Ballet, says In Series founder and artistic director Carla Hübner, “doesn’t have to be this great theatrical thing. It can be something that happens right in your lap.” That sense of experiencing dance up close is one that the In Series offers in its collaborations with the Washington Ballet’s Studio Company, featuring accomplished dancers, choreographers, and musicians working together on performances in a more intimate setting.
January 17 through 19 at DC’s GALA Hispanic Theatre, the In Series and the Washington Ballet present La Vie en Rose, a show celebrating French culture from Berlioz to Edith Piaf, with choreography by Septime Webre and David Palmer. “We have the singers interacting with the dancers, with constant weaving between the two,” Hübner says. “By creating a theatrical environment for both, the product becomes more than the sum of its parts.”
Webre is revisiting a tribute to Piaf and Jacques Brel he choreographed years ago called “Oui/Non,” in which soprano and Catholic University professor Fleta Hylton voices Piaf. La Vie en Rose also features music by Henri Duparc, a little-known French composer who quit writing music at age 37 and destroyed many of his works. “They’re very beautiful, very romantic, very French,” says Hübner, who also plays piano in this production.
For the Studio Company dancers, who are unpaid and typically appear only in the chorus, the show offers the chance to display their talents in a performance that’s all about them. “The singers have found it so inspiring to look at their repertory in a different way and to watch the young dancers’ dedication and virtuosity,” Hübner says. “For us all to be onstage together is really rewarding.”
Tickets ($40) at inseries.org.
This article appears in the January 2014 issue of Washingtonian.
