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Suite: Eight Slavonic Dances
by E.J. Gold
Price: 1 Goldback
Long ago, beyond the reach of maps and memory, there was a village that appeared only in the mist — a place of ritual, rebellion, love, loss, and laughter. Some say it still dances just beneath the surface of our waking world. This ballet is a reconstruction of the village’s final day, told through movement, light, and the ghost of folk melody.
Review:
(By Moira Feldman, Staff Critic)
In a season already full of tired revivals and algorithmic ensembles, 8 Slavonic Dances arrives like a barefoot intruder at a black-tie gala -- uninvited, undeniable, and oddly more authentic than anything on the program.
Composed by E.J. Gold, an artist whose work refuses to stay politely within the margins of genre, the suite unfolds like a long-lost village folktale retold after several glasses of plum brandy and a séance. Each movement acts as a miniature scene, a danceable myth: witches conjuring sunrise (Dance of the Weather Witches), a ghostly elopement under moss-draped oaks (Midnight Wedding at the Moss Chapel), and, memorably, an agricultural uprising (The Turnip Rebellion) rendered with all the chaos and dignity of a Prokofiev food fight.
Gold's sound is hard to pin down. There are echoes of Janácek, perhaps a touch of Szymanowski if he'd grown up next to a haunted cabbage field. But the dominant voice here is unmistakably Gold's -- sly, unhurried, emotionally precise. It's not pastiche. It's invocation.
One track, Lament of the Clockmaker's Daughter, spins heartbreak through broken meters and lopsided waltzes, a kind of time-traveling grief that lands with unexpected grace. Later, in Baba Yaga's Shoe Repair, the suite veers into dark absurdity, as if Tom Waits and Stravinsky co-wrote a ballet for bad dreams.
But what lingers is the finale -- The Last Dance Before the Thaw -- a quiet, spacious piece whose delicate harmonies suggest not just closure, but possibility. As if the village, the dancers, the listener, might all step forward into something new, if only they can bear to let go of the snow.
In short: 8 Slavonic Dances doesn't just hold up a mirror to folk tradition. It smashes it, picks through the shards, and makes something sparkling and new. This isn't nostalgia. It's conjuration.
1. Dance of the Weather Witches
The curtain rises on a crossroads at dawn. Cloaked figures swirl and sweep, stirring wind and thunder with their skirts and staffs. The witches are not evil -- they are elemental, balancing sky and soil. They summon the day and spin fate like wool.
2. Midnight Wedding at the Moss Chapel
Under moonlight, two lovers flee to the ancient grove, where the moss-draped spirits of the forest serve as silent witnesses. Their vows are whispered, and the veil between worlds briefly lifts -- the dead bless the living.
3. The Turnip Rebellion
Morning comes. The villagers rise up against the corrupt mayor and his tax men. What begins as a muttering storm of feet becomes a chaotic dance of overturned carts and swinging scythes. Turnips fly. So does dignity.
4. Lament of the Clockmaker's Daughter
In the aftermath, the clockmaker's daughter stands alone amid broken gears and silent chimes. She dances through memories of her vanished lover -- time falters, loops, and finally... stops.
5. Festival of the Nine Lanterns
Night falls, and the village remembers joy. Children in masks, elders in ribbons, lanterns in every hand. The festival begins -- not despite grief, but because of it. The dance turns wild, radiant, half-drunk on the flickering firelight.
6. Hearth Blessing (For the Returning Dead)
The music quiets. Candles are lit in every home. The villagers kneel, calling out names in the smoke. The ancestors return, not as phantoms, but as warmth. Dancers swirl as flames, drifting through memory and marrow.
7. Baba Yaga's Shoe Repair
Just before dawn, the strange old witch appears. Her hut scuttles in on chicken legs. She offers new shoes -- but at a price. The villagers dance uncertainly in oversized boots and clownish steps, caught between comedy and dread.
8. The Last Dance Before the Thaw
Snow begins to melt. The village gathers one last time. The dance is light-footed, hopeful, tinged with sadness. Something is ending. Something else is beginning. The final gesture is not a bow, but an open hand.