The Miami City Ballet Company (MCB) will close its 2012-2013 season this weekend at the Arsht Center with Broadway and Ballet, a valentine to Jerome Robbins and George Balanchine. No surprise there, since the MCB has been acclaimed far and wide for its devotion to the masters, especially Balanchine. What makes this program so delicious is the unpredictable pairing of the works as well as the works themselves.

The first part of the performance belongs to Jerome Robbins. So successful was he as a choreographer of Broadway musicals — “West-Side Story,” “Fiddler on the Roof,” “The King and I” are only a sampling of his handiwork — that it is easy to forget that Robbins loved ballet as well. And ballet as pure as it gets: that’s what his “Dances at a Gathering” is all about.

Originally created by Robbins in 1969 and set to the piano music of Chopin, it marked his return to more classical forms, most particularly pas de deux. The ballet has no props, and hardly any set. Five couples came together in no less than 18 movements, nearly all of them waltzes and Slavic mazurkas. This “Gathering,” in the hands of the rotating cast of MCB, which includes Jeanette and Patricia Delgado as well as Rene Penteado, is a nearly encyclopedic examination of flirtation. One may as often sigh at its sheer beauty of a piece as laugh aloud at its wit. There are the twists that Robbins was so fond of: a gesture at odds with the lyricism of a movement that manages to zap up its impact. And there are the times when flirtation becomes surrender. Look out then.

If the evening begins with elegance and a delight in non-narrative movement not ordinarily associated with Jerome Robbins, the evening ends with bawdiness and very nearly a funk not ordinarily associated with Balanchine. His ballet, “Slaughter on Tenth Avenue,” was originally a play within a play, part of a Rodgers and Hart Broadway hit, “On Your Toes” from the 1930s. Several decades later Balanchine dusted off his work and expanded it into a stand-alone ballet filled with ladies of easy virtue, silly coppers, sly gangsters and a very deadly competition between two male dancers centering far more on their skill as dancers than any issues of romantic attachment. The real question seems to be, can a great classical dancer become a great hoofer if circumstances demand.

Yep. Especially with a little help from one’s friends, or in this case one Phillip Neil, tap-dancer, former New York City Ballet principal and current South Florida resident. Suddenly — that is after a bit of tutelage — several MCB members  including the great Yann Trividic, become the irrepressible hoofers and jazzistas   “Slaughter” demands. Patricia Delgado, dancing in very high heels, plays the love interest in a climax that could wake the dead.

If all this weren’t enough, on Friday night, the part of gangster gunman will be played by retired Major League Baseball catcher extraordinaire, Mike Piazza. He promises no errors.

Miami City Ballet’s Program IV Broadway and Ballet, Friday and Saturday at 8:00 p.m., Sunday at 2:00 p.m. at the Ziff Ballet Opera House, the Arsht Center for the Performing Arts, 1300  Biscayne Blvd., Miami; tickets range from $20 to $175; www.arshtcenter.org.

This review also appears in Miami New Times.

Photo: Daniel Azoulay

Miami City Ballet closes out the season with Program IV, a combination of Jerome Robbins and George Balanchine with a special guest appearance from baseball great Mike Piazza.

At its 1853 premiere in Venice, Giuseppe Verdi’s beloved opera La Traviata was jeered. That may have been the fault of the singers, as the composer hinted in a letter to a friend. Since Verdi’s time, lush orchestrations, a string of aria hits, and a libretto about a libertine courtesan who finds love and dies have made La Traviata the most performed opera in the world. Indeed, the need to make such a familiar production fresh has lead to many outlandish and sometimes even absurd productions.

Not so with Florida Grand Opera’s 2013 season closer. FGO plays La Traviata straight – and the singers would have made Verdi proud.

On April 20, María Alejandres was indisputably the best leading lady of the season, and one the best Violettas I’ve ever heard. Her voice projected powerfully, with a flawless technique and colorful musicality. It was deliciously decadent to hear Sempre libera, Violetta’s first act tour de force sung, not shrieked.

Ivan Magrì held his own as Alfredo, with a youthful lyric tenor in complete control and balancing neatly with Alejandres throughout. However, it took a couple of acts for dramatic chemistry to flare between the two, in the duet Parigi, o cara. It was worth the wait.

Giorgio Coaduro made a fine Germont, with a convincing paternal presence and vocal command. Although it took him a little while to warm up, he did so in time for a heartfelt Di Provenza il Mar, il Suol.

