By Robert Gottlieb 12/25/06 12:00am

A Fresh Breeze at Ailey; New Faces in Nutcracker

Forget that great tree at Rockefeller Center: We dance-lovers know it must be Christmas because Alvin Ailey’s at the City Center and The Nutcracker’s at the State. Year in, year out, they anchor New York’s end-of-year dance experience. This year, though, Ailey is hoping to confound our expectations (terrific dancers, unterrific repertoire) at least a Read More

By Robert Gottlieb 12/26/05 12:00am

Ailey’s Astonishing Women, Ballets Russes Remembered

You didn’t need a crystal ball to guess that the annual five-week Alvin Ailey season at the City Center would be greeted with rapture by its full-house audiences and restrained enthusiasm by the critics. The message is the same, year in, year out: great dancing, inferior repertory. And in that regard, nothing has changed.

There Read More