SPHERES 03 • MÜNCHEN
★★★★★☆
Photo: Katja Lotter
REVIEW SPHERES 03: FASTEN YOUR SEATBELTS
Munich’s Opera Festival celebrates its 150th anniversary in summer 2025. The festival offers a string of popular operas but also provides entertainment with high-quality modern dance.
In the third edition of the dance concept Spheres, choreographers Sol León and Paul Lightfoot present a wide spectrum of contemporary choreographic styles with abstract, improvised and performance art elements with three teams. Fasten your seatbelts!
Photo: Katja Lotter
In a super-aesthetic setting of dark fog, seven dancers step forward and place a white stone on the edge of the stage in tribute to a deceased person.
Soon after, they dress in loose, white robes that mimic shrouds and embark on a kind of journey into death to the sounds of heavy techno.
Are we passing through Purgatory with alternating twisting, suffering and serene movements as if to find peace with the meaning of life? Insistent, pounding beats drive the ballet Seeking The Truth powerfully forward until the dance comes to an end, the stones are collected and the robes are left on the floor for further reflection. Wow!
Still After opens in a soft, red rock landscape reminiscent of the Grand Canyon or Mars. The ballet is a pas de deux between a man and a woman who are, so to speak, born out of the rocks and embody a long feeling of curiosity, encounter and farewell. The music is floating electronica, which, together with the exquisite lighting, creates a beautiful, albeit difficult to decipher, narrative.
Photo: Katja Lotter
In Fragments is a delightful five-minute micro-ballet featuring two dancers dressed in black and white in a wild Buster Keaton-esque silent film ballet, costumed in black on one side and white on the other, with jerky movements in comical synchronisation, driven by a corny voiceover. Huge applause from the audience for this completely original little gem, which warms up for the highlight of the programme: Sol León and Paul Lightfoot’s new work Subject to Change.
Black suit-ish-clad dancers bolt around a huge 8 × 8 m bright red carpet with a beautiful woman on display, but the gentlemen swarm around her in a spectacular, cabaret-like show number that keeps the audience captivated from start to finish.
Photo: Katja Lotter
In the choreography’s metaphor, the dancers interpret themes such as love, loss and the changing nature of relationships, enveloped in the tones of Schubert’s Death and The Maiden.
Spheres 03 is an utterly entertaining and inspiring ballet evening with five modern ballet treats by today’s hottest choreographers. Five stars from GOT TO SEE THIS.
