Nederlands Dans Theater

Nederlands Dans Theater’s magnificent dancers perform an evening of two visually startling and provocative pieces created by co-choreographers Sol León and Paul Lightfoot. Intimately connected, each explores the nature of love. Set to powerfully beautiful Beethoven works-Piano Concertos Nos. 3 and 4 and to excerpts from Symphony No. 5–Sehnsucht (translated as “yearning”) begins with two dancers hovering in a cube-like room. At various times, the room spins, turning the side walls into the ceiling and floor, and then the other way around. This spinning room, with the man and woman trapped inside it, serves as a metaphor for an intense love that is both intimate and claustrophic. As more dancers take the stage, this metaphor is extended throughout the piece. The evening concludes with Schmetterling (translated as “butterfly”). A perfect companion piece to Sehnsucht, this work also examines the nature of love, this time perhaps in its most basic form–that between mother and child. Set to the cynical love songs by indie pop group Magnetic Fields and British composer Max Richter, Schmetterling replaces the melancholy of Sehnsucht with a sly, somewhat humorous take on love.