On its current visit Canadian company: Ballets Jazz Montreal present its homage to the late Montreal's most celebrated artist- Leonard Cohen, based on his poetry and songs.
It must've seemed a safe choice for the company to lean on Cohen's accessible art products which enjoy worldwide popularity. Yet, there may be a trap lurking when you need to balance the dance with the songs and lyrics of Cohen's unique artistry.
On the positive, highly visible side, the company used a fine line of light and video designers along sound and music direction which wrapped the sage with attractive technical aids that created various moods landscapes and surround ambiance.
Three choreographers were recruited to control the numerous short dance passages and a few more developed dance scenes: Andonis Foniadakis, Annabelle Lopez Ochoa and Ihsan Rustem.
For a long while it was almost impossible to attribute specific section out of a long line of dance pieces to a specific choreographer, since they basically seemed to show the dancers' technique based mostly duets and trios with a rather safe energetic, almost gymnastic moves, adorned with lots of lifts, splits, high kicks etc. That rather conservative modernist's style kept well the rhythms, yet, with far between promising original flares.
During the latter part of the evening we enjoyed an exception, a fully choreographed scene with a clearly styled paradigm with clever humorous set design based on small multifunctional line of boxes that well served the original choreography, by exposing limited choice of limbs at a time.
Given that the songs and recited lyrics were the prioriy, the evening's preliminary concept needed to produce various tools to avoid a simplistic grid of song and dance routines. One should appreciate the effort taken by dramaturgy and stage director Eric Jean to reach some diversity, within the routines.
Such was the silhouette of a dancer dressed like Leonard Cohen and walked on and off stag depicting during the evening a clear visual image, used in impressive forms and fashions also on the screen, imprinting the main image on one's mind.
Playing Cohen's selected songs and hearing his voice reciting some of his lyrics along an occasional comment he recorded, added depth to the dramatic content. Who could stay indifferent hearing L.C. recorded voice, telling us the story behind creating his magical Suzanne, or singing Lover, Lover, Lover, topped by First We Take Manhattan or So Long, Marianne, to name a few.
In the end, the dance itself- some faults aside- served its propose as a descent platform to tailor the production on it, aware that Leonard Cohen's artistry will rule the evening, while the dancing is there for support. One could sense the company's warmth and best intentions to celebrate this wonderful poet, singer and a humanist. And for all of that,it surely was an evening of the Hallelujah.