Boston Ballet’s ‘Fall Experience’ Review: A Contemporary Exploration of Humanity

Boston Ballet’s “Fall Experience,” which ran from Oct. 24 to Nov. 3, opened the ballet company’s 2024 season at the Citizens Bank Opera House. Program inserts announced that the opening night performance was dedicated to the late Michaela Mabinty DePrince, a second soloist at Boston Ballet and activist who passed away earlier this fall. This memorial set the sentimental tone for the show, and throughout the four ballets performed, it was clear to see the raw passion and emotion that each dancer brought to the choreography.

The performance opened with the world premiere of “After,” a new ballet choreographed by Boston Ballet principal dancer Lia Cirio set to selections from Lera Auerbach’s “24 Preludes for Violin and Piano.” On the far right of the stage stood an asymmetric set piece that resembled a small mountain or cave with a curved exterior and jagged and geometric pieces carved out of the hollow interior.

The contrast between the sharp and smooth elements of the set piece was matched particularly well by a small duet within the ballet. The duet featured flowy, beautifully executed pirouettes jarringly punctuated with intentional flexed feet and bent knees. A smooth piano melody paired with staccato notes from a violin complemented the throughline of the contrast between smooth and sharp, making the piece feel cohesive and intentional.

Tableaus were a strong motif in the piece, one forming after another transiently and — combined with the prominence of the cave-like set piece — evoking the allegory of the cave. The dancers creating tableaus with their bodies paralleled the idea of creating a society, and the discordant violin music that underlied the tableaus created a sense of suspense and foreshadowing. As the ballet progressed, the dancers moved towards the set piece until they were gathered within the cave, and on final notes of music, the ballet ended with the dancers running out of the set piece and off of the stage, leaving one dancer facing the set piece.

“After” began to approach an interesting theme in its storytelling, but the choreography felt familiar and uninspired — audiences familiar with contemporary ballet may have felt like they had seen the movements before. Furthermore, the discordant music of the violin and piano were not the most palatable to the ear and felt too on the nose for a contemporary piece, as if trying too hard to be different.

After a pause, the show continued with the second ballet of the night: “Ein von Viel,” choreographed by Sabrina Matthews. Despite the piece simply being a duet, Boston Ballet principal Yue Shi and second soloist Lee danced the ballet with the togetherness of a corps de ballet, moving as if one body. Even during moments in the ballet where the two dancers broke their synchrony, they still appeared to be one entity, like individually captured frames put together into one image.

In between each short piece of music, the dancers stopped moving only to begin once the pianist began to play again the metaphorical music box once again rewound. This theme of cyclical suspension and reanimation was bolstered by Sabrina Matthews’s utilization of a motif of straight arms and legs moving in circles, like the hands of a clock.

Sun Woo Lee and Yue Shi charmed the audience with their vibrant movement quality. However, while the ballet’s plain gray background and white costumes may have attempted to highlight the brightness of the music and the choreography, they felt mismatched and dulled the piece instead.

The first act of the show concluded with “Plan to B,” a ballet choreographed by Jorma Elo. As the curtain rose, a bright yellow rectangular light and two dancers dressed in royal blue were revealed to the audience. Set to regal string music by composer Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber, the ballet had promises of being majestic, but struggled to stand out on its own. Although visually distinct with fast circular arm movements similar to those featured in “Ein Von Viel” and a broad contemporary movement style similar to that found in “After,” “Plan to B” came across as another variation of the two previous pieces.

With the first act’s disappointments leaving audiences looking forward to intermission, the show took a turn for the best in the second act, with the Boston Ballet premiere of Crystal Pite’s “The Seasons’ Canon” — a contemporary ballet that rose to popularity after its United States debut in 2022. “The Seasons’ Canon” immediately differentiated itself from the three ballets of the first act by leaning into the contemporary side of contemporary ballet. Set to Max Richter’s recompositions of Vivaldi’s “The Four Seasons,” the subtle familiarity of the music allowed the sharp choreography to shine.

“The Seasons’ Canon” was an ode to connection between all parts of nature, human or otherwise, and the never ending actions and reactions that make up our world — a theme furthered by the green cargo pants and sheer tops that both male and female dancers wore, erasing the gender binaries often established in ballet. One great strength of the piece was the architecture created by dancers’ bodies — by the time one structure was formed, it morphed into another. In one notable moment in “Winter,” a dancer was lifted above the rest of the ensemble arranged in a circular clump around them, and when the dancer fell backwards, the rest of the dancers rippled outwards like a pool that had been disturbed. Throughout the ballet, every tableau, lift, or pose struck on stage carried tension and strain in a manner that was more energetic than uncomfortable, highlighting the coarseness of the seasons.

With movements that carried a sense of frantic progression towards a state of infinite entropy, the piece as a whole deftly expressed the passage of time and the life energy that is carried between the seasons of nature.

While audiences looking for a new and enhanced experience this fall may have found themselves disappointed with the underwhelming choreography of the first act of the show, the emergence of Crystal Pite’s thought-provoking “The Seasons’ Canon” in the second act redeemed the show for viewers, re-centering the performance not on clichéd maxims of contemporary ballet but rather the novelty and power of honoring the humanity’s connection to the world around it.

—Staff writer Selorna A. Ackuayi can be reached at selorna.ackuayi@thecrimson.com.