Philadelphia Ballet opened its season with a quartet of patriotic pieces. It was impossible not to smile by the end of it.
It’s a patriotic program but one that feels more period piece than political, set in the theater where John Philip Sousa’s “Stars and Stripes Forever” had its premiere in 1897.
Philadelphia Ballet opened its 2026-27 season on a festive note Thursday at the Academy of Music with “Stars and Stripes Forever!,” a quartet of works celebrating America’s Semiquincentennial. It was a program of ballet fireworks, mostly featuring its principal dancers.
All four pieces were created during the 20th-century ballet expansion in the United States, when George Balanchine and Jerome Robbins were laying down the landscape of choreography. The fourth piece was by Eliot Feld, who had a ballet company in New York (and in his teenage years played Baby John in the movie West Side Story).
It’s a patriotic program but one that feels more period piece than political, set in the theater where John Philip Sousa’s “Stars and Stripes Forever” had its premiere in 1897.
The program opened with Fancy Free, which Robbins set to music by Leonard Bernstein in 1944, for what is now American Ballet Theatre. It was the precursor to the Broadway musical and movie On the Town, so it may look familiar even to people who haven’t seen the ballet before. It’s a comedy about four sailors on leave who meet three women who they try to charm.
Arian Molina Soca, Jack Thomas, and Nicholas Patterson outdid themselves in these roles, both as dancers and actors. Molina Soca and Thomas have had many starring roles. But it was a breakout role for Patterson, a soloist, who — having survived a series of double air turns into Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders-style jump splits — is surely a rising talent in the company.
Feld’s Variations on “America” is short and delightful, and on Thursday night was a pas de deux for Ashton Roxander and Yuka Iseda, both of whom were breaths of fresh air. The music is by Charles Ives and William Schuman, and the dancers are the Liberty Bell, cannons, and general spitfires. There were a few moments Thursday night when Iseda’s very fast pirouettes nearly got the best of her, and the pair’s final lift was a struggle. But the overall impression was strong, entertaining dancing.
The last two pieces were both Balanchine, starting with the concert version of Who Cares? to a series of songs by George and Ira Gershwin. It was danced by Sterling Baca and three women: Thays Golz, Dayesi Torriente, and Sydney Dolan (who had been injured most of last season), all of took on the tricky technical steps with ease and sparkle.
The final piece on the program is the showstopper, Balanchine’s Stars and Stripes, also set to Gershwin. This is a full company piece with tutus, military-style uniforms, and necessary precision. Two more soloists proved themselves here: Lucia Erickson and Gabriela Mesa. It was impossible not to smile.
As an added treat, Philadelphia Ballet’s music director, Beatrice Jona Affron, who has already taken a job with New York City Ballet, was back at the baton (and will be for part of the Nutcracker season as well).
Philadelphia Ballet in Stars and Stripes Forever! Through Sunday at the Academy of Music. $25.25-$274.68. 215-893-1999 or philadelphiaballet.org
