Sarasota Ballet first with Matthew Bourne's 'The Infernal Galop'

Iain Webb and the Sarasota Ballet continue a season of firsts with a program including Tony Award winning choreographer Matthew Bourne's "The Infernal Galop" from 1989 and a world premiere of "Wolfgang for Webb" by Dominic Walsh. Also on the program is a reprise performance of George Balanchine's "Allegro Brillante" with five performances starting on Friday, April 25 at 8 p.m. and continuing Saturday and Sunday, April 27 at 2 and 8 p.m. at the FSU Center for Performing Arts (5555 N. Tamiami Trail, Sarasota).

"The Infernal Galop" is typical of Bourne's work in this early Adventures in Motion Pictures ballet, "a Franglais Spectacular", a characteristically witty and astute spoof of English perceptions of the French, inspired by all the familiar and much loved icons of France in the 1930's and 1940's: Edith Piaf, Charles Trenet, Tino Rossi, Mistinguett and others.

In a series of surprising and charming vignettes, Bourne evokes the period, with all kinds of sly humor and oblique references, setting his dances to its familiar and distinctive cabaret chansons, before closing with the "infernal gallop" as Offenbach's famous can-can from Orpheus in the Underworld is correctly titled. On the way, he pokes fun at the grand French amour, a lowlier encounter in a street pissoir, the pretensions of the fashion industry catwalk, and the recurring theme of the matelot.

This is France as seen by the uptight English imagination, an equal mix of ancient hostility and deep affection, with all the traditional clichés joyously paraded for our entertainment.

"Wolfgang for Webb" is the first work in a trilogy by Dominic Walsh with the second work choreographed for Dominic Walsh Dance Theater and a third for the two companies to perform together. Audiences may remember the Dominic Walsh Dance Theater performing their part of the trilogy in their February Sarasota performances. That work, "Amadeus for Anita," has just won the prestigious Choo-San Goh Award for choreography making Walsh one of the few people to win that award more than once in their lifetime.

Speaking of Wolfgang, Walsh says, "This is the first installment of my humble tribute to some of my favorite works by W.A. Mozart. For years, I have found so much of his music both humorous and poignantly touching, and even sometimes intriguingly irreverent. Wolfgang is a look at a process of holding down an idea or an ignited thought in effort to make a work of art around it. The distractions, interruptions and the lucid lack of tangibility during the creative process are the subject of the ballet."

To purchase tickets, call the box office at 941- 351-8000 or toll free at 1-800-361-8388. Tickets can also be purchased online at the Sarasota Ballet Web site, www.sarasotaballet. org. Tickets start at $15 and tickets for children under 12 are 50 percent off.