REVIEWS & INTERVIEWS

REVIEWS

Rapture

  • “Rapture possesses an ecstatic energy in its allegro passages and an understanding and acceptance of life’s struggles in its adagio section that reach the viewer unmediated by any kind of conceptual fanciness. Such professional acumen joined to such truly depicted feeling is to be cherished all the more because the combination is rare on the dance stage today.”
    New York Magazine – Tobi Tobias
    – Read Full Review
  • “Set on an often dimly lighted stage with a field of stars behind, “Rapture” was ingeniously plotted, with moments of dreamlike stillness and melancholy punctuating the dancers’ race across the stage.”
    The New York Times – Jennifer Dunning
  • “…Ambitious and grand in scale, it is also thrilling, with rushes of movement that animate every corner of the stage, and huge expansive diagonals that infuse it with visual drama….Not only is she sensitive to Prokofiev’s rhythmic and melodic subtexts, she is also willing to work against its sometimes bombastic effects”.
    Dance Magazine – Lynn Garafola
  • “…a vision of heaven where people move with energy as explosive as a meteor shower, and as fleeting. York’s command of her craft is evident from the opening.”
    Dance Magazine – Martha Ullman West
  • “York packs a wallop. There is nothing minimal in her reach or the scale of her thinking.”
    Houston Chronicle – Ann Homes
  • ” York’s choreography surprised and delighted with its distinctively offbeat movement. Astonishingly musical, the dance illustrates, amplifies and interprets the choreographer’s singular version of Prokofiev’s remarkable score.”
    Valley Daily News – Cary Smith
  • Lila York had a rip-roaring success with a big new ballet called Rapture…This ballet ought to be snapped up by ballet companies around the country.
    The World of Dance – Francis Mason

Celts

  • “Lila York’s Celts is an astonishing array of dance images of Ireland, a piece that is both profound and thrilling… Celts builds, evoking a thousand years of strife and then a burning joy. There’s not a whiff of cliché in it, nor sentimentality…This dance is in a rush to tell us many things… In its passion, dignity, and invention, York’s Celts is everything the Dublin-via-Vegas Riverdance is not… It offers exactly the kind of lift the world needs now.”
    The Boston Globe – Christine Temin
  • ” Celts is a stunner – a riveting, imaginative marriage of ballet and Irish folk dance with a modern sensibility.”
    Boston Herald – Karen Campbell
  • “Lila York’s brilliantly balletic salute to Irish dancing.”
    The Sacramento Bee – William Glackin
  • “…thrilling choreography thrillingly danced, pure and not-so-simple.”
    Bay Windows – TJ Medrek

Strays

  • “… a piece brimming with richly inventive movement…. Ms. York’s triumph lies in her fresh and witty treatment of familiar material. Ms. York’s character sketches, never literal, are sharply etched. Movement in its variety comes naturally to her. “
    The New York Times – Anna Kisselgoff
  • “Lila York’s Strays is by far the most gratifying dance I’ve seen from Paul Taylor’s descendents…Highly sophisticated in its engineering…Strays revivifies even the devices it borrows from York’s aesthetic forebears.”
    The Village Voice, Tobi Tobias

Concerto 488

  • “…a fabric of complex patterns mirroring the music’s density of ideas and at the same time preserving Mozart’s transparency.”
    Dance Europe
  • “…the dance bloomed to a deeply felt reading of a Mozart piano concerto…the beautiful patternings make this a great neo-romantic ballet.”
    The Philadelphia Inquirer

El Grito

  • “… moves across the stage like a thunderbolt… the social concerns are genuine, but they yield to the thrill of 18 bodies sidling across the stage and hurtling fearlessly through space.”
    San Francisco Examiner – Allan Ulrich
  • “Lila York succeeds admirably…creating a moving tribute to people who risk their lives against tyranny. “
    The Times – Anita Amirrezvani
  • “Incorporating references to murals by Diego Rivera, the dance is intense, hard, modern and laced with tough thrusts and gestures…York introduces unorthodox movement for a fascinating matrix of modern-ballet nonconformities.”
    Mercury News – Paul Hertelendy
  • “York masterfully focuses on the possibility of danger as the dance builds in subtly complex patterns toward a climactic image of crucifixion…The powerlessness of people to intervene in the sweep of events is shown acutely and poignantly.”
    Dance Magazine, Janice Ross

