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With certain dancers, there is an interior drama, an intimate dialogue between movement and music that manages to quiet the air around them, pulling them into greater focus. Mira Nadon, the young New York City Ballet principal<\/a>, is growing into that place of spellbinding luminosity.<\/p>\n We\u2019ve seen her unflappable elegance, her cool sensuality and her creamy elasticity. But dancing in \u201cErrante,\u201d<\/a> on the opening program of the company\u2019s spring season that began Tuesday, she displayed a new kind of dancing courage. The ballet, originally known as \u201cTzigane\u201d after its score by Maurice Ravel, was revived this season with a staging by Suzanne Farrell and a new name, \u201cErrante,\u201d or wandering.<\/p>\n Created for the company\u2019s 1975 Ravel Festival, it was the first ballet George Balanchine choreographed for Farrell upon her return to City Ballet after a rift with Balanchine and time spent in Europe. In Farrell\u2019s restoration, \u201cErrante\u201d is a passionate musical adventure \u2014 rich with play, mystery and seduction \u2014 that opens with a five-minute solo for its female lead.<\/p>\n As solos go, it\u2019s headstrong and questing, revealing a dancer\u2019s rebellious streak in the choreography\u2019s defiant twists and turns. As for the title change? Tzigane, a word that refers to Romani people, is now considered derogatory. Farrell, who holds the rights to the work, selected \u201cErrante\u201d; the decision to rename was made by Farrell, the George Balanchine Trust and City Ballet, which hasn\u2019t staged the ballet in more than 30 years.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Of the ballet and Farrell, Lincoln Kirstein<\/a>, a founder of the company, wrote, \u201cWas part of this an echo of her own wandering, of the fact that she had at last returned to her tribe\u2019s encampment, while proclaiming her own increased identity and independence?\u201d<\/p>\n It feels, especially now, like a stand for female autonomy. Starting with Nadon\u2019s casual entrance \u2014 a detached, loose walk across the stage as her hands come to rest on the hips \u2014 the ballet has a smoldering perfume that heats up over time. Nadon\u2019s sighing shoulders lead her on a path of self-discovery that she fills in with lustrous details. Her elbows rise above her chin like a veil. She flings her arms wildly yet with surgical precision. She arches backward with a rapid shudder of her shoulders.<\/p>\n Ever the wanderer, Nadon seems to be etching her identity onto a role made years before she was born. And like Farrell, she looks great in red, cutting a blazing figure in Joe Eula\u2019s skirt of shredded ribbons, offset by a burgundy bodice with creamy sleeves.<\/p>\n Nadon occasionally snaps her eyes to gaze at the audience. Throughout the violin solo, performed by Kurt Nikkanen, she is a wonder of brazen poise. After stretching her hands forward and slowly wrapping the fingers of one around the pointer finger of another, she whips into tight cha\u00een\u00e9 turns, pausing to reach and lunge with a daring that seemed to grow from one performance to the next.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n When her partner finally appears on the opposite diagonal \u2014 Aar\u00f3n Sanz, dancing with admirable fullness and focus \u2014 Nadon has her back to him. Gradually they shift closer until Sanz embraces her around the waist, close but not quite touching.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n With whiffs of Hungarian folk dance, they rock on their toes and heels and, eventually, are joined by four couples as a more wild energy overtakes the stage. Nadon spins into a backbend, dangling herself over Sanz\u2019s arm, where she remains as she walks, no, trots<\/em> \u2014 en pointe \u2014 across the stage. In moments like these, \u201cErrante\u201d is a rebirth: not a dusty character study from the 1970s, but a vibrant Balanchine miniature imbued with the spirit of the modern world.<\/p>\n On Tuesday, another happy surprise occurred when Farrell, her arm linked in Sanz\u2019s, slipped onto the stage for a bow. Nadon and Sanz, in awe, backed away to applaud along with the crowd. Her appearance was a reminder that preserving Balanchine ballets is a race against time: Former dancers must coach current ones. They knew<\/em> Balanchine. They knew his counts, and that is everything.<\/p>\n While I could have done without \u201cThe Steadfast Tin Soldier\u201d \u2014 I don\u2019t need to see a Christmas tree onstage for many<\/em> more months \u2014 the program was a bright start to the season. Despite some rough patches in \u201cBourr\u00e9e Fantasque\u201d on opening night, it remained witty and rambunctious, especially the pairings of Emily Kikta and KJ Takahashi, and Emilie Gerrity and Gilbert Bolden III.<\/p>\n