Photo By Graham Lienhart

Cincinnati Ballet Artistic Director Victoria Morgan captures dancers' spirited energy in creating her world premiere work, Boléro.

No doubt, dancers are athletes. But how much a role does sports-like competition or teamwork play among a group of dancers? During a visit to Cincinnati Ballet's Over-the-Rhine studios, I sensed spirit of camaraderie hanging in the air, along with a gentle whiff of sweat.

"It's got to have that sense of competition!" Artistic Director Victoria Morgan calls out during a recent rehearsal for Boléro, a world premiere work she's choreographing for her 10-year anniversary with Cincinnati Ballet. They're running through an all-male, powerhouse section where the dancers engage in some playful one-up-man-ship.

Boléro is one of six widely varied pieces in Boléro & More, a mixed repertory program commemorating Morgan's decade with the Ballet that also includes works from George Balanchine, Val Caniparoli and two additional pieces choreographed by Morgan.

"It's a pretty ambitious program," she says. "The sections are all so completely different and I love that it shows the breadth and the diversity of the company, but we're really slamming for the finals here!"

Morgan's belief in collaboration filters through her tenure. Last season, the Ballet teamed up with Columbus' BalletMet to perform an exhilarating contemporary piece Play (set to music by Moby!) from acclaimed choreographer Stanton Welch. Beginning in 2002, Léonide Massine's 1938 "lost" masterwork ballet, The Seventh Symphony -- the third movement of which will be performed again in Boléro & More -- was faithfully re-created through Cincinnati Ballet's joining forces with Cincinnati Art Museum and Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo dance legend Frederic Franklin, who had performed in the original historic production.

Ravel's Boléro is one of Classical music's best-known pieces. Did it feel risky choreographing to it?

She acknowledges that the music is intimidating but says, "I love Boléro, everybody loves Boléro, and I've always thought it would be cool to try and attempt it. It just seemed to work philosophically."

The music's spare initial development works well within the dance piece's less formal studio-to-stage context: there won't be "wings" on the stage sides, so the audience witnesses a broader perspective, literally and figuratively.

In a clever collaboration with the Ballet's academy, selected students as young as age 12 will perform in a loose narrative tracing dancers' phases of training and development. (The company dancers don't enter until about four minutes into the piece.) As the music grows exponentially in intensity and complexity, so do the dancers' movements -- eventually giving way to vigorous, all-out athletic beauty, where one tries to out-do the next. All 28 company dancers appear onstage for, according to Morgan, the climactic and challenging ending.

Good thing she has seasoned company dancers around to help. They have become increasingly integrated within Morgan's choreographic process during her tenure.

Morgan recounts how she was forced to choreograph a piece (2004's Seeking Velocity, also on this weekend's program) while recuperating from surgery.

"I just sat in the chair and proposed ideas. I think they felt sorry for me, so they tried really hard," she smiles. "They were really great and I think I learned a lot about counting on them and a lot about trusting them. That's an important lesson I think for a choreographer to learn. And I had to learn it the hard way by having a hip replacement!

"I used to come into rehearsal and I'd have the whole thing choreographed and just tell them exactly what to do. (Now) when I come into a rehearsal, I like having an idea of the structure: this is when the women come in, this is when the solo is ... but I don't have the exact step they're gonna do. I never have that, because I really count on them to invent it."

She notes that some dancers prefer being told exactly what to do, but many others are stimulated by exploratory movement.

According to some longtime company dancers, Morgan has expanded her receptiveness to collaborative input from the group.

Senior soloist Mishic Marie Corn, now in her seventh season with the Ballet, explains, "I think there's a comfort level with her dancers. She still tries to push the envelope and say, 'Well, I want you to move this speed and try to make it this big and this expansive,' but because she knows us now and she's been working with a few of us for so many years, she'll listen to our feedback and go, 'Yeah, that might work' or 'No, absolutely not, that's not my vision,' so that's been great." Corn adds, "She's still controlling the vision and we try to make that vision happen."

Although the choreographer remains the creating god, er, goddess, Boléro showcases individual dancers' talents.

"One of the things I'm really proud of is just the caliber of the dancers and the things they're able to do," Morgan says. "It's a nice opportunity to highlight that. They all kind of have their moment to shine. "

Senior soloist Joseph Gatti says, "(Boléro) is about each person's individual personality, so I get to do Michael Jackson in it, break-dance. She let me put that in, so it's exciting. It shows the audience that I can do things other than just ballet."

He also spins in endless pirouette variations as if he were on ice.

Reinforcing her openness to dancers' contributions, Morgan shares an aspect of her job she enjoys most: "(When) I just see them take on something and make it their own, and turn it into more than a technical thing, really make it an artistic advancement."

Despite classical ballet's artistically formal reputation, in the studio I heard echoes of healthy competitiveness coupled with true team spirit -- even a nod to cheerleading. As a dancer lofted ballerina to the height of a quick, pop-up style vertical lift, one of the men call out, "Go Ballet!"