BalletNext will bring another take on the Wild West when it performs Sunday at the Eccles Center for the Performing Arts.
The production, part of the Park City Institute’s Main Stage Season, will include a new work, “The Devil Wears Pointe Shoes,” which Park City’s history inspired, said Michele Wiles, BalletNext’s founder and artistic director.
“It’s a western-inspired piece that I created and developed during the New Year’s Soirée we did with Park City Institute at my home studio last year,” she said.
The work will start with live music performed by StringFX, a locally based electric chamber-music ensemble, and their musical menu includes a cover of Dolly Parton’s “Jolene,” which has been recently covered by Beyoncé on her new album “Cowboy Carter,” Ennio Morricone’s iconic theme from “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly” and the William Tell Overture, which is commonly known as the “Theme from ‘The Lone Ranger,'” Wiles said.
Another piece will be a cover of Charlie Daniels’ “The Devil Went Down to Georgia,” and that’s when Wiles and BalletNext dancer Matthew Helms face off.
“Matt will dance in his full western regalia with hat, jeans and big belt buckle, and we’ll finish with ‘Roundtable Rival’ by Lindsey Sterling,” she said.
Joining the piece will be Hayley Clark, Wiles said.
“Haley is from New York, and she is a great dancer,” she said.
Wiles can’t wait to see the audience’s reaction to the work.
“I was in the theater over the weekend setting the lighting with Zander Levy, who does the lighting for Park City Institute,” Wiles said. “We were there for four hours, and we’ll have some cool lighting with a moon, clouds and windows. It will be like a rock concert at the end. I’m really excited about it.”
“The Devil Wears Pointe Shoes” will close the evening of repertory, which will begin with the Eccles Center premiere of the duet “La Follia” by Italian choreographer Mauro Bigonzetti.
“This is an iconic work for BalletNext,” Wiles said.
Bognzetti set the work, whose title means “madness” or “folly,” to the music of Vivaldi, and Wiles gave Park City a sneak preview during BalletNext’s “Works in Process” performance last February at the Park City Library’s Jim Santy Auditorium.
“It’s the first piece ever created on BalletNext,” said Wiles, a former principal dancer for the American Ballet Theatre in New York City. “In 2011 I lept off the stage after performing ‘Swan Lake’ at the Met (Opera House), and I jumped right into forming BalletNext.”
Wiles envisioned BalletNext as a platform to collaborate with world-class dancers, choreographers and musicians, while encouraging risk-taking and creating unexpected performances, she said.
A friend suggested that Wiles ask Bigonzetti, whose works have been performed by Balletto di Toscana, New York City Ballet, City Ballet of São Paulo and the English National Ballet, to work with her on a piece. Wiles emailed him out of the blue, and her husband, James R. McCullough, suggested they fly to Italy to meet him.
“I met Mauro at the Fountain of Neptune, and we were having prosecco, and then a few months later he was in New York creating ‘La Follia.'”
The third work BalletNext will dance during Sunday’s performance is Wile’s “Petrichor,” which she also sneak-peaked in February.
In addition to Clark, the piece will feature another guest dancer, Hunter Solomon, who is currently dancing in Tucson, Arizona, according to Wiles.
“Hunter has danced with us before, so he’s a returning artist,” she said.
The word petrichor means the “smell of rain,” and the piece is set to Max Richter’s album “Infra,” which StringFX will perform, according to Wiles.
“I learned about the word from Katrina Kmak, Park City Library’s youth services librarian,” Wiles said. “We were talking about words, and she said she had this amazing word. And I thought it would be a fabulous name for a ballet.”
In creating “Petrichor,” Wiles examined the concept of tension and viewed the studio as her blank canvas.
“The movement is a bit different than what we have done in other ballets,” she said. “Some of it comes out of nowhere, and it’s really superfluid, like all the drops of water coming together. Hence, the smell of rain.”
Wiles is grateful for the partnership BalletNext shares with the Park City Institute.
“It’s just cool, and I think it will be brewing even more things this time next year as well,” she said.