When Ballet BC announced its 30th anniversary season it promised many highlights: Program 1 had a section performed to music by a live choir; Program 3 will have new work by artistic director Emily Molnar. But one sentence in particular stood out: Program 2, a full evening of work by Medhi Walerski.
Walerski, a rising French choreographer who, up until his retirement last July, had also been dancing as a soloist with the renowned Nederlands Dans Theatre, is the man responsible for one of Ballet BC’s most beloved hits.
Created specifically for Ballet BC in 2011, his piece, Petite Cérémonie, was a jubilant, theatrical, full-company crowd-pleaser that showcased not only the skill of Ballet BC’s dancers, but their personalities, as well. At the time of its debut, Ballet BC had just regained its footing financially and, in hindsight, Petite Cérémonie’s reception was part of a succession of turning points for the company under Molnar, who took the reins in 2009.
Ballet BC retired Petite Cérémonie with one final showing last season, but it isn’t the only Walerski creation that came out of Vancouver.
In 2014, he returned with the world premiere of Prelude – an eerie, abstract exploration of the passage of time that swung masterfully between order and chaos. In fact, it was that piece that inspired Molnar to more seriously consider an ongoing relationship with the innovative young Frenchman.
“I had a pretty good idea after Petite Cérémonie, but I really knew after Prelude,” confirms Molnar, speaking with Westender at Ballet BC’s Scotiabank Dance Centre headquarters. “I thought, I really want to give Medhi the opportunity to do a full-length. And that was done very strategically – to not ask him to do that right away, when it was not something he’s [used to] doing. So I built a relationship with him with the company; with him, the company and the audience; and now I feel like this is the natural next step.”
While Walerski admits he misses being on stage (watch for an as-yet-unannounced return alongside a noted Canadian dancer), he reveals that he stepped away from dancing because he felt fully drawn towards choreography at this point in his career.
“Choreography needed more of my attention – my full attention – if I really wanted to develop myself,” he explains, during a break at the Ballet BC studios.
“But this is endless,” he adds with a smile. “I still feel that I am a beginner. When I see other people’s work I still feel that I have so much to learn.”
In fact, this will be the first full-length commission for the 36-year-old – a watershed moment for any choreographer, and one he has been preparing for since Prelude.
“I felt it was kind of an unfinished work, a prelude, so I wanted to go on with the idea,” Walerski explains. “Musicians used to play [preludes] before they had a concert – they had these little pieces of music – so when I created the work I knew that it was going to be a smaller version of an extended one.”
The piece forms the base for Program 2, but he has built it out with approximately 10 more minutes, while creating an entirely new second half for the evening that explores, more narratively, the human need for celebration, and follows one man (dancer Peter Smida) through the motions of birth, life and death.
He has also added more dancers, drawing in 10 students from Arts Umbrella, Ballet BC’s official training body, to flesh out the cast of the signature work to an impressive 25.
“There’s something so beautiful and haunting and so architectural about that piece. It’s just such a gem,” says Molnar, of Prelude. “The minimalism and yet the human spirit that’s inside is just captivating.
“And then what he’s going to do as a complement to that – this idea of celebrating...” she continues. “He’s a director of theatre. He not only has a beautiful movement language and one that’s investigating movement invention, but one that is very aware of buidling a world and telling a story, be it very abstractly.”
Fresh off a heart-pounding group rehearsal for that section, the soft-spoken choreographer is still deep in thought when he sits down with his lunch and a glass of water.
“It’s a shock,” Walerski says, of the sequence he just saw. “It was ambitious to go on for them right now because we just created this last section yesterday, at the end of the day, and it’s very demanding on the dancers to just recall something that fresh,” he says, snapping his fingers for emphasis. “It’s also challenging for me because then I see something that I might, how do you say, doubt? […] But you just have to go on; you have to trust. Trust is very important.”
Molnar would say the same. Known for programming Ballet BC’s evenings as triple bills – three separate, 20- to 25-minute works by a range of choreographers – inviting a full evening by just one is a rare departure from form, but well within her repertoire of risks.
“We don’t always do full-lengths, we tend to have more voices in one evening, so I like the fact that we do have that ability. It’s a different challenge for the choreographer and for the dancers,” says Molnar, who has established Ballet BC’s reputation as a Canadian company to watch by placing bold new works alongside complex pieces by William Forsythe, Johan Inger, Jorma Elo, Cayetano Soto and more.
“But also,” she continues, “Medhi is developing his voice as he’s doing it, so he feels like he can experiment here, and when you have a longer-term relationship […] you build a rapport and you build a way to go deeper, quicker in.”
Walerski agrees, adding that Ballet BC felt like the right company to create this work on. They won’t know what they have achieved together, however, until March 17 on opening night.
“Sometimes, when it’s performed I’m like… Wow. What came out of me?” says Walerski, with a bashful laugh. “You can really be surprised. I have a strange relationship with work; when it gets on stage I have a hard time to let go.”
• Ballet BC’s Program 2 runs march 17-19 at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre. Tickets from $30; Ticketmaster.ca
