The Royal Ballet: Les Patineurs, Winter Dreams, The Concert, December 2018

[Sim]

I didn't stay for The Concert, but glad it was good!

[BeauxArts]

I was able to see this programme twice and found both performances to be an unalloyed pleasure. I have seen both of Yudes'  performances as the Blue Boy and  thought he was exceptional last night - really well-danced and musical.  Winter Dreams: Morera and Hirano: I actually found Hirano to be more imposing both dance-wise and dramatically than on the first outing together before Christmas, but strangely I was not as moved last night as I had been by their first performance, although the stand-out on both occasions has been Morera - she  is exceptional in this role. Very happy to see The Concert again - a lot of fun. What an excellent triple bill this has been. 

[ninamargaret]

Agree that this is a lovely triple bill. I have seen it twice and enjoyed Winter Dreams more last night. Could be more familiarity with it, or because I was in the Grand Tier the first time and Side S/C las night, so was able to see what was going on more clearly. I still think it's a bit lost on the large stage, and it's all rather dark. An elderly lady sitting next to me, who admitted she had eyesight problems, commented that she found it difficult to see what was going on, and wondered if anyone from the RB ever checked to see how,well performances could be seen - a point that several of us have commented on with this and other productions.But would happily see this triple again.

[saki]

10 hours ago, JohnS said:

I never imagined Nehemiah Kish would demand such sympathy but I was very touched by his portrayal. 

 

I was moved too at the matinee performance on the 20th. 
I also saw Avis's Kulygin on the 18th and the 20th evening but there was something about Kish's modest stage presence (I believe some posters have found it too modest for certain roles?) that suited the role particularly well. Next to Avis's more emphatic, more obviously anguished (and more charismatic) Kulygin, Kish's was timid, inarticulate, quiet in his suffering. He was a most ordinary man in pain. And for me that was the pathos of it.

[capybara]

57 minutes ago, BeauxArts said:

 I actually found Hirano to be more imposing both dance-wise and dramatically than on the first outing together before Christmas........

 

I'm not usually this outspoken but all I can say is that Hirano must have been sleepwalking at his first performance, then. In common with Sim, I felt the need, at the end, to blot him out and concentrate on Morera who was transcendental.

 

I should have said earlier that I thought Kish was excellent, as saki describes so well. I really felt his portrayal coming from the inside - special.

 

 

 

Edited January 3, 2019 by capybara

[Lizbie1]

32 minutes ago, saki said:

 

I was moved too at the matinee performance on the 20th. 
I also saw Avis's Kulygin on the 18th and the 20th evening but there was something about Kish's modest stage presence (I believe some posters have found it too modest for certain roles?) that suited the role particularly well. Next to Avis's more emphatic, more obviously anguished (and more charismatic) Kulygin, Kish's was timid, inarticulate, quiet in his suffering. He was a most ordinary man in pain. And for me that was the pathos of it.

 

I so agree! I saw both on the same day and much preferred Kish: I’m a fan of Avis in many roles but think that on occasion there’s a tendency to ham it up a little where it’s not needed. (Others’ opinions will vary.)

[Dawnstar]

It seems a pity that only one of the three Vershinins, Muntagirov, seems to be generally considered satisfactory in the role. Would Soares & Hirano have been cast were it not that so many of the male principals are currently away that, apart from Kish, they are the only ones actually available?

[FLOSS]

I must confess that while I like genuine mixed bills which are not merely three ballets with a supposed unifying theme I find this a strange selection of ballets particularly as I assume that it was intended for an audience which included young ballet goers who had decided that they were far too adult and sophisticated to sit through Nutcracker again. Les Patineurs is a fine opener and the Concert is a good closing ballet but "Winter Dreams" is not a particularly good choice for the centre piece. It is not MacMillan at his best; it is too long and reverential as far as its source play is concerned; it is dimly lit and it requires high octane performances to make it  seem worth watching. If it had been me I think that I would have staged a major work which would be guaranteed to hold the audience's attention rather than a work which at its best has its longeurs and at its worst feels like one uninterrupted longeur.  I think that Firebird, Petrushka, Nureyev's staging of The Kingdom of the Shades or Raymonda act 3 or a revival of MacMillan's Four Seasons would have been better choices. On second thoughts I think that one of the Fokine  ballets would have been best if the intention was to make the audience aware of the great one act ballets that lurk in the. Royal's back catalogue.

