LINCOLN Center was heavy with the sound of farewells this weekend as New York City Ballet said a heartfelt goodbye to one of its greatest stars – 40-year-old Nikolaj Hubbe, who in 1992 left the Royal Danish Ballet to become City Ballet’s principal dancer.
After a dazzling final performance Sunday, he’s hanging up his slippers to return to Copenhagen as artistic director of the Royal Danish Ballet.
Not only was he among City Ballet’s most cherished dancers, he was also a valued teacher at the company’s School of American Ballet, specializing in the August Bournonville style, named after the 19th-century Danish choreographer.
Sunday’s program showed Hubbe in a range that would have exhausted most 20-year-olds, from Balanchine (“Apollo,” “Western Symphony”), Robbins (an excerpt from “West Side Story”) and “Zakouski,” created for him by Peter Martins, the role in which Hubbe made his debut nearly 16 years ago.
It was also a particularly lovely touch to have, on this farewell celebration, two of Hubbe’s top students, Kathryn Morgan and David Prottas, both in the corps de ballet, dance a Bournonville duet with elegance, style and brilliance.
City Ballet’s other major departure is Christopher Wheeldon, who’s leaving after 15 years with the company, the final seven years as resident choreographer.
His last creation is “Rococo Variations,” set to Tchaikovsky’s “Variations on a Rococo Theme” for cello and orchestra.
It’s a small ballet for four dancers, Sterling Hyltin and Sara Mearns partnered respectively by Giovanni Villalobos and Adrian Danchig-Waring.
More decorative than emotive, the piece seems to sum up the choreographers who’ve influenced the British-born Wheeldon the most: Balanchine, Robbins and Frederick Ashton.
The patterns of “Rococo Variations” parallel one another, implode and reverse, as Wheeldon’s choreography gently rides on the enchanting turns and tides of Tchaikovsky’s romantic musings.
Eloquently danced, the ballet is fluent not so much in its invention but in its sure-footed and sure-minded progression. If only Wheeldon had used this last chance to demonstrate his skill in working with a large company, instead of the hand-picked four.
Now heading his own small New York/London-based troupe, Morphoses, and freelancing, he’ll doubtless return to City Ballet, which has provided such a fine launching pad for one of the leading choreographers of his generation.
NEW YORK CITY BALLET
New York State Theater, Lincoln Center; (212) 870-5570. Runs through Feb. 24.