Dance Performance | 5 Iconic NYC Dance Companies

Five of NYC's most iconic dance companies--Ballet Hispanico, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, American Ballet Theatre, New York City Ballet, and Dance Theatre of Harlem--share the spotlight and an outdoor stage with dancers and pieces from across the companies.

Participants:

American Ballet Theatre - Children's Songs Dance by Jessica Lang
A work for seven dancers, Children's Songs Dance by Jessica Lang takes its name from the music. Set to selections from Children's Songs by the late American jazz composer Chick Corea, the ballet was created on ABT Studio Company in January 2020 during a residency at The Pocantico Center in Tarrytown, New York. According to Lang, Children's Songs Dance "draws its inspiration from the transition in life between being a child and becoming an adult, with the goal of never losing the spirit of play."

Ballet Hispanico - Club Havana by Pedro Ruiz
Latin dancing at its best. The intoxicating rhythms of the conga, rumba, mambo, and cha cha are brought to life by choreographer Pedro Ruiz, himself a native of Cuba, as he imagined his very own "Club Havana."

Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater - Cry by Alvin Ailey
Choreography by Alvin Ailey
Music: Alice Coltrane, Laura Nyro, Voices of East Harlem
In 1971, Alvin Ailey choreographed the solo Cry as a birthday present for his mother on his stunning muse, the legendary Judith Jamison, who has taught the treasured role to subsequent generations of Ailey women. This physically and emotionally demanding tour-de-force - dedicated to "all Black women everywhere - especially our mothers" - went on to become an enduring work of American art. The ballet is made up of three parts - the first is set to Alice Coltrane's "Something about John Coltrane," the second to Laura Nyro's "Been on a Train" and the last has the Voices of East Harlem singing "Right On, Be Free."

Dance Theatre of Harlem - When Love by Helen Pickett
"Insistent time maps our days but when we are in love, we surrender," says choreographer Helen Pickett about When Love. Her exquisite pas de deux captures the wondrous feeling of timeless love.

New York City Ballet - Allegro Brillante by George Balanchine
George Balanchine called the exuberant Allegro Brillante "everything I know about classical ballet in thirteen minutes." One of George Balanchine's most joyous, pure dance pieces, Allegro Brillante is characterized by what Maria Tallchief -- the ballerina on whom the bravura leading role was created -- called "an expansive Russian romanticism." The ballet is set to Tschaikovsky's Piano Concerto No. 3, a work that the composer created from sketches for a composition that was intended to be his Sixth Symphony, but which instead served as a single movement work which was published posthumously in 1894. Balanchine described this ballet as a concentrated essay in the extended classical vocabulary, in which a maximum amount of choreographic development is contained within a rather restricted area of time and space.

One for All, World Premiere Lincoln Center Commission by Annabelle Lopez Ochoa, commissioned by Lincoln Center and featuring dancers from each of the five companies, is set to Manteca by Funky Lowlives/Dizzy Gillespie.