The cast as a whole seemed disconnected from each other in the first acts, finally coming together as an ensemble in Act III. Bliss Heberts’ staging did not help. It seemed static, perhaps because Allen Charles Klein’s majestic sets did not leave much room for anything or anybody else. This posed a particular challenge for the dancers in the Gypsy and Picador chorus. Fortunately, choreographer Rosa Mercedes made the most of the limited space.

Maestro Ramon Tebar brought out the best in the orchestra, taking a Bel Canto approach that highlighted the influence that style had on Verdi’s work. The contrast in tempi between the pathetic opening prelude and the adjacent party scene, and the unusually fast Brindisi were refreshing jolts.

Energized, the audience responded to FGO’s production of La Traviata with a standing ovation that lasted almost as long as the courtesan’s drawn-out death.

Hailed as the “greatest tap dancer who ever lived,” Savion Glover will bring more than thrilling footwork to the Arsht Center this Saturday. His latest project “SoLe Sanctuary” is a “meditation” on the dance form that he says is his life — and an homage to the late dance greats, who paved the way.

Performing with him is Miami’s own Marshall Davis Jr., a long-time collaborator and like Glover, an accomplished torchbearer of the hoofing tradition.

“SoLe Sanctuary’ rekindles the legacies of Gregory Hines, Steve Condos and Sammy Davis Jr., among other tap icons who left an indelible mark on the dance world and American society at various eras. The touring show is intimate and features a candlelit stage and a white-clothed human prop who meditates on stage for the duration of Glover and Davis’ rhythmic sequences. As critics have said, the stage is literally an altar for the late legends.

“People will enjoy themselves,” says 39-year-old Glover. For Davis, coming back to where he got his start makes the show even more heartfelt. “I’m really looking forward to it. When I left, the Adrienne Arsht Center didn’t exist,” says the 35-year-old, who resides in New York.

Both Glover and Davis rose to stardom as child prodigies. Glover, with his signature dreaded hair and joyful animation, was credited for reinventing tap dance with his hard-hitting style and improvisational choreography, a groundbreaking fusion of jazz, hip-hop, be-bop, and world music patterns and rhythms. The two-time Tony Award winner has enjoyed an illustrious career on Broadway, television and motion pictures, including starring roles with his trainer and mentors Gregory Hines and Sammy Davis, Jr.

Similarly Davis, trained by the late Condos, performed in the award-winning “Bring in ‘da Noise, Bring in ‘da Funk” on Broadway (the show that gave Glover a Tony Award) and Disney’s Oscar-winning motion picture “Happy Feet,” which was choreographed by Glover.

Before heading to Miami, Glover spoke to Artburst about what he and Davis hope to convey through ‘SoLe Sanctuary.’

AB: Could you explain the concept of “SoLe Sanctuary.”
Glover: The concept is basically an opportunity for myself and Marshall to pay homage to the men and women who came before us and some of the greatest contributors, the greatest expressionists and greatest dancers we’ve had. All of my productions are dedicated to them, but this is the first one that speaks to that point and that the audience can hear better.

It’s mostly improvisation and an evening of meditation. It’s like that person is meditating to the sound of the dance and thinking about and praying for the women and men that the production is about. If I wasn’t dancing, that’s what I would be doing. It’s like subconsciously, I am that person.

How has it felt to have worked personally with such dance greats who have passed on.? Do you feel a renewed drive to carry the torch?

It’s motivating. It’s everything. It gives me more of a sense of purpose. There’s not a day that goes by that I don’t think of them. They are my life. They are my teachers, my fathers, my friends.

Tap dance is seemingly less prevalent than other performance art. Do you feel that it’s a challenge to keep it relevant?

I’ve been hearing this my entire 32-year journey, but to us it’s alive. Tap is as popular as the individual chooses it to be. Since there has been air and gravity, there has been tap dance.

Besides touring for “SoLe Sanctuary,” are there any upcoming productions, movies or collaborations that you are working on?

I’m not working on any movies or anything. I am continuing to work at my craft. As far as collaborations, all of the people who I’ve wanted to collaborate with have already passed on, like Michael Jackson, John Coltrane and Miles Davis. Maybe I would do a collaboration with Sade or Anita Baker. But I’m pretty cool and grateful that I’ve been able to collaborate with the ones who I have collaborated with.

You emerged as hip hop music hit its stride and many associated you with that generation. But given your work with the likes of Hines and Sammy Davis, you were also perceived as the bridge between the old and new. Do you see yourself in that role and do you make an intentional effort to connect with younger generations?

