublin-based friend Tom Lane. Women watched as men lifted and flung one another. Women and men formed couples and partnerships quickly climaxed with lots of creative, unusual lifts. It raised constant questions like: Is this love? What is love? Technically, it was a very contemporary exploration of the possibilities of dance partnering. The final petal?  She loves me.

Julia Feldman has created works for the Sacramento Ballet annually since 2012, and since 2015 for the Capital Dance Project which she co-founded in Sacramento. Her Romantiques was inspired by the little-known music of four women composers of the 19th century Romantic era. “My hope,” her program notes say of these musical works “is to create a visual world that allows audiences to experience their richness and nuance more fully.” Her dancers’ thoughts provided further inspiration. There were five short dances separated by brief blackouts. It was probably the most classically styled ballet in Genesis, but the sensibility was contemporary. It opened with a bang: a powerful musical chord and a burst of lighting revealed dancers dressed sheer white robes.

I was touched by the fact that both the men and the women executed the same quick, graceful pirouettes, extending their arms and fluttering their hands. Feldman knew the music well. She’d have new dancers pop in just to cap a musical phrase. I’d find myself chuckling. Then, of course, a slow piece would follow with constant virtuosic lifts, such as a woman fully stretched across a man’s upper back and shoulders, athletic and graceful and spotlighted. I don’t have words or space to describe the virtuosity all the dancers constantly exhibited in solos, partnerships, and group passages. There was playfulness, humor, something for every musical phrase. I’d guess that at least some of the stalwart classical moves were meant to point to a time long gone.

The professional judges gave Romantiques first place. The audience favorite was Tear the Petals.