Twinkle toes
A recipe for relaxing from a long week and slightly busy weekend:
Ingredients: Downtown, Ballet, Nashville Symphony Orchestra, Cathy Rigby and Disney influences, Sunday midday, Fantastic seats, and Vanderbilt ID.
Instructions: Step 1. Go Downtown, buy student rush tickets (tickets discounted for being an awesome, fabulous college student), Step 2. watch the gleeful World Premiere for Peter Pan at the the Andrew Jackson Preforming Arts Center. Step 3. Relish it :).
You know that moment…that wonderful moment, when you know that you could bury yourself back into that deep pile of homework, or you could indulge yourself…a little bit? My theory of work is not to be strictly indulgent or studious, but to have a little balance of both.
This weekend I got to see the the first production that has ever given Peter Pan ballet shoes. Paul Vasterling, the CEO of Nashville Ballet, has a love for storytelling through ballet. He was inspired to build this production of Peter Pan was from the ground up. The score was composed taking snippets of a collection of different scores. The costumes and characters outfitted to perfect fantasty-worldness. A pretty whimsical tune accented the beautiful movements of the company.
I loved seeing the same dancers transition seamlessly from the previous production of Romeo and Juliet into different roles for Peter Pan; Captain Hook had the part of Romeo and Juliet had the part of Mrs. Darling. Peter Pan flitted across the stage. I must ask…how many theatre productions of Peter Pan can boast both a flying and simultaneously ballet-twirling Peter Pan? The character’s charming demeanor beamed from the stage and was thoroughly engaging.The lightheartedness of the production, from the laughable full-body crocodile swaying its tail, cued to the beat of a drum, to Tinkerbell’s adorable antics, was enchanting to every age. At the end of the production, everyone couldn’t help but give the cast a standing ovation. The crowd of kids behind me made me smile, “I can’t see! Let me see!”