State Street Ballet’s Evenings: Another Evening to Remember!

So much diversity and creativity were on display at State Street Ballet’s (SSB) Evenings 2026! The styles ranged from ballet to Broadway, expressing emotions from pure delight to deep love, from witty sarcasm to haunting sadness. 

The choreographers presented nine new works, all created and rehearsed in just three weeks! Executive Director Cecily MacDougall explained, “By giving dancers the freedom to create within the studio and collaborate closely with their peers, Evenings plays a crucial role in developing the next generation of choreographers.”  

And the dancers really showed off their amazing range of abilities and tastes in music!

Beginning with the purely classical, Balanchine-esque Souvenir de Florence, choreographed by Amber Hirschfield, we went straight to ‘80s disco in Maria Rita Rapisarda’s “Crying at the Discoteque.” From sequins and glitter, we luxuriated in Charlie Chaplin’s ultra-schmaltzy “Love Song,” choreographed by Saori Yamashita. Ethan Ahuero’s  “Doin’ Time,” a driving jazz piece with a Latin-sounding beat and unbelievably athletic choreography, contrasted with Nathaniel Tyson’s cheeky portrayal of “The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly.”   

A catchy contemporary jazz fusion piece, “Interlude,” choreographed by Brenna Chumacero, reminded me of Meredith Ventura’s Palermo! for the sassy way the women flaunted trench coats. The show ended with Aimee Le’s supremely clever rendition of “Cell Block Tango,” one of my all-time favorites.  

Out of this colorful bouquet of delightful pieces, two works deeply spoke to me: Ryan Lenkey’s  Mishima and Armine, choreographed by rehearsal director and guest artist Tigran Sargsyan. 

When I asked Lenkey about his choice of music, he explained that he was drawn to the “melancholic yet hopeful quality” of Mishima by Phillip Glass. Having Glass’s music played live on the piano by SSB’s accompanist Eben Drost gave the choreography a very in-the-moment, almost imperative, feeling. Lenkey explained, “Rather than illustrating a narrative, I wanted to translate the emotional response the music gave me into physical form. My recent proposal and marriage to Saori Yamashita inevitably influenced the work, and I wanted the audience to experience that same emotional resonance.” 

And, as an audience member, I certainly did! Lenkey created his choreography for the lovely Yamashita and Ethan Ahuero, who is known for his dramatic portrayals (see Evenings last year and Little Mermaid). 

“Using Glass’s music, I envisioned a story of two souls finding one another and falling into each other’s gravity,” Lenkey explained, “supporting one another through both the heavy and light moments of life. The fluttering melodies capture the exhilaration and sense of flight of overwhelming love, while the contrasting tones of the score reflect the way partners find balance and rhythm through life’s shifting highs and lows.”  

The lifts were fascinating, so I asked Lenkey which choreographers inspired him. He cited SSB’s Nilas Martins, whose style I detected in some of the lifts, and all of his previous coaches and collaborators, including Christopher Wheeldon and Alexander Ekman. 

Lenkey is definitely an up-and-coming choreographer whom we should keep an eye on! Look for him and the beautiful Saori Yamashita in the Independent’s Wedding issue.

The piece that went straight to my heart was Tigran Sargsyan’s Armine, set to a famous Armenian lullaby, “Ari Im Sokhak” (Come to me, Nightingale), and dedicated to his mother, who recently passed away. He wrote in the program notes, “The lullaby she sang to me now carries her angel … a quiet hand on my heart, leaving me in peace.” 

Sargsyan further explained, “This song meant a lot for me, especially that my mum would sing it for me or play it on the piano. [After] she passed away, this melody played in my head for days. So I looked it up, and of course it was this song that was calming me down since I was a child, and in some ways letting me know about my mum’s presence.”

As I watched Amara Galloway and Nathaniel Tyson perform this piece, the music and choreography deeply moved me. Even without knowing what the song was about when I first saw this piece performed, the choreography made me think of the Armenian Genocide. It seemed deeply sad, as if portraying fleeing through the woods at night. The dancers kept looking outward, as if longing for their homeland. 

Sargsyan explained, “The song’s origin itself has a lot of deeper meaning about the time of the Armenian Genocide and Vardapet Komitas, who created it, so of course there is a lot of pain and sorrow in the melody.”

After the concert, I asked Galloway about how she felt dancing this role. She said, “I was very excited to be in Tigran’s piece. We walked in on the first day of rehearsal, and for Tigran to explain what it was about, that set the tone from the beginning.” She relayed that it was an honor to have been trusted with expressing Tigran’s emotions through this piece.

The traditional Armenian song “Ari Im Sokhak” is traced back to 1915, to the village of Shatakh, in the Van province of Western Armenia, which was heavily impacted by the Armenian Genocide. The composer, Vardapet Komitas, was himself captured and suffered greatly. 

But Sargsyan wanted the audience to feel hope as well. “The meaning I wanted to give to the audience through my piece is that even in your deepest pain, there is still support from the people that love you and that you love. Even if they are no longer with us physically, that source of love still remains with us and carries with us forever.”

Sargsyan, who has been a principal dancer with numerous companies in Europe and the U.S., is currently the resident choreographer with the Hollywood Ballet and the rehearsal director for SSB. He is planning a larger work on this theme for May 9th, 2027. Watch for announcements! 

Evenings 2026 was undoubtedly an evening to remember.

Evenings is supported by generous donations. To read about the fabulous dancers and their future performances, and become a patron-angel-donor for State Street Ballet, see statestreetballet.com.