 

It is a relief to see Les Patineurs back on stage without the ill conceived staging of Ashton's Tales of Beatrix Potter a work  which Ashton only ever intended should be seen in the context of the film for which it was created. But some of the fine detail seems to have been lost in this revival. In prehistoric performances of Les Patineurs, by which I mean  those staged when Ashton was still alive and for many years thereafter the dancers performing in the pas de deux, the pas de trois and the solos  did not return to the stage to acknowledge applause or to beg for it after they had performed their sections of the choreography they danced through. Dancing through is , or it would seem was, an essential element of the ballet's structure as it disguises the fact that  Patineurs is essentially a series of divertisements. Dancing through  creates  the impression that the ballet is a continuous display of dance rather than  a series of vignettes in which the dancers are given the opportunity to display their special technical skills. I find it difficult to understand why this has been altered in current performance practice as it undermines the effect which Ashton set out to achieve. There are other changes which require explanation as they detract from the effect that the ballet should create.

 

The girls in brown no longer have usable muffs. Who authorised the costume change which reduces the muffs to an item firmly attached to one arm when this renders tiny sections of their choreography nonsensical and makes Ashton look incompetent? Today on at least two occasions they hold their bare hands to their faces when in the dim and distant past the brown clad girls were shown holding their muffs close to their faces. Finally I come to the Blue Skater who  continues to be deprived of the proper ending to his final solo in which he begins turning the curtains are closed quickly and then reopened to show him still turning before they are finally closed. The ending was altered when the company returned to the House after the major refurbishment at the end of the last century and the reason then given for the change was that it was no longer possible to open and close the curtain as the curtain was only capable of being raised and lowered. But now the curtain can be opened and closed should not we return to the original ending?

 

 As far as the Concert is concerned can anyone explain why the company has been fobbed off with a vague  front cloth which breaks all the rules of good ballet design as described by Danilova?  The one which the company used previously prepared the audience most effectively for what it was going to see the current one could be a front cloth for virtually any sort of ballet.

 

 

 

 

Edited January 3, 2019 by FLOSS

[Jane S]

32 minutes ago, FLOSS said:

 

 As far as the Concert is concerned can anyone explain why the company has been fobbed off with a vague  front cloth which breaks all the rules of good ballet design as described by Danilova?  The one which the company used previously prepared the audience most effectively for what it was going to see the current one could be a front cloth for virtually any sort of ballet.

 

 

 

 

 

Which frontcloths are they using this time? - Gorey or Steinberg?

[alison]

I was at the first performance of this Winter Dreams cast, but way up in the amphi, but my impression was that people who were much closer to the stage had found Hirano very moving in that performance.  I'm rapidly coming to the conclusion that Winter Dreams needs a more intimate theatre than the ROH (Darcey Bussell's farewell programme at Sadler's Wells, anyone?) - and probably some brighter lighting, as I'm finding faces hard to read - to be really effective, because the only cast I've really got anything from was the one where I was watching from Stalls Circle standing. That one did feature Muntagirov, though, which may have had something to do with it

 

Interestingly enough, though, it was only out of the corner of my eye, but I believe I did actually catch sight of a few chassés - more or less - in Les Patineurs last night.  I'll have to take my binoculars on Friday in case they should reappear   

 

 

[FLOSS]

The Steinberg frontcloth is being used.

Edited January 3, 2019 by FLOSS

[bangorballetboy]

1 hour ago, FLOSS said:

The ending was altered when the company returned to the House after the major refurbishment at the end of the last century and the reason then given for the change was that it was no longer possible to open and close the curtain as the curtain was only capable of being raised and lowered. But now the curtain can be opened and closed should not we return to the original ending?

