Dance
Ballerina Wendy Whelan gave her farewell performance with the New York City Ballet on Saturday night after 30 years with the company. Choreographer Alexei Ratmansky designed Whelan’s farewell piece to focus on her attributes as a dancer, in particular, the lines of her legs, her strong face and her ability to convey emotions ranging from bleak to rapturous. Her final performance, at David H. Koch theater, featured the entirety of George Balachine’s “La Sonnambula,” a Grand Valse Brilliante pas de six from Jerome Robbins’s “Dances at a Gathering” and the second movement of Mr. Ratmansky’s “Concerto DSCH,” among others.
Opera
Security was tightened at the Metropolitan Opera this week as it prepared for its first performance of John Adams’s 1991 opera “The Death of Klinghoffer” on Monday night. New York police were prepared for a protest outside the opera house. Rudolph W. Giuliani, the former mayor of New York and Republican presidential candidate offered to join the protesters outside the opera house on Monday to denounce the work, which, as he told the New York Times, he believes offers “a distorted view of history.” However, New York’s current mayor, Democrat Bill DeBlasio, defended the Met’s right to perform “Klinghoffer,” telling the New York Times that Mr. Giuliani had a history of challenging cultural institutions when he disagreed with their content.
Video Games
The video game studio Harmonix has had massive success with its titles including Guitar Hero and Rock Band. This notoriety eventually led to Disney approaching Harmonix in 2010 with an interest in adapting its classic 1940 animated film, “Fantasia,” into a musical game. The film was not intended to be a loose adaptation, like the versions in the 1980s and ‘90s. Rather, Disney wanted to capture the essence of “Fantasia” by exploring and celebrating the work of classical composers. This Tuesday, Harmonix will release “Disney Fantasia: Music Evolved,” a rhythm game for Microsoft’s Kinect system that allows players to use their hands to conduct songs by following prompts on the screen.
