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| Katia Carranza and Renato Penteado in SYMPHONY IN C. Photo by Joe Gato |
The "Neighborhood Ballroom" will be the theme for the next program (Program III) presented by Miami City Ballet during the weekend beginning Friday, February 12 at the Broward Center for the Performing Arts in Fort Lauderdale. And given the trail of excellence that Artistic Director Edward Villella has left in his wake, from hometown Bayside (New York) to the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow and now Broward County, one can be sure that the dancers will be at their best and the choreography will be - magnificent.
Villella founded Miami Ballet in 1985, gathering and priming his dancers with one year of preparation before opening the doors to the public in 1986. Under his direction, the company would gain worldwide recognition in just a decade. And while his contributions have been noted in the field of classical dance and arts education, Villella will always remain first a dancer. |
Program III, which he choreographed, is divided into four acts: the waltz, the quick-step, the fox-trot and the mambo, with each act connected to the historical period in which the dances first became American favorites. The audience is invited to witness the changes and complexities of a gifted, young, aspiring Poet as he seeks to negotiate his own Dance of Life, from his teen years to his sixties. And with each stage of life, comes new rhythms.
"The entire performance is based on the evolution of American daily culture and dance is without question a major part of popular culture," he said. "I wanted to look at the ballroom more closely because most of what we see today reflects what our teenagers are into - hip-hop. But the traditional dances that you see in this show are actually very much alive and well and still being taught."
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| (l)Callie Manning, Carlos Guerra and dance ensemble. Photo by Bruce Weber (r) Artistic Director Edward Villella |
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With so many dance companies suffering in the midst of a struggling economy, one wonders how Villella has continued to be so successful. But this is no ordinary dancer turned director/ choreographer. According to Villella, he had a plan when he first accepted his position with the Ballet and he has stuck to it.
"I am so proud to be at a place where we will be celebrating our 25th season next year and we are going to do some really special things this fall," he said. "When we first began I selected my dancers based on three categories: those who were right out of school, those with two years of experience and those with more maturity. That way we were able to set up a natural rotation and therefore guarantee a continuum."
Villella, always the teacher, has since opened a school for dancers that trains over 400 students at any given time, some coming for an intensive summer program, many traveling thousands of miles from their native countries."
"You could say that the school was included in my original plan for Miami Ballet, but what mattered most to me was not making significant changes but rather making sure that the company and our dancers continued to develop as the years went along," he said.
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Haiyan Wu in SWAN LAKE, ACT II. Photo by Lois Greenfield |
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"Sometimes the emphasis was on raising money, other times it was all about increasing our visibility and then of course there were times that my focus was on programming. But it's all been a series of planned steps from the very start."
Based on his many accolades and given the national recognition that he has earned for Miami Ballet, it's clear that Villella is no ordinary dancer.
In the early part of his career he achieved phenomenal success, first garnering the position of principal dancer with the New York City Ballet just three years after joining the company to earning the distinction of being the first American male dancer to perform with the Royal Danish Ballet -- even "strutting his stuff" for four American presidents.
But the moment he says he will always remember is when he traveled with the New York City Ballet to the then Soviet Union where he danced at the Bolshio Theatre in Moscow.
"I suppose I was really inspired that day and later realized that I had gotten somewhere around 24 curtain calls," he said.
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Jeremy Cox in MERCURIC TIDINGS. Photo by Lois Greenfield |
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| "But when I was asked to perform an encore [the only American to ever have such a request] I knew that day would always stand out as the most important moment of my career. Here we were in the middle of the Cuban missile crisis and on the brink of nuclear war and I was doing an encore at the Bolshio. That was something special."
Villella, who has the kind of personality that instantly draws you in, admitted that while he loves what he is doing, teaching, directing and choreographing, that he still misses dancing on stage.
"I would pay the Devil if I could dance again."
For show times and ticket information visit www.miamicityballet.org.
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