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Stattgarter Ballett likes its triple or quadruple bills thematic. The most recent “Dutch Dance” focussed on Dutch impulses in dance from Hans van Manen to Jiry Kylian, whereas “Rendez-Vous Avec Chopin” is one of those clever dramaturgical evenings that cut a line through dance history to make you aware of connections and differences between styles and concepts. With Michail Fokine’s “Les Sylphides”, Jerome Robbins’ “Dances at a Gathering” and Christian Spuck’s “Nocturne” the common denominator is Chopin’s music that inspired three generations of choregraphers.

Fokine is tradtionally heralded as the harbinger of modern ballet. Yes, he took the corps de ballet of romantic ballet from the wings and put it centre stage. He made the soloists interact with the group as George Balanchine did after him. And yes, he did away with narrative and choreographed what for many is the first abstract ballet as such. But viewed on stage of the Stuttgart Opera House it looked more like the last stronghold of the ninetheenth-century tradition bringing it to its own by focussing on its constituent elements. Modernism, for sure, was happening elsewhere. Almost a hundred years later, I cannot help but wince at the symmetries, at the linear perspective and its vanishing point at the centre of which the only man of the ballet raises his arms to take two female dancers under his wings. After a bit of a shakey beginning the Stuttgart dancers developed strength and assurance. But the distance and blandness with which Nikolay Gudonov treated his various female partners ensured that on the night I saw them, “Les Sylphides” were a sure case for the ballet museum.

Jerome Robbins’ classic „Dances at a Gathering“ had its German premiere 33 years after it took American critics by storm. It took Reid Andersen, director of Stuttgarter Ballett, twelve years before the Robbins’ Trust would entrust his company with the rights to dance the piece. It’s a first for a German company, and it made the best of it. Choreographed in the late sixties in a time of social upheavel it must have seemed like a touch of hope. Robbins went at great lenghth to describe how the ballet expressed his trust and love in humankind. In its refusal to work the tensions of the times through, however, “Dances at a Gathering” seems more like Scott McKenzie’s hippy dippy “San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear some Flowers in your Hair)” than Jimi Hendrix’ powerful deconstruction of the American national anthem at Woodstock. War and burning inner cities are acknowledged only by their conspicuous absence, perhaps with a sligt hint towards the end when after an hour the ten dancers raise their heads to look at the sky above. It is an uncanny moment that expresses faith as much as fear of the unkown.

“Dances at a Gathering” is as hopelessly romantic as it is deeply humane. The five men and five women twirl across stage like polite courtiers at early Renaissance Italien courts from whose dances Robbins seems to have gathered some inspiration. Social interaction lies at the centre of interest here, not virtuoso display of power. The occasional lifts and jumps are never ostentatious. They are an expression of the joy of living with people meeting, bowing to greet each other, flirting, turning away until the next one comes along. As fas as the movements and the energy is concernd almost everything happens at middle level thus giving the piece the air of controlled lightness and freshness. But the emotions and situations portrayed resemble each other too much to keep interest up, a hint, perhaps, of what it must have cost Robbins to keep aggression as a legitimate human emotion out of his gatherings altogether.

The only real premiere of the programme was Christian Spuck’s “Nocturne”. Spuck, resident choreographer with the Stuttgart company, and composer Arne Vierck completed the dramaturgical line of the evening by bringing both ballet and Chopin into the late 20th century. Which basically means, one copies William Forsythe and the other Thom Willems. Taking their cue form the early 19th century salons, where Chopin would play his music, they create a modern day lounge with six white moveable sofas that are framed by woodpanellings. The walls are raised dragging the dancers holding on to them up from the floor. And then six women and twelve men dance in the manner of mid-period Forsythe: neo-classicism to the breaking point. The only drawback is that nothing really breaks here, since the dancers remain stuck in their classical idiom. Vierck, on the other hand, chases Chopins “Nocturne op. 55” and his “Prelude op. 28” through the computer to improvise on the sounds thus producing nervous electronical beats, ripping and twanging mettalic sounds reminscent of Thom Willems’ music for Forsythe ballets. For some this “Nocturne” may be too close to Forsythe for comfort. For others, including myself, it is the thought that counts. It is never too late to open the museum doors.