 

I'm not sure that's right.  After the house reopened, the ballet still ended as you described (i.e. correctly).  It was the second (or later) run after the reopening that the reopening of the curtain was omitted.  In the current run, only one of the blue boys would be properly visible anyway on reopening (Yudes) as the others have strayed too far from the central line.

[alison]

Well, I hope the judges reduce their marks for technical merit, then.  Being able to centre a spin properly is a fairly basic requirement for a figure skater  

[Jane S]

I agree it's a pity they seem to have dropped the Gorey designs for The Concert (which, for anyone who doesn't remember them, were done specially for the RB's first performances in the 1980s) - they switched to the Steinberg (the original NYCB designs) several revivals ago: no reason given so far as I remember but one always suspects it's the Robbins Foundation's decision.

[RuthE]

2 minutes ago, alison said:

Well, I hope the judges reduce their marks for technical merit, then.  Being able to centre a spin properly is a fairly basic requirement for a figure skater  

 

We don't know that the Blue Boy is meant to be a pro skater, though.  Just a MASSIVELY slappable show-off

[alison]

Only massively slappable in certain dancers' performances!

[Sim]

Yudes was incredible last night.  Not only were his final spins very centred and central, but how on earth did he start from such speed?!  He didn't have to build it up,  it just came from the very first spin!  Fabulous.  I also loved him because he looked so effortless and natural.  Standing next to Isabella Gasparini, the pair of them were like reflections of each other, their smiles of delight emanating from deep within them and taking over their whole bodies.  This made me more emotional than anything in Winter Dreams!  

[ninamargaret]

1 hour ago, Sim said:

Yudes was incredible last night.  Not only were his final spins very centred and central, but how on earth did he start from such speed?!  He didn't have to build it up,  it just came from the very first spin!  Fabulous.  I also loved him because he looked so effortless and natural.  Standing next to Isabella Gasparini, the pair of them were like reflections of each other, their smiles of delight emanating from deep within them and taking over their whole bodies.  This made me more emotional than anything in Winter Dreams!  

and he looked as though he was thoroughly enjoying himself, as well as he might, dancing like that. After seeing him as Puck a while ago I suspected he'd be worth seeing in this.

[MAX]

 Concerning Hirano I was yesterday in the Orchestra stalls, row E... Even from there he was uninteresting !  

 

What Kevin O'Hare sees in that dancer is a mystery....

[Sim]

9 minutes ago, MAX said:

 Concerning Hirano I was yesterday in the Orchestra stalls, row E... Even from there he was uninteresting !  

 

What Kevin O'Hare sees in that dancer is a mystery....

He's tall, and a solid partner.  That's all I can think.  Just my opinion, but (with the exception of The Winter's Tale) there is nothing I have seen him in that makes me feel anything other than neutral.

[Jan McNulty]

24 minutes ago, MAX said:

 Concerning Hirano I was yesterday in the Orchestra stalls, row E... Even from there he was uninteresting !  

 

What Kevin O'Hare sees in that dancer is a mystery....

 

14 minutes ago, Sim said:

He's tall, and a solid partner.  That's all I can think.  Just my opinion, but (with the exception of The Winter's Tale) there is nothing I have seen him in that makes me feel anything other than neutral.

 

Well I was on the front row of the orchestra stalls for the matinee on 20th December and found his performance very moving indeed!

 

Horses for courses I suppose.

[Josephine]

36 minutes ago, Jan McNulty said:

 

 

Well I was on the front row of the orchestra stalls for the matinee on 20th December and found his performance very moving indeed!

 

Horses for courses I suppose.

 

Of the three dancers cast as Vershinin in the current run of Winter Dreams Ryoichi Hirano is the one who seemed to me the most insightful in portraying in dramatic terms Vershinin as I remember him from Chekhov's play, or at least as remembered from a personally definitive theatrical production (Trevor Nunn's).

