Famed Canadian choreographer Jean Grand-Maître still gets intimidated by talent. But when youre working with the likes of Joni Mitchell, k.d. lang, Elton John, and now Sarah McLachlan, its not a feeling you really expect to fade.
In that way, Grand-Maître, artistic director of the Alberta Ballet, might seem like any other music lover. But the man responsible for the opening and closing ceremonies of the Vancouver Olympics has something we dont: The talent to elevate incredible music by reinterpreting it with dance. And he has done so with Fumbling Towards Ecstasy a shimmering ballet set to McLachlans music.
Who knew a Sarah McLachlan song could be more touching? ....
Grand-Maître first met McLachlan during the Olympics, and knew the award-winning musician (who has sold more than 40 million recordings), would be an ideal continuation to his companys series of portraits of living music icons. With a dancers perfect timing, Grand-Maître thus ensured McLachlan was able to see Joni Mitchells The Fiddle and The Drum which he co-created with Mitchell in the hopes that McLachlan would want to do something similar.
It was serendipity that she was in town and she came to see it, because shes a big Joni Mitchell fan. [She] loved the dancers, loved the aesthetics and how we portrayed this kind of music and dance. She said shed be honoured if we actually created a ballet to her music.
Conceptually, his method centres around getting to the root of each singers message.
When I talked to [McLachlan], I deemed that the female ethos would be at the heart of it. With k.d. lang it was about how the Prairies shaped her voice and her musicality, with Joni it was about war and Elton was about repression and addiction. So you can see how the ballet takes a form that is close to the heart of what they are trying to achieve with their music.
Grand-Maître also spoke with other women, to better understand what guides the female life course.
Many mention betrayal, first love, first child. The themes were very strong, and thats what Sarah was talking about. Today women have so many more choices than they had 40 years ago. Its hard to find a spiritual balance with the choices you can make career-wise and with family.
The ballet captures the journey of a woman from young innocence to mature love, featuring all the principal women in the company including 55-year-old ballet mistress Beverly Bagg at different points in the one womans life.
Puritans may raise a skeptical brow, but Grand-Maître is penning a new page in the national arts canon: I know, at first, a lot of people look down on these projects from their ivory towers. But it has brought me into as much an aesthetic direction as working with a classical composer. [These singers] really have their own unique world to represent, and thats why they lasted the decades in such a competitive market. You realize how brilliant they are.
And while the city is especially receptive to Grand-Maîtres neo-classical portrait ballets, the fact that Vancouver is McLachlans home isnt lost on him.
Thats why were working very hard! he chuckles. And also, Vancouver knows its dance. Vancouver is the only city, outside of our home city, that has seen three of the portrait ballets.
In a way, its doing what these singers wanted the ballets to do, which is bring a new audience, he continues. That was very important for all of them. They know how we struggle in the fine arts. And they see that often one third of the audience has never been to a dance performance theyre music fans. Thats really a good and healthy project, I think, for the ballet world.
But really, hes just a big fan, too.
Its about finding one thing that reconnects us to their music. Like a little umbilical cord that really makes us feel their music in a new way, but at the same time is true to who they are as musicians. You feel that they do open their diary a bit and let us into their creative thinking.
McLachlan is planning to attend the Vancouver premier.
Presented by Ballet BC, Alberta Ballet in Fumbling Towards Ecstasy runs Nov. 14-16 at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre. Tickets range from $40-$99; BalletBC.com
Sarah McLachlan with dancers from Fumbling Towards Ecstasy. Phil Crozier photo.
