Choreography: Todd Bolender
Music: Aaron Copland
Costume: Russ Vogler
"The Queen of Hearts
She made some Tarts,
All on a summer's day'…..
and a rascally knave stole them all and came to regret it. If this
musical theater comic ballet is not about the Queen of Hearts (and it
is not) it is about four brash boys whose worlds of play and romance continually
collide and whose judgment, like that of the Knave of Hearts, is somewhat
flawed. They romp through this piece which is punctuated with souvenirs
of boyhood-images of baseball, leapfrog, and tom-foolery. They move
quickly and unself-consciously from ballgames to romance to contention
and back again, charmingly unscathed by it all.
The dance collects elements of jazz and sports. The forms are stretched
and angular, a kind of brassy swagger replaces the fluid grace of Classical
Symphony or Tchaikovsky Suite. Aaron Copland's Danzon Cubano, a
work originally composed for two pianos in 1942, reflects Copland's sure
hand with incorporation of folk rhythms. The music, neither samba,
tango nor mamba, is nevertheless convincingly Latin. A Summer's
Day was choreographed by Todd Bolender for the Cologne Opera Ballet in
1964. It is presented for the first time in Kansas City.
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