Previews: SPRING REPERTORY CONCERT at Lorraine And Bill Dodero Center For Performing Arts

City Ballet of Cleveland, the pre-professional student company in residence at Cleveland City Dance, will present its 17th annual Spring Repertory Concert on Saturday, May 16, 2016, at the Lorraine and Bill Dodero Center for Performing Arts at Gilmore Academy.

The 90-minute program includes three premieres: two by CBC Artistic Director Courtney Laves-Mearini and one by former CBC dancer Adrienne Chan. 

The program will open with Laves-Mearini’s “Dr. Coppelius’ Workshop,” a ballet based on the 1870 comic ballet Coppelia about a 19th-century village girl, Swanilda, and dollmaker Dr. Coppelius. For it, Laves-Mearini modified the second act of Coppelia and created original choreography.

“Dr. Coppelius’ Workshop” tells of a curious Swanilda, portrayed by 16-year-old Aria Risling, and her friends who sneak into Dr. Coppelius’ workshop, where they encounter a room full of 15 mechanical dolls, including Scottish Highlander dolls, ones from China, Marionettes from Italy, a Spanish doll, and the Coppelia Doll, portrayed by 18-year-old Sidney Evans in a comically large hair bow.

At first, Swanilda and her friends don’t realize that they are seeing dolls. When they do, they begin to play with them, and the dolls come to life and dance. 

For the ballet, Laves-Mearini curated a soundtrack using various sections of Léo Delibes’ original music for Coppélia. “I chose music that would be good for each mechanical doll and the lands they represented,” says Laves-Mearini.

Next, the program will switch gears with Chan’s coming-of-age work, “How to Build a Rocket.”

Her inspiration for the 15-minute contemporary dance work for 8 dancers in 3 sections, she says, was thinking about my time at Cleveland City Dance and about how hard it was being a young person. 

“Dance gave me such a great structure and a place to process thoughts and feelings, as well as form friendships that have been really meaningful to me. I was also thinking about loss and what it was like to navigate difficult times as a young person here. My answer was to create a work that focused on care, community, and connection.”

A recent Harvard University graduate, Chan began her dance training at Cleveland City Dance at age 9 and later joined City Ballet of Cleveland. She continued her dance training at summer intensives with Pacific Northwest Ballet, American Ballet Theatre, and Atlanta Ballet. In 2023, she was a summer trainee at Ohio Contemporary Ballet, and at Harvard, she performed with and choreographed for the Harvard Ballet Company. 

Set to music by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Caroline Shaw and Sō Percussion, Chan says the work’s title is an analogy to navigating the worries of youth. 

“I like to use allegory and analogy in my works,” she says. “A rocket ship has a lot of parts, and going out into space can be dark, scary, and uncertain. Graduating from school and going off into the unknown can be similarly unsettling. While there is darkness and uncertainty in space, there is also a community of stars and planets. Similarly, there are communities of people to help navigate life’s uncertainties.”

Chan recalled a moment in her youth when she found a simple way to cope with the stresses of growing up. 

“I remember once taking a break between classes, getting ice cream, and sitting on the floor in the studio with a friend to eat it,” says Chan. “It was such a contrast from dancing and being really athletic to also wanting to eat ice cream and cry together in between classes, even if we didn’t talk about what we were sad about. I tried to bring out those feelings in “How to Build a Rocket.”

Going from building a rocket to The rockets’ red glare, the 2026 Spring Repertory Concert will close with Laves-Mearini’s “Star Spangled Ballet,” in celebration of America’s upcoming 250th Anniversary.

The 25-minute neoclassical ballet in six sections is set to music by John Philip Sousa and will feature the student troupe’s dancers, from youngest to oldest. 

Costumed in patriotic garb, the celebratory dances reference military high-stepping drills and marches complete with a bevy of salutes.

Says Laves-Mearini: “This is the first time many of the dancers have had original choreography set on them, and they have found the process challenging. I also wanted to push them with more difficult dance steps and phrases.” 

Included in the upbeat and entertaining ballet will be a pas de duex choreographed by CBC faculty teacher Mike Keating. Set to Sousa’s “The High School Cadets,” the intricate pas de deux will be danced by 14-year-old Anna Fujiki and 17-year-old Nickolas Miller.

The ballet and the program will then conclude with the cast in a rousing group dance to Sousa’s “The Stars and Stripes Forever.”