“Dance Me: The Music of Leonard Cohen”
Ballets Jazz Montréal
Detroit Opera House
Detroit
Oct. 17, 2026
The lighting and set design team might have been the stars of Ballets Jazz Montréal’s performance Saturday at the Detroit Opera House — no easy feat given the high caliber of the company’s contemporary ballet dancers. Titled “Dance Me: The Music of Leonard Cohen,” the multimedia performance paid homage to the Montreal-born songwriter, artist, and poet. The piece featured choreography by Andonis Foniadakis, Annabelle Lopez Ochoa, and Ihsan Rustem, performed to a fluid mix of 16 Cohen songs, including “So Long, Marianne,” “Suzanne,” and “Hallelujah.”
From the moment the company’s 14 dancers entered the stage I knew we were in for an interesting evening. Opening with Cohen’s “Here It Is,” the dancers filled the stage, often walking in straight lines toward us in the darkness as spotlights flashed over different faces and bodies — evoking the mystery of who might be hiding in the shadows. Neat, vertically stacked columns of spotlights bordered them on three sides. The columns were used sporadically throughout the evening when they weren’t hidden by projection screens, shadows, or fog.
The individual pieces of the evening explored various themes of Cohen’s life and work, with a dancer portraying “Cohen” himself making an appearance as a suited, silhouetted dancer in a fedora weaving in and out of different dances.
Some pieces were sad, some were playful, and some were accompanied by prop typewriters, long sticks, and falling snow — all performed by dancers clad in simple suits, blazers, and dresses in shades of black, white, and gray. Together they created a mystical, moody vibe that joined the various pieces with one cohesive through-line.
A video projection screen added some of the oddest and most interesting effects of the evening. The anguished “Dance Me to the End of Love” featured one male dancer dancing in a series of pas de deux with rotating partners as a projection of giant dancers fell in the background. Another featured a lip-synching “Rocky Horror Picture Show”-esque red mouth — paired with dancers showing off red-lit mouthpieces — which I thought was particularly cool. One dance had dancers lying on their backs, legs up, tossing a projected square with their feet, almost Atari-style.
“Dance Me” featured a variety of solos, duets, small groups, and full company numbers — including two songs sung live by two dancers. The stamina to get through the 75-minute show without pause was impressive, especially considering a steady stream of dizzyingly fast lifts, plus quirky moves like a male dancer carrying a female dancer as she advanced on imaginary bike pedals.
I walked into the Detroit Opera House with a limited knowledge of Cohen’s work. While I can’t say “Dance Me” has converted me to a proper Cohen fan, I left feeling I had a better understanding and appreciation of who he was. And perhaps an interest in learning more.
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