Ballet: Apollo
Dancer: Connor Walsh
Photo: Pam Francis

FANCY FREE (1944)
Choreography: Jerome Robbins
Music: Leonard Bernstein

Premiered in 1944, Jerome Robbins’s first ballet Fancy Free launched his career as one of the most celebrated American choreographers in history.   Set in New York City, the ballet follows the escapades of three sailors on leave on a hot summer night.  Fancy Free was later translated into the hit musical On the Town.  Robbins went on to collaborate with Bernstein again for West Side Story.

APOLLO (1928)
Choreography: George Balanchine
Music: Igor Stravinsky

This ballet depicts Apollo, the young god of music, who is visited and instructed by three Muses: Calliope, Muse of poetry, whose symbol is a tablet; Polyhymnia, Muse of mime, whose symbol is a mask that represents the power of gesture; and Terpsichore, Muse of dance and song, whose symbol is a lyre.  It was with this work that Balanchine, at age 24, achieved international recognition and began his lifelong partnership with Stravinsky.

-The George Balanchine Trust

HUSH (2006)
Choreography: Christopher Bruce
Music: Yo-Yo Ma and Bobby McFerrin (Hush)

If you've ever wondered what circus folks do when the big top closes, Hush gives an answer: They act and feel exactly like the rest of us. Set to, and inspired by, the Bobby McFerrin/Yo-Yo Ma album of the same name, Hush embraces life, from youth to old age, in the guise of a clown-faced family ending their day under the big top.  Bruce's brilliance lies in expressing human emotion through simple, almost minimalist, yet fluid movement.

-Houston Press