The Handmaid’s Tale

  • “The opening scene of Act II, set in a clandestine club, has a boozy, Sweet Charity feel. There’s an intricate pas de trois for Offred and the elite couple she serves, brimming with subtly shifting power dynamics…. Her use of petit allegro for the Handmaids, all dry, stabby footwork, gives them the look of a flock of vicious red birds. And the ending, if ambiguous, is full of lyricism and hope.”
    Ottowa Citizen
  • “The renowned New York-based choreographer succeeds at creating a darkly theatrical world complete with onstage technicians scanning the stage and audience with penetrating searchlights….York’s vision breathes new life into a venerable Canadian classic while literally embodying the story’s dark forces, with its sobering message as timely — and relevant — as ever.”
    Winnipeg Free Press – Holly Harris

Echoes of the Jazz Age

  • ” …Echoes is substantial, not only because it looks behind the surface gaiety of the music and presents an almost elegiac look at the roaring 1920’s, but because in its episodic, wayward way, it has a strong sense of form… Ms. York has absorbed [Paul Taylor’s] skill at creating shifting patterns that suddenly gel into sharply etched, fast-moving ensembles.”
    The Washington Times – Jean Battey Lewis

Gloria

  • ” Lila York succeeded in Gloria, an intimate piece about a disintegrating community that is calmed by a healing figure…the dancing builds in complexity, achieving emotional impact through propulsive dynamics. Ms. York puts movement together with natural fluency.”
    The New York Times – Anna Kisselgoff
  • “…a powerfully emotional work…More a meditation through movement, the work spoke not only to the power of a peaceful presence in the midst of a society wracked with pain and turmoil, but to the weight of responsibility borne by the person everyone else relies upon for strength.”
    Asbury Park Press – Karyn D. Collins
  • “…the work’s formal composition reached exceptional heights of sensitivity, and York blended her corps passages with great skill.”
    The Star-Ledger – Robert Johnson

Ode to Joy

  • “Boston Ballet’s big, bountiful ‘Ode to Joy’… a panoramic view of humanity evolving from discord to harmony….York doesn’t let the music dictate. She takes up its cues, but she’s not over-reverent…York crafts movement that looks workaday and never descends to cliche.”
    The Boston Globe – Christine Temin
  • “A joyous work…York wins points for a choreographic conception as grandiose as the music…one of the most audacious works ever presented by Boston Ballet in its relationship of music to dance and in terms of its narrative. She has taken a number of themes from our past and rolled them into a statement about the human ability to rise above adversity.”
    Dance Magazine – Iris Fanger

Rules of the Game

  • “…Inspired by Jean Renoir’s 1936 film, Rules of the Game ended the program on an emotional high note. She made the most of the company’s lightening-fast technicians, good actors, and acrobatic youngsters….It was pure ecstasy.”
    Houston Chronicle – Molly Glentzer
  • “Rules of the Game bursts onto the stage like a pop-up valentine, displaying cut-out facets of love in ever-shifting patterns and relationships.”
    Houston Voice – DL Groover

Sanctum

  • “…a heartfelt piece about humanity vs. technology.”
    The Telegraph, UK – Ismene Brown

Windhover

  • “…a tour de force for 13 dancers…Windhover doesn’t lull. It’s shaped like a dagger.”
    Seattle Weekly – Jean Lenihan

Psalms

  • “…The dramatic intensity of this conversation on faith makes this a very timely work. The fact that it’s told through pure movement and music makes it timeless.”
    The Seattle Weekly – Jean Lenihan

Breathless

  • a heart-pounding work that left the audience, well – breathless.”
    Go Memphis – Christopher Blank

All American

  • “York is a master at moving dancers on, off and around the stage. This, rather than individual steps, is where most of her surprises came. All American’s spirited third section was a glorious surge of entrances and exits that led into eight solos. Ensembles of men spinning and leaping morphed seamlessly, each time leaving a soloist behind.”
    Molly Glentzer – The Houston Chronicle

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________

INTERVIEWS

Photo: Karsten Moran