Irmgard

Queensland Ballet, based in Brisbane, has just announced they will be performing Kenneth MacMillan's "Romeo and Juliet" in 2014 with guest stars Tamara Rojo and Carlos Acosta. Queensland Ballet's Artistic Director, Li Cunxin ("Mao's Last Dancer") is in his first season with the company. Ballet Mistresses are ex-ENB principals Mary McKendry Li and Janette Mulligan.

In ballet companies attached to western European opera houses, dancers are more or less regarded as ‘civil servants’ with a mandatory retirement age (if memory serves me, it is 43 in Stockholm) at which point they can draw a handsome state pension. They can, however, return as guest artists and some remain on call as character artists. In the UK dancers have to wait with the rest of us for our pensions, and therefore it is up to them when they want to retire. I think most dancers are sensible enough to know when their bodies have had enough and, with a few notable exceptions, this is by their late thirties for those who do not reach principal status and are therefore still in or on call for every performance. Sometimes management may subtly imply retirement to dancers by not casting them in previous roles or not offering them anything new. All dancers in the major UK dance companies pay into the Dancers Resettlement Fund, which has been around for about 40 years and funds retraining when dancers retire early through injury or by choice. Dancers retrain in a wide variety of fields – at the end of the 1970s, I knew one dancer who retrained at the Royal College of Music as a piano teacher and another as a ceramics restorer. The Fund also pays for dancers to attend Professional Dance Teachers’ courses etc. There have always been those stars who dance well into their forties and beyond, most modifying their repertoire as they go; and long may it continue, otherwise I would never have been able to see Fonteyn (glorious in her mid-fifties as Odette), Alonso or Plisetskaya!

There seems to be a Park and Ride from whichever direction you approach Oxford. Because of the ban on traffic in central Oxford, they are great, except on a Sunday when the last bus back is about 6.30pm in the evening. However, if you are approaching Oxford from the east, there is some parking to be found in the centre, pay and display until 6.30pm (seven days a week). Where you have to turn up Longwall Street, keep following the road around until you come to Park Road. Turn left and there are a number of parking spaces towards the junction with Holywell Street and Broad Street (where the Sheldonian Theatre is). I have usually been lucky enough to get a space there and it is only a five minute walk to the theatre. Alternatively, the train service for Oxford is great and, again, it is only a five-minute walk to the theatre. If you haven't been to the New Theatre before, be prepared that they sometimes don't open the outside doors until 15 minutes before the performance (happened to me this year when I went to the Saturday matinee of ENB's 'Beauty') and the main doors are actually in the side street, not on the main road, so you end up waiting beside the rubbish bins! However, the auditorium is fine for sightlines and the acoustics are very good.

Better wait until the casting is officially announced because, like all these things, some of those learning it may not actually get a performance. To be honest, I can only remember three of the names but I am sure they will all be worth watching!

Just a slight correction if I may, the first night of MacMillan's R&J was meant to be Lynn Seymour and Christopher Gable, the disappointment vividly described in Seymour's autobiography.

The ENB dancers have actually been sent to Lausanne to learn it. Presumably someone from the company will come to London to polish it later on.