I am doing what I set out to do. I’m not gearing my work to any generation. Every generation has their own following. It’s obvious that people of my generation will be aware of me. Tap dance is loved by all. But I do not wish to associate what I do with hip hop. Now, because I grew up listening to that music at a point in my career it was very aggressive, but I’ve moved far passed that. My dance is universal.

Showtime for “SoLe Sanctuary” is 8:00 p.m., April 6, at the Knight Concert Hall at the Arsht Center for Performing Arts, 1300 Biscayne Blvd., Miami. Tickets cost $50 to $125. For more information, visit www.knightfoundation.org or call 305-949-6722.

If ever a Broadway show was to be written about a man, Fela Kuti is that man. When he died in 1997, over a million people attended his funeral in Nigeria. But Fela lives on, in almost 70 albums that he leaves behind and his musical legacy as the creator of Afrobeat. Now there is a Broadway play that further immortalizes him, produced by iconic figures such as Shawn “Jay-Z” Carter and Will and Jada Pinkett Smith. Grammy-award-winning recording artist and former member of Destiny’s Child  Michelle Williams joins the cast for the current U.S. tour at the Ziff Ballet Opera House at the Arsht Center for the Performing Arts through March 24.

Fela! The Musical is an inspirational tale of courage, passion and love based on the real life events of pioneer and agent provocateur Fela Kuti. It traces the creation of this new musical form of Afrobeat, which is an infusion of jazz, funk, salsa, calypso and indigenous African rhythms, harmonies and percussion. It is a unique, pounding, bright, joyful, and pulsating soundscape created to mirror the political terrain of the times of Nigerian Independence and post-colonial identity. Afrobeat can be considered a political art form, at least in the way Kuti created it. It is a music of confrontation. While the Western listener is confronted with battling sounds of brass and drum, call and response and myriad Yoruba chants or forms, the music is mapping historiographies of dictatorship, colonial oppression, and disenfranchisement.

Another way Kuti performed his legacy and politics is in his unconventional lifestyle, reflected in the lyrics of his music. He founded a compound and recording studio where he lived with 27 wives. Influenced by James Brown, Miles Davis, and the politics of Malcolm X, Eldridge Cleaver, and other international figures of Afrocentrism, Kuti’s lyrics were not only a rallying cry for the oppressed but a direct assault on the oppressor. Sadly, in 1977, during a government attack on the Kalakuta commune, military soldiers arrested and beat Kuti and the musicians, burned the commune to the ground (including his master tapes and instruments) and threw his 82-year-old mother out of an upstairs window, which proved to be fatal.

Fela! features many of Kuti’s most captivating music and is directed and choreographed by Tony-award winner Bill T Jones, with a book by Jim Lewis and Bill T Jones.

Fela! Runs through March 24 at the Arsht Center for the Performing Arts, 1300 Biscayne Blvd., Miami; at 8:00 p.m., on Saturday at 2:00 and 8:00 p.m., and Sunday at 2:00 and 7:30 p.m. Tickets range from $26 to $56.

After patiently waiting for an audience member to silence his/her phone, Maestro Giancarlo Guerrero gave the downbeat to a performance full of color and dance. The Cleveland Orchestra, being the extremely fine-tuned instrument which it is, responded gracefully and lavishly to the Maestro’s controlled but immensely exciting and sometimes dance-like conducting throughout the evening.

The first work of the program, Neruda Songs for Mezzo-soprano and Orchestra by Peter Lieberson, was a sensuous treat. Lieberson selected these five sonnets out of the Cien Sonetos de Amor (One Hundred Love Sonnets) by beloved Chilean poet and Nobel Laureate Pablo Neruda, and set them to music specifically for his wife, the great late Mezzo-soprano Lorraine Hunt Lieberson. In the composer’s own words, “each of the five poems that I set to music seemed to me to reflect a different face in love’s mirror.” Anyone familiar with Hunt Lieberson’s incomparable artistry, with her natural gift for phrasing melodic lines and dynamic shaping, would understand the enormity of the shoes Mezzo-soprano Elizabeth DeShong had to fill for this performance. With a deep but tender, powerful but soothing voice, and a vast palette of musical colors, DeShong more than did both Mr. and Mrs. Lieberson justice. It was an intimate rendition, becoming apparent that Ms. DeShong understands that Neruda Songs are filled with a sort of delicate passion and peace made with the loss of a loved one. Maestro Guerrero accompanied Ms. DeShong very sensitively, also bringing out of the orchestra the vast array of sound colors in Mr. Lieberson’s score, especially pleasingly in Amor, amor, las nubes a la torre del cielo (Love, love, the clouds went up to tower of the sky) with the winds ascending to a climactic chord, and in Ya eres mía. Reposa con tu sueño en mi sueño (And now you’re mine. Rest with your dream in my dream), with its repeating sensual bossa-nova rhythm. In the last song, Amor mío, si muero y tú no mueres (My love, if I die and you don’t), DeShong’s diminuendo on her final Amor made me believe that peace is in fact attainable.

