He said a few final words to the dancers: “Remember, there is a mystery about the seasons, a divine energy. It’s more than pretty dances. There is an inescapable force that makes these things happen.”
The dancers found their places, and the room went quiet. Then the rehearsal pianist, Jacek Mysinski, began to play the first glistening notes of the Glazunov score. The dances unspooled one after another with a kind of inexorable momentum: a small ensemble driven by the winter wind, a solo full of footwork as sharp as shards of ice. Each section embodied a quality drawn from nature; solos and duets highlighted the attributes of the individual dancers — boldness, sensuality, attack, lyricism.
“The Seasons,” which is to have its premiere at Ballet Theatre’s spring gala May 20, is Ratmansky’s 16th ballet for the company, where he has been the artist in residence since 2009. In those 10 years, the dancers have grown conversant with his style, which combines a pliant use of legs with a mobile and free upper body; crisp, rhythmic attack coupled with melodic sweep.
By now, some Ballet Theatre dancers have spent their entire careers performing his dances; the famously difficult choreography has shaped their technique and stage personas. “The other day,” Kevin McKenzie, the company’s artistic director, said in his office near Union Square, “they were rehearsing ‘On the Dnieper’” — Ratmansky’s first ballet for the company, out of repertory for almost a decade — “and I asked myself, ‘Why does it look so different now?’”
He said he realized that no one in that original cast had ever worked with Ratmansky — they were strangers to each other. But now “the ballet can come to life in a way it never could have before,” McKenzie added. “Through working with him, the dancers have come to know themselves and what they’re capable of.”
Ratmansky’s decadelong tenure at Ballet Theatre is also the longest period he has spent in one place since leaving his home city of Kiev, Ukraine, for ballet school in Moscow. His career has zigzagged across continents and straddled the end of the Soviet Union: He went from Moscow back to Kiev; then Winnipeg, Manitoba; Copenhagen; and back to Moscow, where he directed the Bolshoi Ballet for five years beginning in 2004.
After it was announced that he would be leaving the Bolshoi, he was in talks to join New York City Ballet, for whom he had already made a successful work, “Russian Seasons,” in 2006. (He has returned to the company several times since.) But when those negotiations fell through, McKenzie snapped into action, inviting him to come to Ballet Theatre. His contract, renewed in 2011, runs through 2023. “I hope to have him here till 2053!” McKenzie said.
A few days ago, Ratmansky, 50, reflected on his relationship to the company and to New York, and on his own evolution as a choreographer over the past decade. Here are edited excerpts from the conversation.
Q. When you first came to Ballet Theatre, did you think you would stay as long as you have?
A. It’s surprising even to me! Before I came to New York there was a pattern in my life. Every six or seven years, or even less, I felt like I need to start anew. First, as a dancer, I was looking for interesting repertory, then I was looking for a place to choreograph. And then I was invited to direct the company in Moscow.
But here, I can do what I love the most, serve the company and its needs, which is very important, but also pursue projects that are interesting and inspiring in other places. It feels like the right balance.
Q. How has your relationship with the dancers evolved over that time?
A. The first experience with “On the Dnieper” [2009] we were trying to impress each other. The next one, “Seven Sonatas,” was probably the most difficult. It was like we didn’t understand each other. I think it was about breaking old habits.
Q. What changed?
A. Before my eyes, the company switched its focus, from a company of international stars to a real company with its own dancers. I think it was a healthy transition. It took time to give fruit and I think it’s beginning to pay off. There are dancers in the company now, like Catherine Hurlin and Tyler Maloney, who I’ve worked with since they were kids in the company school. They understand my style really well.
Q. What aspects of New York have fed your imagination?
A. Exhibitions. The Metropolitan Museum. Sometimes I go every week. Lately I’ve mostly been visiting the Roman and Greek antiquities. And the Asian collection. You can keep going back for years and always discover new things.
Q. What about dance — what do you like to see?
A. I’ve developed an interest in Indian classical dance. It’s about the way they tell stories. There are parallels with classical ballet — the way they subdivide dance into pure dance, expressive dance, like ballet d’action in ballet, and pure mime. They have it all. In New York I’ve really had the chance to see amazing classical Indian dancers.
Q. Do you feel like an American now?
A. I do. But in my life I’ve been from somewhere so many times. At the Bolshoi school I was from Kiev. In Kiev, I was from the Bolshoi School. Then in Canada, my wife, Tatiana, and I were from Ukraine; in Denmark we were Russian. In Moscow we were from Denmark. My roots are Russian Jewish, and my native language and schooling is Russian. But I vote in New York. So that’s the mixed salad.
Q. In your time here, you’ve worked with both Ballet Theatre, your home, and City Ballet. Do you choreograph differently for the two companies?
A. I think that you come into the studio and see the dancers and you play to their strengths. City Ballet is a unique company, because of the Balanchine technique. They have that speed and musicality. Ballet Theatre is a bit more like a traditional European opera house with different ballets, different styles and a more traditional ballet hierarchy with principal dancers at the center of a big work.
Q. Is there something you’ve created over this past decade that feels particularly significant to you?
A I think I would say the “Shostakovich Trilogy” [2013]. It sums up my very old love for Shostakovich’s music and, in some way, my connection to my Soviet upbringing. It’s a very personal work. But it’s also symphonic in scale. I love the fact that it’s a full ballet but that each section can be performed independently.
Q. How do you think you have evolved as a choreographer over these 10 years?
A. At the moment I’m under the influence of classicism. There was a time when I tried to develop my own language, but it felt limiting. Now I think it’s all right to use the classical vocabulary. Because it works. Hundreds of thousands of dancers every day do these exercises, which are full of beautiful, effective steps, refined by generations and generations.
Q. Since arriving in New York, you’ve made ballets to Shostakovich, Leonid Desyatnikov, Stravinsky, Tchaikovsky and other Russians. What keeps bringing you back to this music?
A. I know it better, and maybe it’s in the blood, I don’t know. Maybe it’s my upbringing. It’s not a nationalistic thing, it’s just that the pool is so rich. I have a list of music that I want to use, but I’m nearing the end of it. I’d like to choreograph more to Leonard Bernstein; I think he is remarkable. And I love baroque music, and French music.
Q. You’ve recently begun restaging works by 19th-century choreographer Marius Petipa, using archival materials. What spurred this new interest?
A. Partly because I think it’s not right to overwhelm the repertory of the company with my own work. This encouraged my interest in staging classics, which is completely different from my own work. Even though my taste as a choreographer is of course reflected in the reconstructions that I do. They’re my productions, but the choreography is Petipa. It’s more Petipa than other productions of Petipa! These productions also inspire my original work.
Q. “The Seasons” definitely feels inspired by Petipa; do you think of it as an extension of your exploration of his style?
A. Yes! The music, by Alexander Glazunov, was composed for Petipa. I took Petipa’s plan for the ballet and thought, it works perfectly. It’s all very clearly laid out. The number of soloists and groups, the kids. Also, when Petipa made it he was working as a ballet master in chief, showing off the company. And that’s what I wanted to do. I wanted to celebrate the company and use as many soloists as I could. The other thing I wanted to celebrate with this ballet is the classical vocabulary. That’s my little secret celebration.
Q. In 2009, when you became artist in residence at Ballet Theatre, you barely knew the company. What made you take the job?
A. It was something like destiny, from my point of view. When the negotiations with NYCB fell apart, the next morning I got a call from Kevin inviting me. It was something I didn’t expect at all. He took a leap of faith. Another moment was when I first visited ABT studios and I was introduced to the company. They didn’t know me. They had never worked with me. But they trusted me. And that’s really important. When you feel that, you want to serve.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.