I went to the Saturday evening performance and was delighted to see a packed house with a lot of teenagers and some younger children and, by the comments around me, a number of people who had not seen the company before. For me, the outstanding piece was “Hooked” by ENBS student Emmeline Jansen which won her the School’s choreographic competition. Unusually (for ballet), this was a duet for two girls who sometimes mirrored each other and sometimes partnered each other. It was danced barefoot in the beautiful, flowing skirts beloved of Martha Graham and this enhanced the already sophisticated, swirling choreography danced by Jansen herself and Ashley Scott. Unlike the choreographers from ENB who had been paired with student composers from the Royal College of Music, Jansen chose her own music and used snatches of “The Paschal Spiral” but mainly danced to silence and the dancers’ own breathing, showing how rhythmically in tune the two girls were. It was a piece I would be happy to watch again, as were most of the pieces produced by the ENB dancers, three of whom were choreographing for the first time. Stina Quagebeur is the most experienced of the ENB choreographers and her work, “Domna” was certainly the most accomplished, using a Philip Larkin poem as its starting point. The music score provided by Laurence Osborn was rather angst-ridden but Quagebeur came up with extremely watchable, classically based choreography for Nathan Young and four predatory females, including the increasingly sophisticated Jia Zhang who is fast cornering the market in Femmes Fatales! Tamarin Stott created the quirkiest and most entertaining piece of the evening to an upbeat score by Ryan Cockerham which was a sound loop of repeated musical phrases interspersed with comments from the dancers and the choreographer. The title “Work in Progress”, reflected the fact that a dancer’s work is never done and the audience was given the rare opportunity to see what happens on stage before the curtain rises: four dancers, each in their own world, repeating various movements and occasionally coming together to work out bits of pas de deux. The piece that dazzled me was “[co][hes][ion]" by first-time choreographer Fabian Reimair which also had the most attractive, rhythmically interesting, music score by Raquel Garcia Tomas. Reimair’s concept was about “touch and (non) contact manipulation” and he succeeded admirably in showing this, particularly in the first pas de deux for Erina Takahashi and Ken Saruhashi in which he seemed to manipulate her in various stages of levitation, a truly original and ingenious duet. Jung ah Choi and Joshua McSherry-Gray had a lively pas de deux, the most classically based of the evening, and then Nancy Osbaldesdon started in an almost impossible position, appearing to hover over her partner Laurent Liotardo, held for a breathtaking length of time before dissolving into another intriguing pas de deux. Whoever was responsible for (not) proof-reading the programme should be shot as the cast list for Reimair’s piece was a complete mess, listing dancers from the previous piece and none of his. There was also no credit given to whoever was responsible for the costumes, lighting or stage management. Apart from that, it was an excellent evening for the bargain ticket price of £12 and all credit to ENB for opening this up to the general public for the first time and in a venue new to them.

Perhaps it should be noted for all those who have bemoaned the fact that there are so few British principal dancers at present that all the up and coming dancers capybara mentions above trained at English National Ballet School and have chosen to remain in this country. Perhaps we should all rejoice in the fact that the UK offers such wonderful training that we attract top level students from all over the world, many of whom go on to give us many years of pleasure by dancing with UK companies. One such example in ENB is Erina Takahashi who trained at ENBS and has spent her whole career with ENB.

As far as I am aware, this was open to all members of the company so nationality does not come into it.

I'm aware of the policy of having guest artists but I don't know why it is deemed necessary, especially when one remembers the debacle last time when Semionova's visa didn't arrive in time so Daria Klimentova opened the season with Vadim Muntagirov to great acclaim (not to mention helping to bring the company to the general public's attention by providing the basis for the first episode of "Agony & Ecstasy"!). With the company trying to deal with a smaller grant from the Arts Council, it does seem a waste of money to bring in a guest artist for a programme that will sell anyway.

Just to mention that Anais is appearing in ENB's choreographic evenings tomorrow and Saturday. (Have just posted a new topic about this.) Possibly the last chance to see Anais dancing with the company.

Just a reminder that ENB is presenting an evening of new works to specially commissioned scores from students at the Royal College of Music at The Place on Friday and Saturday evening (3-4 May). Tickets cost £12 (£8 concessions). Seems an excellent opportunity to see some established and up-and-coming talent within the company at a bargain price! The full line-up is: Choreographer: Stina Quagebeur Composer: Laurence Osborn Cast: Nathan Young, Senri Kou, Crystal Costa, Adella Ramirez and Jia Zhang Choreographer: Makoto Nakamura Composer: Gerardo Gozzi Cast: Anais Chalendard, Juan Rodriguez and Junor Souza Choreographer: Fabian Reimair Composer: Raquel Garcia Tomas Cast: Ken Saruhashi, Erina Takahashi, Nancy Osbaldeston, Jung ah Choi, Laurent Liotardo and Joshua McSherry-Gray Choreographer: Tamarin Stott Composer: Ryan Cockerham Cast: Barry Drummond, Shevelle Dynott, Désirée Ballantyne and Araminta Wraith Choreographer: Anton Lukovkin Composer: Andrew Baldwin Costume: Cristiano Casimiro Cast: Bridgett Zehr, Alison McWhinney, James Forbat, Anjuli Hudson, Zhanat Atymtayev, Ksenia Ovsyanick and Teo Dubreuil (box office - 0207 121 1100 or via the company's website)

