By: Tessa Perkins

Ballet BC’s resident choreographer Cayetano Soto is presenting a new one-act ballet, Eight Years of Silence, during Program 1 of the company’s 32nd season. Also opening the season is a work from Johan Inger, B.R.I.S.A. Ballet BC audiences have previously been impressed by both of these choreographers, and will have a chance to revisit their work from November 2–4 at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre.   

     In 2015, Barcelona-based Soto began his three-year tenure as resident choreographer, creating works including the undulant Twenty Eight Thousand Waves which the company has performed on two occasions. Last season’s opener featured four of his works, showing off his range as a choreographer. With a full-bodied contemporary style full of sharp lines and innovative lifts, I’m sure his new work will suit the equally innovative Ballet BC.  

     In an interview with the Vancouver Sun, Soto explained that Eight Years of Silence is based on his difficult experience with illness. The experience itself, coupled with his reaction to it after the fact was the inspiration for the choreography. He has a way of taking something negative and turning it into something beautiful through dance that obscures the basis upon which it was founded.

     Swedish choreographer Johan Inger is a well-known choreographer who has created memorable work for Ballet BC, including Walking Mad which featured a movable wall that the dancers climbed over and around. B.R.I.S.A. was created while Inger was an artistic associate at Nederlands Dans Theater. The piece is to be performed on a carpeted surface, and it includes his playful trademarks with props such as a hairdryer and all different types of fans. His works explore the deeper intellect and motivations of people, and they are always spirited and lively.

     Continuing to present fresh, contemporary works from esteemed international choreographers, Ballet BC’s latest season is shaping up to be another collection of must-see works. It will continue with a new full-length Romeo and Juliet in February by Medhi Walerski (choreographer of Ballet BC audience favourite Petite Cérémonie). In May, Soto’s BEGINNING AFTER, created for Ballet BC in 2016, returns along with an encore of Bill by Sharon Eyal and Gai Behar. Also on the same program will be a new work by artistic director Emily Molnar in collaboration with the Phoenix Chamber Choir and conductor Graeme Langager.     

Soto and Inger are both well-known names among Ballet BC regulars, and with good reason. Their works are innovative and unexpected, just the way Ballet BC likes it these days.