Upstairs, at Liberty Station’s Dance Place, all but two San Diego Ballet dancers were rehearsing last month for the company’s signature dance, “Mambomania.”
It’s one of the works, along with “The Firebird,” that will be part of this weekend’s season-opening performance.
Behind the rehearsal room’s glass doors, a line of ballerinas could be seen dancing on pointe shoes, swiveling their hips to the sultry, horn-driven rhythms by Cuban bandleader Perez Prado, better known as King of the Mambo.
Downstairs, in the smaller rehearsal space, artistic director Javier Velasco was overseeing a fight.
Company dancers Alexia Norris and Marshall Whiteley were learning the pas de deux in “The Firebird,” a ballet based on an old Russian fairy tale that’s accompanied by a Stravinsky score.
Norris will play the firebird.
Whiteley has the role of Prince Ivan, who tries to capture the magical avian and enlist her help in battling the evil sorcerer who put a spell on his beloved.
Unlike the delicate swan in “Swan Lake,” the firebird is literally a hot superpower.
Before rehearsing her part with Whiteley, Norris described her excitement at getting her first title role with San Diego Ballet.
“The firebird is more energetic and eye-catching,” said Norris, who admits to “ripping through a pair of pointe shoes” every week.
“I really like that she’s not the love interest in the story. I want to show that she’s a powerful character who takes charge and helps the prince save the day.”
First, though, the prince must capture her and convince her to give up one of her enchanted feathers, hence the taut, athletic pas de deux that made both dancers sweat.
Hand and arm gestures are significant, in that Norris has wings instead of arms and she must flutter and fight to be free.
Whiteley must try to contain her and Velasco said he should elevate his arms in an embracing position that would resonate as “cage-like.”
“It’s very primitive,” Velasco explained to the couple, as they danced to the section of Stravinsky’s score known as the “Supplication of the Firebird.”
“Pull her up from the splits, chassé (travel), then piqué (shift weight) on the other foot.”
As the couple moved and darted across the floor, Norris picked up speed and, with both hands, she pushed Whiteley in the chest.
“Look away,” Velasco told Whiteley as Norris moved closer to him.
“She’s on fire.”
After the rehearsal, Velasco described the firebird as beautiful, but also a little scary.
“When the prince is trying to subdue her, there’s a danger to it. She never should look like the ballerina on a music box. She has an imposing, ferocious quality.”
Velasco has a reputation for fusing traditional ballet with unexpected dance forms.
In “The Firebird” story, Prince Ivan is attacked by the sorcerer’s minions and when Velasco listened to “the energized and percussive accents of the music” he envisioned the minions as hip-hop dancers in the battle scenes.
“I wanted those bad boys close to the ground,” he said.
“It’s a lot of fun when the ballet and hip-hop dancers come together. They can understand and appreciate what the others are putting into it, even though they’re different styles.”
Velasco assigned the roles of hip-hop dancers to students from the Chula Vista School of Creative & Performing Arts.
Velasco also encouraged the young dancers to provide input, so that their performance would be more “contemporary and organic.”
Both dance works in this weekend’s production stir Velasco’s emotions for different reasons.
“’Mambomania’ was inspired by the parties my family would have at my house,” he said wistfully.
“Both of my parents passed within a couple of months of each other last year, and though it’s mambo music with girls dancing on pointe, it’s a deeply felt, extremely personal ballet. It’s also a lot of fun, not a thing of sadness at all.”
Velasco remembered hearing Stravinsky’s “The Firebird” score at age 5, when he was on a school trip to see the San Diego Symphony.
“It was one of the first classical pieces of music that I ever heard,” he recalled.
“That music is something I always remembered. It’s moody and it takes you back to primordial days. It goes down to your core.”
San Diego Ballet presents: ‘Firebird and Mambomania’
When: 7 p.m. Friday; 2 p.m. Saturday
Where: Joan B. Kroc Theater, 6611 University Ave., San Diego
Tickets: $15-$65
Online: sandiegoballet.org