Begona Cao is on leave of absence so that is the reason she is not dancing. Elena is perfectly healthy so it seems that she is the one to forfeit her performances this time (happened to Sarah McIlroy last time at the Albert Hall). I expect the new staff don't realise what a big following Elena has and it might be worth a few people writing in to express regret that she is not dancing.. Having previously looked at the RAH website, the performances had already sold extremely well even before the casting was announced so, as capybara says, 'names' do not matter to a lot of the audience members for these performances and therefore I do wonder why a guest artist is being brought in to dance Siegfried on the opening night. There are some excellent young men in the company who could partner Tamara Rojo (Esteban Berlanga has done so on several occasions now), highlighting the strength of the company, and still leave Vadim Muntagirov to partner Daria Klimentova.

Just relaying information I have had from some of the dancers. They all know which performances they are doing and I am sure it will be posted on the website soon. If it's any help, I know that Fernanda Oliveira and Dima Gruzdyev are dancing on 20th (evening) and 23rd plus one other but I can't remember the date. I understand Tamara Rojo will be dancing the opening night.

As I also have plans to go to that performance, I'm sure you will be delighted to know you will be seeing the wonderful Erina Takahashi who should be partnered by Zdenek Konvalina if he is fully recovered. I hope you enjoy the show!

I had booked for this afternoon’s (Sunday's) performance when the ‘jeune homme’ was still TBA so I was delighted to discover two weeks ago that it would be Fabian Reimair, who had been ‘filling in’ at rehearsals with Tamara Rojo until Nicolas Le Riche arrived. The chemistry between him and the magnificent Jia Zhang was almost tangible and electrifying. She was at her malevolent best, with Reimair’s whole body responding with increasing anguish to every cruel blow. The audience response was so great that the couple was given an honour usually reserved by ENB for its biggest stars, i.e. taking curtain calls in front of the curtain. “Petite Mort” also received a rapturous ovation after another riveting performance. Such is the work ethic of this company, that Zhang was back in the ensemble as one of the girls in black tutus for the final performance of “Etudes”. This was not quite as tidy as the performances I saw on Friday, but the company more than made up for it by dancing with great elan from start to finish. It seems Alban Lendorf has had a very positive effect on the dancers by inspiring them to be more extrovert, especially in the Mazurka which was danced with such panache as if to quote Rojo’s new slogan for the company: “we have something to say”. Long may this continue!

