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The Arts Intel Report

A Cultural Compass
For the World Traveler
A Cultural Compass
For the World Traveler

Noces & Opus 40

Les Ballets de Monte Carlo performing Jean-Christophe Maillot’s Noces.

May 25–27, 2023
155 Bd du Mercantour, 06200, Nice, France, France

The choreographic vision of Jean-Christophe Maillot is forward-looking, to say the least. As the artistic director of Les Ballets de Monte Carlo—a company of chic and sleek dancers—Maillot revisits the classics often, but always relocating, reconstructing, rethinking them. Noces (Wedding) is in that category. It is set to Les Noces, the savage yet sublime ballet-cantata that Igor Stravinsky composed in 1917, then revised, and then premiered in Paris in 1923, with choreography by Bronislava Nijinska. In this program, Maillot’s 2003 version of the ballet is paired with Opus 40, a work from 2000. Set to music by Meredith Monk, it is about childhood, youth, the energy of growth and first love—a common theme for dance, and one that contrasts nicely with the more ritualistic community of Noces. —Laura Jacobs