Expecting to be bombarded by Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, the main course on the evenings menu, I was very pleasantly surprised by Maestro Guerrero’s relaxed but nevertheless intense interpretation. Despite the endless debate over Beethoven’s tempo and metronome markings, Maestro Guerrero chose to obey the Master’s wishes and for the first time in my life was able to hear the written articulation in the second violins and cellos in the opening of the first movement. I was also able to hear the different instrument sections’ interaction and famous Beethoven crescendi boil to a simmer, making me break a sweat. The second movement made Maestro Guerrero dance on the podium. His precise and subtle conducting filled the movement with an elegant drama, as opposed to a nervous one. The third movement made ME dance. At a slightly slower tempo than that in Beethoven’s marking, the enhanced heartbeat-like pizzicati in the double basses and cellos created a great groove which made the graceful melodic line dance. The Finale, that symphony within a symphony, shined with the presence of roughly 200 members of the combined forces of the Master Chorale of South Florida, Alec Schumacker, director, and the Master Chorale of Tampa Bay, James K. Bass, director. After the series of beautifully shaped recitatives in the cellos and double basses, and the exposition of the “Ode to Joy” theme, came the commanding presence and voice of bass Raymond Aceto, triumphant and virtuosically stating his own recitative. While the balance between orchestra and chorus was perfect throughout the movement, the same thing cannot be said about the four soloists as they sang together. Ms. DeShong, after having thrilled us earlier in the evening, disappeared into oblivion, making it seem as if she did not know her part well and was afraid of being found out. Soprano Nicole Cabell had some intonation issues, but displayed great command of her part, a very difficult one. Tenor Garrett Sorenson, with a lovely lyric voice, sang his solo majestically, and was in perfect balance with Mr. Aceto at all times. The massive choir maintained a well-shaped sound throughout, and got the most bravo shouts in the four curtain calls at the end.

Maestro Guerrero looked exhausted but blissful, and I’m sure he had a tremendous night sleep after such a fabulous performance, probably ecstatic at the thought of doing it all over again the next evening, AND the next.

The Tony-Award winning choreographer and dancer returns with a tap dance extravaganza, “SoLe Sanctuary,” his tribute to the greats of tap of the 20th century.

Never assume that because an artist performs in his or her city’s premier arts venue that they’ve reached their pinnacle.

Sometimes, performing there is just the beginning of bigger and better things, like reaching new audiences, or being discovered and catapulted to other markets. And that’s what the Miami Made Festival, now in its fifth season, and its home the Arsht Center for the Performing Arts, can help artists do.

“You think about New York, Chicago, L.A., as places where new work is created, but really, I believe that Miami-based artists are creating some of the most exciting art anywhere in the country,” says the Arsht Center’s executive vice president, Scott Shiller, who’s been involved with Miami Made Festival since its inception.

From Feb. 26 to March 3, the Miami Made Festival 2013 — now with new philanthropic sponsors including the Riviera South Beach hotel on board — features a week-long plethora of events that include, free of charge, staged play readings, pop-up performances, and a dance showcase.

The twist here is that these are works in progress, which first come to life at the Arsht Center in previous incarnations, and are now ready for the broader world to see their evolution.

Last year the dance highlight was the almost evolved work from the much-acclaimed Rosie Herrera Dance Theater, Dining Alone, which will make its fully formed premiere in New York at the Baryshnikov Arts Center in April.

This year the focus is on Cuban-American Letty Bassart, a choreographer, dancer, and writer who in a previous life was a hospice nurse and, you guessed it, an epidemiologist.

“It’s so powerful to be able to show your work in a place where there’s a certain level of production and support in terms of resources, and it’s really interesting too that this particular support comes for a work that has been seen in a very raw kind of state, and that they’re willing to invest in its growth,” says the Miami native. “That is something that is so rare.”

Bassart’s dance piece Good, God, Go, whose first iteration goes back to 2010’s Miami Made edition, will be showcased on March 2 at 3:00 p.m. and at 7:30 p.m., at the Carnival Studio Theater in the Arsht’s Ziff Ballet Opera House, 1300 Biscayne Blvd. All that you need to know for now is that this work features a trio of dancers, animation and film, sculpture, a cappella singing, a marching band, and 50-plus wooden canaries (yes, wooden canaries.)