Yesterday I had the pleasure of attending both of ENB’s performances at the Coliseum and was delighted that both attracted quite large houses although I suspect most people were there on ticket offers. Except for James Streeter, the matinee cast for “Petite Mort” were all making their debuts and it was lovely to see Amber Hunt and Tamarin Stott, who do such beautiful work in the corps de ballet, have their chance to shine beside principals Elena Glurjidze and Erina Takahashi. Both of them, along with Stina Quagebeur, then provided a complete contrast as the epitome of Romantic sylphs in “Etudes”. The evening cast of “Petite Mort” gave their second performance and, as I mentioned after the rehearsal, there were some very interesting new partnerships – Ovsyanick and Forbat and Summerscales and Berlanga are two to watch out for. I wasn’t too keen on the costumes which seemed dated (reminded me of 1970s modern dance) but the lighting was great and made me even more aware of how Kylian can create so many stunning and highly inventive images using two bodies and how different but how perfect different casts can look dancing the same movements. And because he uses the pulse of Mozart’s music, the sometimes frenetic movement perfectly complements the adagio feeling of the music. In “Le Jeune Homme et la Mort”, we had the student (Putrov) and the Master (Le Riche). I would like to see Putrov again when he has had time to grow into the role so that his interpretation matches his very fine dancing. His ‘girl’ was the elegant Jia Zhang who was an ice-cold dominatrix who used her hauteur to totally crush him. Tiny Tamaro Rojo, dancing with Le Riche, was a spitfire, tormenting him with demented glee. Le Riche himself inhabited the role with every inch of his being to devastating effect and the two of them received a rousing ovation which was richly deserved. The matinee saw the debuts of Shiori Kase, Ken Saruhashi and Guilherme Menezes in “Etudes”, all of whom gave very accomplished performances. I felt the rest of the company, while dancing with great style and precision, were not taking advantage of being in the limelight and there was a slight reserve to their performance. However, all this disappeared in the evening, with most of the dancers appearing for the second time that day, albeit it some in different places, when they revelled in the chance to show off their formidable techniques and they sparkled from start to finish. The performance was led by Erina Takahashi who danced up a storm in all the virtuoso sections but was such a sublime sylph that I longed to see the company’s production of “La Sylphide” again just so I could see her in the title role! She is a very modest dancer with a huge talent and it was lovely to hear the very enthusiastic audience clapping and cheering at every opportunity. Her cavalier for the sylph section was Berlanga who clearly relished dancing with her, as did her partners for the virtuoso sections, James Forbat and Alban Lendorf. Forbat continues to impress as a sensitive partner and an elegant technician. Lendorf, replacing Muntagirov at very short notice, gave a masterclass in the Bournonville style without ‘milking’ the Mazurka as Schaufuss and Patrice Bart used to do. All credit to him and Takahashi for the very smooth pas de deux work on almost no rehearsal! If anyone still hasn’t seen this fantastic programme and is at a loose end tomorrow afternoon, I am sure there are still plenty of ticket offers available!

Having spent my school years in Toronto, this is the company, and Karen Kain in particular with her beautiful Juliet in Cranko’s classic production, that ignited my love of ballet. Therefore, I am extremely sad that I cannot be as euphoric as Meunier about the performance I saw this afternoon. The dancers were as I expected: highly disciplined, neat and precise and they deserved so much more than Ratmansky gave them. To be blunt, I would sum up this “Romeo and Juliet” as amateurish with sets that seemed to have been designed for a shoestring budget and costumes with no design theme. This was not choreography, it was a series of steps unrelated to the story or the passion of the music (wonderfully played by the Royal Ballet Sinfonia), with a few bits of traditional mime and meaningless mime in the breaks. Ratmansky failed to deliver anything original or inventive and I longed for Nureyev’s vibrant crowd scenes, Macmillan’s passionate pas de deux and Cranko’s masterly interpretation of all the other scenes, in particular his magnificent ballroom scene (these three versions melded together would be my ideal ballet!). Jiri Jelinek’s fiery Tybalt and Jonathan Renna’s genial Mercutio did their best with the material on offer (although Mercutio suffered from having to wear the worst costume in the opening scene). McGee Maddox and Elena Lobsanova made a very attractive pair of lovers but the choreography did not allow them the chance to develop their characters. For example: after Romeo is unmasked at the ball and is told to leave, Juliet goes back to dancing with Paris and her friends as if just meeting the love of her life had never happened. Ratmansky uses the ending from the original Italian novella on which Shakespeare’s play is based, so that Juliet wakes up before Romeo dies (although in the novella she does not stab herself but dies of a broken heart) and this was the most effective and genuinely moving moment of the ballet, perhaps because there was no dancing and the lovers, then the families, were allowed to show unencumbered emotion. Luckily the rest of the audience was far more appreciative than I was so that the company received a rousing ovation at the end. As this is a highly critical piece, I am signing my full name: Irmgard Berry

