‘So many fun moments in this show’: Kansas City Ballet is bringing back ‘Peter Pan’

In J.M. Barrie’s children’s classic “Peter Pan,” Peter says to Wendy:

“I taught you to fight and to fly. What more could there be?”

What more, indeed. Peter, Wendy and the rest of the Darling children will take flight again when the Kansas City Ballet presents “Peter Pan” for seven performances beginning Feb. 16 at the Muriel Kauffman Theatre.

Artistic Director Devon Carney, who first presented his “Peter Pan” with the Ballet in 2018, says he is excited to bring back the story of the boy who wouldn’t grow up. Carney says he can relate to the title character.

“I’m a kid at heart,” Carney said. “I read ‘Peter Pan’ as a kid, and it was read to me in various forms. There’s this kid in all of us, and it gets buried with adulthood. Yes, we do have to grow up, eventually. You’ve got to pay the bills and do it on your own, but the idea of living life freely and for the day is just a lovely sensation. The chance to be able to create a ‘Peter Pan’ and to this particular score is a dream come true.”

That score is by Carmon DeLeone, Cincinnati Ballet’s music director for the past 50 years.

“Carmen and I are good friends,” Carney said. “He is just so adventurous in the way he writes his music. It’s very big. He’s a percussionist and a jazz musician and a classically trained French hornist, who played with as well as conducted the Cincinnati Symphony. He knows his stuff. To this day, he still performs in a jazz band, so there’s a jazzy feel to the music.”

DeLeone conducted the orchestra when the Kansas City Ballet presented Carney’s “Peter Pan” in 2018.

“He found himself enamored of this production, and he counts this as his favorite interpretation of his music,” Carney said. “We talked just the other day about the ballet. I think he’s going to come and see a show, so I’m really excited about that. Hopefully, opening night. It’s extremely rare to do a full-length ballet and have the composer still alive.”

Besides not wanting to grow up, Carney says the story of “Peter Pan” appeals to him for another reason.

“I’ve always wanted to fly,” he said. “As a kid, I used to jump off garage roofs just to see how far I could jump and learn how to roll out of it. I climbed trees as a kid. I loved getting as high as I could.”

As a dancer, Carney says that he’s flown since he was 30. Just a couple of years ago, he was seen flying as Drosselmeyer in the Kansas City Ballet’s “The Nutcracker.” Carney says that flight is very expensive in theater because a specialist company and crew that know what they’re doing need to be hired. But when it comes to sending his dancers flying, Carney says safety is always job one.

“Just like dancing, when you’re working with a partner, there’s a lot of trust involved,” Carney said. “When you throw a female up in the air, there are no nets. She’s trusting you to catch her. In the same way, we use a very trusted company called Flying by Foy. Their cables have double redundancy for the people who are up in the air. A single cable that a dancer is flown on has a 1,500 pound test line on it, so there is no way that cable is going to break.”

In addition to the flying Darlings, the cast of “Peter Pan” is filled with children, giving Kansas City Ballet students a chance to shine. Besides all of Tinkerbell’s fairy assistants, there’s a gaggle of lost kids who follow Peter in Neverland.

“There are moments that will make you cry a happy cry,” Carney said. “Your heart will feel full. There are just so many fun moments in this show. And it is a show. This isn’t ‘Swan Lake.’ It’s a time to just have fun, sit back and let your dreams come true as you watch this iconic story come to life.”

7:30 p.m. Feb. 16, 17, 22, 23 and 24 and 1:30 p.m. Feb. 18, 24 and 25. Muriel Kauffman Theatre, Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts. $34-$149. 816-931-8993 or kcballet.org.

Te Deum & Bach Aria Soloists

There’s a choral work by Dietrich Buxtehude that seems to be getting more and more play lately, both on recordings and in the concert hall. Te Deum Choral Ensemble led by Matthew Christopher Shepard will join forces with Bach Aria Soloists to perform Buxtehude’s “Membra Jesu Nostri” Feb. 17 at Village Presbyterian Church.

Every movement of “Membra Jesu Nostri” is a meditation on the sufferings of a different limb of Christ during the Passion.

Shepard, who is always so thoughtful with his programming, has chosen two works that beautifully complement the Buxtehude. Bach’s “Mein Herze schwimmt im Blut” (“My heart swims in blood”) is a soprano solo cantata. And Benjamin Britten’s Festival Te Deum features a very difficult organ part, which I’m sure Elisa Bickers of Bach Aria Soloists will toss off with aplomb.

7:30 p.m. Feb. 17. Village Presbyterian Church, 6641 Mission Road, Prairie Village. $5-$40. te-deum.org

National Symphony Orchestra of Ukraine

As Ukraine continues its resistance against the Russian invasion, one of its major orchestras is coming to Kansas City. The Harriman-Jewell Series presents the National Symphony Orchestra of Ukraine conducted by Volodymyr Sirenko with special guest cellist Natalia Khoma on Feb. 18 at Helzberg Hall.

The program opens with the Sinfonia Concertante in B flat Major by the Ukrainian Cossack composer Dmitry Bortniansky. Then Khoma will be the soloist for Schumann’s cello concerto. The second half of the concert features the Symphony No. 3 by Jean Sibelius. What a wonderful symphony that isn’t heard nearly often enough in concert. Just wait for that thrilling finale.

7 p.m. Feb. 18. Helzberg Hall, Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts. $17.50-$90. 816-415-5025 or hjseries.org.

Ensemble Ibérica

Escape this Midwestern February and travel to sunny Portugal when Englewood Arts presents Ensemble Ibérica on Feb. 17 at the Englewood Arts Center. Guitarists Beau Bledsoe and Nilko Andreas will be joined by cellist Ezgi Karakus to perform music from Brazil, Colombia and Portugal.

Bledsoe, the founder and artistic director of Ensemble Ibérica, is a beloved local favorite. Andreas, from Colombia, has quite the international career, having performed with the Prague Symphony Orchestra and the Shenzhen Symphonic Orchestra of China. He also started the “Amazonas” series at Carnegie Hall, which uses music to raise awareness about environmental damage.

Karakus, from Turkey, is a cellist with the Symphony of Northwest Arkansas. She’s also done a lot of touring, and has performed with the Kansas City Symphony and was highlighted as a soloist in a master class with Yo-Yo Ma. The concert will feature music Bledsoe, Andreas and Karakus performed in Carnegie Hall last year.

6:30 p.m. Feb. 17. Englewood Arts, 10901 E. Winner Road, Independence. $25. 816-379-6011 or englewoodarts.art.

Super Bowl Sunday Organ Concert

Jan Kraybill, the Taylor Swift of the organ, will present her 25th annual Super Bowl Sunday Organ Concert on Feb. 11 at the Community of Christ Temple. This year’s concert, “Most Valuable Player,” will salute, among others, the late John Obetz, Community of Christ’s long-time organist, Michael Barone, host of the NPR organ program “Pipedreams,” and Chiefs kicker Harrison Butker, in whose honor Kraybill will perform a work using only her feet, something I have never seen Tay do.

2 p.m. Feb. 11. Community of Christ Church, 201 S. River Blvd., Independence. Free. jankraybill.com.

You can reach Patrick Neas at patrickneas@kcartsbeat.com and follow his Facebook page, KC Arts Beat, at www.facebook.com/kcartsbeat.

This story was originally published February 9, 2024 at 5:30 AM.