Dance 2011: Highs, lows and top 10 moments

High: Maria Kochetkova and Gennadi Nedvigin at San Francisco Ballet. In the greatest partnerships in ballet, the union is greater than the sum of its parts, and so it was with these two dancers throughout the 2011 season. It wasn't just that his princely comportment set off her delicate phrasing in "Giselle," or that his rakishness highlighted her vivacity in "Coppelia." So well matched in their impeccable Russian training, Kochetkova and Nedvigin serve up not only artistry of the highest caliber but also that inexpressible, mysterious excitement born of potent onstage chemistry.

Low: The premature retirement of Miami City Ballet Artistic Director Edward Villella. The word that Villella was being ousted by his board sent ripples of outrage through the dance world. Now there are signs that a similar fate may await Ballet San Jose Artistic Director Dennis Nahat. Tracking fiscal health is a board's mandate, but when it ventures into artistic decisions and treats a ballet company like a business machine, the real loser is the art form.

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'Nearly 90{ 2},' Merce Cunningham Dance review

Rarely does an audience have a chance to anticipate the final performance of a great work. But so it was on Tuesday night as the 13 members of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company gave the company's final performance of Cunningham's last creation, "Nearly 90," capping eight days of workshops, lectures and events at Stanford Lively Arts.

The company's two-year Legacy tour - which commenced at Cunningham's death in 2009 - continues until the end of this year, when the company will disband permanently. This last appearance at Stanford's Memorial Auditorium felt like a firm push forward from one of modern dance's most influential choreographers.

'Nearly 90{ 2},' Merce Cunningham Dance review...

KQED Profile: Merce Cunningham

"There are ... distinct elements which when put together makes something which ... was not possible otherwise."

-- Merce Cunningham

One of the 20th century's most original dance-makers, Merce Cunningham has influenced a generation of choreographers with his abstract and complex methods of movement analysis and cerebral yet aesthetic creations. In fact, Cunningham's love of intellectual engagement and his academic background make his company a natural favorite at colleges and universities. In the "Masterworks" episode, Spark follows the Merce Cunningham Dance Company to Stanford University as he and his dancers take on "Encounter: Merce."

"Encounter: Merce" was an unusual campuswide interdisciplinary project that took place in March 2005. The event put Cunningham's decades-long career in context, with exhibits, films, workshops and panel discussions presented not only by the dance division and arts presenter Stanford Lively Arts, but also by the music and visual arts departments and the Stanford School of Medicine.


Read more on the KQED Spark website.