It seems we in the UK are far more reserved about expressing our dissatisfaction with a performance than our European counterparts. In the 1980s, I was given a ticket for a mixed bill of 'chamber' works by the Paris Opera Ballet at the Theatre Champs Elysees when Nureyev was Artistic Director. This included a piece he choreographed for himself to a Bach cello suite. It was full of the fussy little terre-a-terre steps and ronds de jamb ad nauseum that he favoured towards the end of his dance career. It really was pretty awful and he never once raised his eyes from the floor. As soon as the curtain fell, there was a claque of people booing, almost certainly orchestrated by the many people who were opposed to him being Artistic Director. This was immediately countered by another claque clapping and cheering. The battle lasted almost longer than the piece and all the while Nureyev cheekily continued to take his bows, obviously enjoying the situation. I had clapped politely (mostly for the cellist) and then had to sit bemused until the management decided enough was enough and brought up the house lights for the interval. I don't know if this happened at every performance but it was certainly an experience for someone used to the politeness of a UK audience!

Having said that, don't forget Shiori makes her debut as the lead ballerina in "Etudes" this Friday afternoon and Ksenia is in one of the casts of "Petite Mort". Both are definitely worth watching!

Unfortunately no scheduled debuts for Shiori or Ksenia but you never know what may change between now and June!

Have just heard that Laurretta Summerscales is scheduled to make her debut as Odette/Odile at the matinee performance on 20 June at the Albert Hall with another matinee on 22 June. She will be partnered by Arionel Vargas.

Yesterday I had the privilege of watching a complete run of ENB’s triple bill for the Coliseum next week. Forget the “Death”, this show is pure Ecstasy and I would urge everyone to see it. The rehearsal started with “Etudes” which will close the programme. I have loved this ballet since I first saw LFB dance it in the late 1970s. It has to be the ultimate celebration of classical ballet technique and ENB’s latest staging shows the company at an all-time high – immaculate work by the female corps de ballet at the barre and then all the fireworks you could wish for from the entire ensemble. Vadim Muntagirov was dancing at this rehearsal and, what he lacks in the showmanship of past interpreters, he more than makes up for with clean, virtuoso technique coupled with supreme elegance – he really is a superstar in the making. New to the rep is Kylian’s barefoot ballet “Petite Mort” and two casts have been assembled from all ranks of the company with some interesting new partnerships. Each cast had a go yesterday and they are both excellent. The ballet starts with six men ingeniously dancing with six fencing foils and then dissolves into a series of pas de deux. As always with Kylian, these are complicated and intriguing. Those who know anything about Medieval poetry and songs know that ‘petite mort’ or ‘little death’ is a euphemism and the whole piece is sexually charged but tasteful enough for a family audience. Last was “Le Jeune Homme et la Mort” which will be the centrepiece of the programme. I was lucky enough to see all three casts. LeRiche and Rojo simply sizzled, he a tortured soul from start to finish. Putrov, dancing as a last-minute replacement for Acosta, has a bit of a way to go to match LeRiche but is certainly worth seeing. The final performance will be danced by the company’s own Fabian Reimair and the enigmatic Jia Zhang. I have long considered Reimair to be the best dramatic male dancer in the company and he does not disappoint in this role, seizing the opportunity to showcase his considerable technique while giving an emotionally draining interpretation. This programme is a feast for the eyes and ears and it is unfortunate that (in my opinion) poor choice of title and image to advertise it means that ticket sales have been slow when it really should be considered a highlight of the ballet year.

The whole link is not spelled out above but it does work!

I might be posting at the same time as others, but I have just been told about the special offer for ENB next week: £45-£55 seats available for £25. The link is: https://uk-offers.timeout.com/deals/ecstasy-and-death-english-national-ballet. It's a greal programme - shame about the offputting title - and well worth a visit at £25!