The Ballet in Opera Atelier: Integral motion
By Kathleen Smith
Once upon a time, dance was an integral part of the opera experience. Following the Greek model, in which opera comprises a plurality of forms — dance, music, song, poetry, design, acting — the work of early European composers such as Monteverdi, Rameau and Lully always contained a ballet or two. In the 19th century, dance and opera began to part company, with both forms developing independently along separate tracks. By the 20th century, opera and dance were rarely seen on the same stage together.
In 1985, along came Marshall Pynkoski and Jeannette Lajeunesse Zingg, founders of Toronto’s Opera Atelier, determined to put the dance back in opera. Each season they remount Baroque-era and later gems such as Monteverdi’s Orfeo (1607), Henry Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas (1688) and Mozart’s Magic Flute (1791). With lavish costumes and live music played on period instruments by Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra, they have developed a loyal fan base. The company’s resident Atelier Ballet choreographer, Zingg, and her lively reinterpretations of the dances of the Baroque era are a big reason why.
Classical dance brought Pynkoski and Zingg together almost four decades ago — both studied ballet in Toronto. Both are tall, imposing performers. For Zingg, being 5’11” (well over six feet on pointe) accelerated a path toward Baroque dance. Time spent in Paris performing together at the Moulin Rouge in the early 1980s led to deep research into the French history of the Baroque form. Zingg says simply, “We fell in love with it.”
With its origins in the court of Louis XIV, the Sun King, Baroque dance was hugely important both as a social convention and as a symbol of the king’s grace and power. Dancing masters employed by the king choreographed and taught courtiers new dances for special occasions. But the minuets and gavottes crossed class lines — even humble servants learned and shared the latest quadrille. That sharing prompted written and illustrated documentation that would come to be passed down the centuries, spawning classical ballet, among other things.
“It was the Age of Enlightenment, so everything was written down,” says Zingg. “There are texts with detailed illustrations describing exactly how to do each dance, and they tell you everything you need to know.” The Academy of Dance that Louis XIV formed in 1661 further codified the steps and techniques through notation. Reviews in the art gazettes and magazines of the day, the venerable Mercure de Paris, for example, also help with the job of reconstruction.
But Zingg insists that despite the company’s opulent preservations of history, what Opera Atelier is doing is absolutely contemporary. In their conceptually and visually progressive productions, Pynkoski as director and Zingg as choreographer have never been afraid to experiment, which distinguishes them from some proponents of Baroque dance, who cling to the academically authentic. Zingg says they avoid the right/wrong binary, preferring to be known as a new avant garde, as a friend once said of them. “That was a lovely compliment,” recalls Zingg. “We’re trying to get to the essence and not just have the outside,” she says. “Look at a classic like George Balanchine’s Apollo through the years, as an example. When it was first done in 1928, they had sandals and robes down to here and by the end they were barely wearing anything. And he cut the ending. We have a similar attitude toward not setting things in stone, not because he did, but because it seems like the right thing to do.”
Zingg has hung on to what she deems sacrosanct about the form and its sprightly yet demure quartets and ensemble dances. “On the technical side,” she notes, “you have to have absolutely straight carriage of the spine. And even though you are always moving, you still make each position precise and married to the music. Mostly it’s up on the down beat to keep everything very light. It is the most musical of dance forms.”
Zingg and Pynkoski definitely do their research but put the creative needs of each production ahead of iron-clad authenticity. Opera Atelier has also experimented with more contemporary dance forms, sometimes highlighting them right alongside the Baroque dances. Atelier Ballet member Tyler Gledhill has even stepped up to contribute contemporary dance segments, nestled within Baroque productions, or in original hybrid events such as The Angel Speaks (2019). This omnibus evening of Baroque and contemporary music and dance featured a collaboration between violinist Edwin Huizinga and Gledhill called Inception, as well as classical dances by the Atelier Ballet ensemble and arias to further new composition from Huizinga, as well as Henry Purcell and William Boyce.
Classically trained but working in contemporary idioms long before joining Atelier Ballet in 2008, Gledhill auditioned for the company on the advice of a friend and took a while becoming comfortable with the Baroque style. “The arm positions were the hardest for me,” he recalls. “The way the arms move and the shapes they make — I had to spend a lot of time looking into the mirror front and profile. It felt completely foreign. The feet were not so hard — really the basic position is balletic, just with a flexed foot. I didn’t find it hard to pick up what the legs were doing; the problem was more with the upper body.”
Director Pynkoski has worked with Gledhill on injecting a more contemporary movement aesthetic into operas like Handel’s Alcina (1735). “Baroque operas often have a demon character that’s played by a man,” says Gledhill. “Marshall liked the abandon that I put into that sort of character. Marshall really likes a lot of leaps, a ‘throw it into the air’ quality that’s more about the energy than finding a position. I think that’s the correlation between what he wants and contemporary dance: it’s not so much about shape, it’s more about expression.”
Gledhill appreciates Zingg and Pynkoski’s broad-minded approach to creation: “Jeannette is very open despite being purist in her approach to Baroque movement. She’s curious about what I do and what I bring to the table.”
Opera Atelier’s new season, re-imagined after the pandemic lockdown mostly scuttled what would have been a banner year for the company, features the upcoming mixed program Something Rich and Strange. Created around themes of sleep, visions and dreams, the show features the music of Handel, Lully, Locke and Purcell, as well as arias sung by soprano Measha Bruggersgrosman, Baroque dance segments with Zingg and the Atelier Ballet, and a re-worked iteration of Inception.
The company will also present a new production of Handel’s The Resurrection in April 2021. It is Zingg and Pynkoski’s hope that both shows will be performed live at Koerner Hall with a limited audience and public health protocols in place. With COVID case numbers rising in Toronto, live streaming is also planned, both as a Plan B in case theatres shut down completely, but also to potentially grow new audiences. And, in light of the pandemic, Zingg has re-worked already choreographed dance sections to observe social distancing onstage. Instead of intimately executed duets and ensemble dances, she has exploded the spatial patterning to keep the dancers safe. It’s a process that she has mostly enjoyed.
“Any kind of restriction gives you new ideas,” says Zingg. “It makes you think of things differently and that can be quite inspiring. So the spatial revision is more than a stopgap; as much as I can love my own work, these pieces are as good as anything I’ve done — very airy, ethereal and light.”
That said, Zingg is anxious to get back to normal as soon as the pandemic timeline will allow. “Dancing really does need physical contact between people and studio time and that sort of thing,” she says. “We’re very much looking forward to being back live in theatres. Let’s face it, the world’s been through Spanish Flu, two World Wars — there have been far worse situations than this.”
Although the future is uncertain for all forms of dance, Zingg’s perspective on the current context is heartening. You get the sense that she and Pynkoski won’t be pivoting away from producing Baroque dances and operas anytime soon — small blips like pandemics aside. Their love of the form demands it.
Zingg explains the abiding attraction: “It’s the inherent spirituality of people working together, and those wonderful planetary patterns. I feel like this is an art form I could give a lifetime to.”