“Miami Made Festival is a step further, not just a launch of these ideas as a work in progress, but it’s also the recognition of the development of these ideas, which is incredibly humbling,” says the 2012 Knight Arts Challenge grant recipient.

For Bassart and her Miami Made Festival colleagues, more good news may be on the way.

“This year’s festival really represents sort of a new commitment to the Miami Made program,” says Shiller. “Out of all of the projects that are being done this year, the Arsht Center will likely produce some, if not all of these, as fully developed works in our future seasons.”

Along with the Good, God, Go, other highlights include:

Pop-Up Performance: Extended Stay from the Project [Theatre], in the style of reality TV, Feb. 26 & 27 at 9:00 p.m. at the Riviera South Beach Hotel, 2000 Liberty Ave., Miami Beach.

Staged Play Reading: Fear Up Harsh, based on a military phrase that refers to “enhanced interrogation,” Feb. 28 at 7:30 p.m. at the Carnival Studio Theater, Arsht Center.

 Staged Play Reading: Two-Merz, dark comedy about brothers with cancer, March 3 at 4:00 p.m. at the Carnival Studio Theater, Arsht Center.

All are free on first come first seated basis; www.arshtcenter.org.

Alvin Ailey Dance Theater’s performance at the Arsht Center Friday night began and ended with a prayer, or rather with an electrifying, raging, shimmering, sassy, full-bodied reminder of what prayer can mean.

A work by choreographer Garth Fagan, of Lion King fame, opened the show. Fagan has often acknowledged his debt to African dance and music; that debt is all over this dance entitled “From Before.” It began with a series of solos, as dancer after dancer — each in a body suit of strong color —  moved through proscribed and ancient polyrhythmic movements, each said to call down a different aspect of the creator. This work was so accomplished, let alone downright beautiful, that at one point the audience could actually see the machetes said to be carried by one of the warriors of the godhead.

The dance went on as more and more similarly attired dancers came onto the stage. The music began to change and didn’t stop changing as the company moved in and out of kaleidoscopic patterns. At one moment the company was all calypso; soon the dancers appeared almost as Pac Man figures. Then bam: The sudden reappearance of sacred dance and rhythms. The poignancy was heart-stopping. Revelatory too, as we realize we have been seeing versions of those rhythms all along.

A short piece was followed by one of Miami’s own Robert Battle, who became artistic director of Alvin Ailey in 2011. Entitled “Strange Humors,” it was part comedy, part titanic struggle: a pas de deux for our time, more likely for any time. These dancers did their director proud. Angles were juxtaposed with the grace of round gestures; a string quartet and percussion wrestled as well, while two male dancers were driven by more feeling than they knew how to contain.

A compilation of works by choreographer Ohad Naharin followed intermission. Again, the company was masterful with kaleidoscopic moves in a work that went from Yiddish folk tunes to electronic rock to Vivaldi. Although the dancing itself never failed, the choreographic connection of the parts to the whole seemed at times tenuous.

The compilation began with images of Hebrew scholars; with stunning tenderness the dancers and the work managed to both embrace them and their tradition and suggest the hollowness let alone the danger of righteousness.

A short piece that followed seemed misplaced.

Then there was a pas de deux at least as full of feeling as the earlier “Mixed Humors.” Meanwhile dancers in black tuxes had come and gone. Now they were here in force and goofing on just about all social dances from the 1940s onward, from the skimmy to the chachacha to mambo, even to Bill Cosby’s signature moves. They were goofing on themselves too.
Wry can be a lot of fun, but it isn’t sublime. And this is a company that knows its sublime. Goofing continued as the dancers drew folks from the audience to the stage to dance along with them, or try to. Granted, if ever there was an audience pleaser, this was it. Still, this reviewer wonders why an audience would miss a chance to see more Alvin Ailey dancers dancing, and choose instead to cheer the chutzpah of audience members.

The evening closed, as almost all Alvin Ailey evenings close, with “Revelations,” the signature piece of the company’s founder. One might yearn to see Judith Jamison back in the role that became her signature as well, one might praise some of the dancers in this epic and fault others. Bottom line, the work is so beautiful, so full of joy and homage that we can only be glad this piece continues to have the place it does in our cultural canon.

Ailvin Ailey American Dance Theater at the Arsht Center for the Performing Arts, 1300 Biscayne Blvd continues through Sunday; for more details and tickets, call 305-949-6722; arshtcenter.org.

The thunderous Japanese taiko drum group returns for a second year.