 

However I can't be sure that this is what MacMillan intended in his creation, and it was Vadim Muntagirov who made the choreography soar in another cast.

 

I did find the performance by yesterday evening's cast deeply affecting. I do love this work, and think it repays repeated viewings.

Edited January 3, 2019 by Josephine

[bridiem]

9 minutes ago, Josephine said:

 

Of the three dancers cast as Vershinin in the current run of Winter Dreams Ryoichi Hirano is the one who seemed to me the most insightful in portraying in dramatic terms Vershinin as I remember him from Chekhov's play, or at least as remembered from a personally definitive theatrical production (Trevor Nunn's).

 

However I can't be sure that this is what MacMillan intended in his creation, and it was Vadim Muntagirov who made the choreography soar in another cast.

 

I did find the performance by yesterday evening's cast deeply affecting. I do love this work, and think it repays repeated viewings.

 

That's an interesting distinction, Josephine. I used to know the play well (many years ago!) but have now forgotten most of it. In the end I only saw the Muntagirov cast, and he did indeed make the choreography (and my soul!) soar; I would have liked to have seen Hirano (in spite of some of the comments above!). And I'd like to see the work again, though I do wonder if it would indeed work better in the Linbury as has been suggested.

[alison]

Oh no, the Linbury would be far too small!

[alison]

As mentioned elsewhere, Nunez is replaced by Lamb in Winter Dreams tomorrow night.

[Rob S]

Couple of pics from last night

[Rob S]

[Josephine]

2 hours ago, bridiem said:

 

That's an interesting distinction, Josephine. I used to know the play well (many years ago!) but have now forgotten most of it. In the end I only saw the Muntagirov cast, and he did indeed make the choreography (and my soul!) soar; I would have liked to have seen Hirano (in spite of some of the comments above!). And I'd like to see the work again, though I do wonder if it would indeed work better in the Linbury as has been suggested.

 

I was very fortunate to see all three casts! I think the work does allow for some range of dramatic interpretation, and for me Vershinin is definitely not a romantic hero. But I treasure the memory of Vadim Muntagirov's glorious dancing!

 

I think you mentioned Kristen McNally's solemn solo in an earlier post. I loved this too, and also the following sequence when MacMillan so beautifully evokes the joy and affection in the sisters' shared childhood memories.

 

I do hope the work will return soon. The Linbury stage seems maybe too small for some sections of the choreography and also for the visual impact of the stage space in conveying dramatic themes in this work (for me). But perhaps the stage in the redeveloped Linbury is larger than before??

 

I would also like to revisit the play and have been intrigued to read about a forthcoming production at the Almeida, Islington which sounds interesting, for anyone based in or near London.

 

[Richard LH]

7 hours ago, FLOSS said:

The girls in brown no longer have usable muffs.

Which is a serious problem and I am glad  no-one has tried to make a cheap joke about  it.

[Rob S]

1 minute ago, Richard LH said:

Which is a serious problem and I am glad  no-one has tried to make a cheap joke about  it.

 

I've just nearly choked on a goujon!! 🤣

[bridiem]

17 minutes ago, Josephine said:

 

I do hope the work will return soon. The Linbury stage seems maybe too small for some sections of the choreography and also for the visual impact of the stage space in conveying dramatic themes in this work (for me). But perhaps the stage in the redeveloped Linbury is larger than before??

 

 

I don't know, Josephine - I haven't been yet. I was just following up on someone else's suggestion because it strikes me that Winter Dreams is a sort of 'chamber ballet' if such a thing exists, and gets a bit lost on the big stage. But the Linbury may well not be big enough.

[capybara]

I don't 'get' what is being talked about regarding the muffs.

[RuthE]

Oh, come on, capybara. If it is genuinely the case that you don’t understand the above mild innuendo (which I accept some won’t, especially if English is not your/their first language), I suggest a logical first step would be to google the word “muff”.

Edited January 3, 2019 by RuthE