When Caili Quan listened to Camille Saint-Saëns’ Cello Concerto No.1 in A Minor, she knew she had found the inspiration for her first piece for New York City Ballet, which will have its world premiere at the Fall Fashion Gala on October 9. Quan wanted to use a concerto because she was eager to work with a full orchestra—“a rare opportunity,” she says. She was entranced by the sweeping emotions unleashed by Saint-Saëns’ lush score. “The way he takes you into these blissful moments of euphoria, and then plunges you down into the depths, is very much like life,” she observes. And she loved that the concerto was for the cello, noting it is said to be the instrument closest to the human voice. “I think that’s why it resonates with me. It brings me back to my family and singing,” she says.
The lyrical family life Quan recalls unfurled on the island of Guam where she grew up, steeped in the Chamorro Filipino culture of food, music, and family. “When I was little, we’d have these huge family fiestas where we’d get together for holidays, and they would always end with one of my relatives picking up an instrument, my aunt singing, and lots of music and dancing,” she says.
Though she left that world at the age of 16 to study ballet in New York, Guam has remained a powerful influence for Quan, one that always slips into her choreography, even if only subliminally. “The more I can share about Guam, the happier I feel. I think all the pieces I make are naturally inspired in some part by my life, and then the dancers I have in front of me inform the movement,” she says.
Quan traces her love of ballet to her first lessons at age seven at a school run by John Grensback, a former NYCB dancer who became a principal dancer with Houston Ballet and married a dancer from Guam. “I loved how challenging ballet was and how it made me feel. I wanted to do it all the time,” she says. After Grensback moved away, she took private lessons with dancer Bettina Sanzotta, who eventually informed her that if she wanted to dance professionally, she would have to leave the island.
Fortunately, Quan’s sister lived in New York, and Quan’s audition tape won her a spot at Ballet Academy East, where she studied for two years. After a traineeship with Richmond Ballet, an apprenticeship with North Carolina Ballet Theatre (now Charlotte Ballet), and dancing with Delaware’s First State Ballet Theatre, she landed at BalletX, Philadelphia’s vibrant contemporary ballet company known for showcasing new choreography, in 2013.
Quan credits her time dancing with BalletX—the intensely creative atmosphere and working with choreographers like Matthew Neenan, Nicolo Fonte, and Gabrielle Lamb—and the encouragement of Artistic Director Christine Cox, with inspiring her to try making dances of her own. Shift, a pop-up piece on BalletX dancers for the Barnes Foundation, led to a flurry of assignments for small duets and trios throughout Philadelphia.
When she landed her first stage commission from BalletX in 2020, she decided to retire from dancing to become a full-time choreographer. The pandemic, of course, intervened. At Cox’s suggestion, Quan created a screen dance. The result was Love Letter, a heartfelt exploration of yearning and Quan’s memories of Guam that was choreographed on Zoom and filmed outdoors in Philadelphia and Sea Isle City in New Jersey. An expanded version called Mahålang was invited to film festivals, including Lincoln Center’s Dance on Camera.
By the time live performances resumed, assignments were rolling in. In 2021, Damian Woetzel invited Quan to choreograph a pas de deux together with former NYCB Principal Dancer Robert Fairchild at the Vail Dance Festival. She returned to Vail the following summer, pregnant with her first child, as an Artist-in-Residence, making a solo for NYCB Principal Dancer Roman Mejia. An invitation to create a work at the New York Choreographic Institute, a sister organization of NYCB, followed. She has also made dances for Sacramento Ballet, American Repertory Ballet, Flight Path Dance Project, The School of American Ballet, Ballet Academy East, and The Juilliard School, where she is a Creative Associate. A recent commission for Ballet West was performed at the Kennedy Center in June, as part of 10,000 Dreams: A Celebration of Asian Choreography, curated by the Kennedy Center and Phil Chan.
Working with NYCB has allowed Quan to experience one of her favorite aspects of dance making—the dancers amplifying her movement further than she imagined. “It’s so gratifying to create this world, this movement that’s beyond the body I have. These dancers have unbelievable range and can do anything. The options are endless,” she says.
A bonus for Quan, who relishes collaborating with fellow artists, was teaming up with fashion designer Gilles Mendel, who is designing the costumes. “The lines of his dresses as they hug the body are aesthetically pleasing and classic,” she says. “They look like they were made for ballet.”
Asked what she’d like to achieve with her new piece, Quan circles back to the Saint-Saëns concerto that inspired it. “My hope is that audience members will be even more in love with this gorgeous piece of music because of what the dancers show them or help them hear,” she says. "Maybe they'll hear something they've never heard before."
Visit NYCBallet.com.
