Turn It Out with Tiler Peck and Friends Review 4*
Turn It Out with Tiler Peck and Friends, vibrant, virtuoso dance from New York, returns to Sadler’s Wells
This article was first published on London Unattached
Tiler Peck is one of the most thrilling dancers in the world today. Technically there is nothing she can’t do, and she does it with panache, contagious joy of dancing, intense musicality and, when required, vertiginous, almost superhuman speed.
An opportunity to see her dance, then, feels like a privilege. Turn It Out with Tiler Peck and Friends, a personal project that keeps her dancing when New York City Ballet (NYCB), where she is a principal, is not in season, offers just such an opportunity. As well, if showcases Peck’s talent as a choreographer, director and curator of dance evenings.
Made up of four diverse pieces with a 15-strong cast, the show has been touring for the past three years – we first saw it at Sadler’s Wells in 2023 – so it’s been fine tuned to perfection. It kicks off with William Forsythe’s The Barre Project, Blake Works II.
Created on Zoom during lockdown, and set to a score by the electronic musician and Forsythe favourite James Blake, with a ballet barre as its only prop, it riffs on dancers’ class work, but with Forsythe’s typical distortions, humorous twists and breathtaking virtuosity. Led by Tiler Peck, four dancers come on one by one, do a few fast exercises at the barre before abandoning it to perform freely. Tiler Peck is joined on stage by husband and fellow NYCB principal Roman Mejia, and freelancers Brooklyn Mac and Lex Ishimoto. Virtuoso dancers all, they turn the crescendo of movement, both individually and in groups, into an exhilarating spectacle.
Tiler Peck’s own Thousandth Orange comes next. Choreographed in 2019 when Peck was Injured and unable to move, it is set to the eponymous musical score by Caroline Shaw, played live on stage by a pianist and a strings trio. The composer and subsequently Peck herself were inspired by an orange’s intricate structure; and as the curtain raises six dancers dressed by Harriet Yung and Reid Bartelme in deep pastels, are posed centre stage in the shape of an orange tree.
As the shape dissolves and the piano starts an uneasy dialogue with the strings, the dancers evolve unhurriedly in classical ballet steps, creating harmonious lines, relating to each other and to the musicians.
There’s a languid, almost pastoral feel to the piece, in welcome contrast to the vitality of Forsythe’s work; and it shows beyond doubt that Tiler Peck can choreograph.
Swift Arrow is a pas de deux for Peck and Mejia, choreographed by the veteran Alonzo King and set to a piano piece by the jazz composer Jason Moran, played live Joel Wernhardt. It is a forceful encounter, which the choreographer said was inspired by a line from the Upanishads, where “the swift arrow is the obsession with accuracy in a concentrated mind.”
You don’t actually need to know that. You can enjoy the push and pull of this combative pas de deux, the balance of forces, Mejia anchoring Peck’s expansive movement as if to contain it, until eventually she appears to submit. It is a short, but mesmerising piece of work.
The programme ends with an oddity: Time Spell, an extended dialogue between ballet and tap dance, helped along by the extraordinary vocal improvisations of Brinae Ali and Aaron Marcellus Sanders.
The tap section was devised by the experimental tap dancer Michelle Dorrance, who opens the piece by tapping a repetitive rhythm on a platform wired for sound. Gradually, 14 dancers amble on, their silhouettes tinged blue by Brandon Stirling Baker’s lighting. They will then launch into what appears a long jam session, with plenty of room for improvisation.
I admit to having enjoyed this piece more the first time around. On second viewing, I found it sagged quite a bit in its rambling, fragmentary middle, though it was seriously engaging when tap and ballet really spoke to each other.
We rarely see exceptional exponents of American ballet, like Tiler Peck and her excellent company, this side of the pond – Turn It Out with Tiler Peck and Friends opens new, welcome and hugely enjoyable perspectives.
© Teresa Guerreiro
(Banner image: The Barre Project, Blake Works II. Photo: Christopher Duggan)
Turn It Out with Tiler Peck and Friends is a Sadler’s Wells 12-14 March 2026