SheilaC

What has poor William Bracewell done to deserve selection as Edgar? And the roles of young Cathy and Heathcliff are important, who would you choose? Isabella Gasparini is very familiar with David Nixon’s choreography from her years at Northern Ballet and might make a good young Cathy.

The pyrotechnics were, indeed, absolutely exhilarating, but given the theme of the show it was the sadder and more reflective pieces which moved me most. Several were, in different ways, about death. The opening pas de deux showed Ukrainian Katja Khaniukova and Aitor Arrieta in Liam Scarlett's No Man's Land. As there was no information about pieces, other than title, choreographer and composer, not everyone in the audience may have realised it was about grief in the First World War. I found the interpretation dancing and music incredibly poignant. That was followed by The Dying Swan, Javier Torres in one of his final performances in a powerful and harrowing solo that started with natural sounds like wind followed by the famous Saint-Saens score. Later Luca Acri performed Lacrimosa to Mozart and the ENO chorus, Natalia Osipova in Ashes, to music played by Nigel Kennedy, culminating in MacMillan's Requiem, the wonderful Ukrainian Aud Jebsen dancer, Marianna Tsembenhoi. Altogether a wonderful programme, varied and well balanced, with fabulous dancers. It's amazing that Ivan and Alina put it together in so little time. Their comments at the start were moving. The ambassador was sat in the royal box, so close to the stage that he couldn't see much of the action, but he kept leaning forward to catch as much as he could, and applauded very enthusiastically. Inside the printed programme (again, very professionally presented, with some lovely photos of each dancer) there was a slip with a message from Alina encouraging us to donate to the charity of which she is a patron, Hospices of Hope, which has a Ukraine appeal, to extend its support to refugees, to provide medical, palliative, counselling support and medical supplies and food. https://www.hospicesofhope.co.uk/Appeal/help-for-ukraine

The policy of controlling British companies' touring venues and, arguably, schedules has impacted, in my view, the scale and spread of the ballet audience across the country. The discussion of Liverpool audiences being conservative made me recall all the wonderful performances I used to see in Liverpool by LFB, most notably a terrific triple bill that included Petit's L'Arlesienne with Schaufuss and Mireille Bourgeois. The audience wasn't conservative then, their caution now is likely to be due to the significant reduction in varied performances over the years. Likewise, the variety of ballets on offer by BRB has declined markedly since the creative days of John Field and Peter Wright during the RB touring group and SWRB. In a rare attempt to declutter I've come across a leaflet for SWRB in Sunderland in 1987. In that week there were 5 performance of Fille (casts: Karen Donovan, Petter Jacobsson; Nicola Katrak, Michael O'Hare; Sandra Madgwick, Roland Price; Leanne Benjamin, David Yow; Marion Tait, Patrick Armand). Yes, SWRB even announced casts well in advance. Still a standard rep choice you may think. But in addition there was a triple bill, 2 performances, of Paquita, (Marion Tait, Patrick Armand; Miyako Yoshida, Roland Price), The Picture of Dorian Gray, an overdramatic ballet by Derek Deane, (Roland Price, Samira Saidi; Petter Jacobsson, Leanne Benjamin) and Facade (Galina Samsova, Alain Dubreuil, at both performances. And there was a special schools matinee that included Facade (June Highwood, Stephen Wicks) and the Sleeping Beauty pas de deux (Leanne Benjamin and a certain Kevin O'Hare- not even a soloist then). If I went through my filed programmes for that era I would find many similar examples of varied and interesting repertory for SWRB- and LFB too. There was so much choice that someone who initially attended the ballet just for a social occasion could be tempted to try a more adventurous programme and would gradually become a more educated ballet goer. Wonderful though Swan Lake is, a diet of that classic offered by all the main companies doesn't encourage people to try out something new- there are so few options. I deliberately listed the main casts because many members of the forum will recognise some of the names- dancers who went on to become ballet stars, dancers who have since contributed significantly to dance teaching, even both parents of an up and coming RB dancer. People who think Carlos Acosta is the first to reinvigorate the company that is now BRB couldn't be more wrong. But the reduction in touring (venues, number of performances per week- halved in the case of Sunderland) and having to play safe by choosing well known ballets, is a self-inflicted wound by the Arts Council. In these difficult times they are unlikely to change policy.

So,once again the North loses out. Raymonda was scheduled to premiere at Manchester, but will they show it there?- no. Instead, yet another Swan Lake. BRB had already announced that they will be touring Swan Lake next season.

Did Shang not perform in Birmingham Janet? She was scheduled to and is listed in the cast lists. I'm greatly looking forward to seeing her in Sunderland, Covid permitting.

Who was the Don? Last week in Birmingham I saw 3 dons. Two made the most of the humour but Valentin Olovyannikov was superb, not just presenting him as a geriatric buffoon, like the others, but bringing out his misplaced idealism and gallantry, even dignity, which added depth.

And I've got a DVD of his Sylvia- Paris Opera Ballet (with a dream cast : Aurelie Dupont, Marie-Agnes Gillot, Jose Martinez and the equally but differently wonderful Manuel Legris and Nicolas Le Riche)

I don’t think that he is currently dancing or attached to any company. (I hope I’m wrong). He’s certainly not listed with the Mark Bruce company and his association with Phoenix may have ended.

Beatrice was absolutely fabulous, the best Kitri so far in Birmingham, technically and in characterisation. And she inspired a better performance from Mathias than on the first night. Great character performances from Rory Mackay and Valentin Olovyannikov at each performance. At the matinee Shang was exquisite as Queen of the Dryads. A true ballerina. Brandon was an amazing Espada on Friday, even better than as Basilio at the matinee. The quality varied between soloists at all performances, but overall the company is on exhilarating form.

This is probably not the right thread so please move it, moderators, if you wish. By accident I heard a Radio 4 programme (In our Time) about Romeo and Juliet this morning, describing the historical context and analysing both the poetry and the various characters in the play. At the end the 3 academics were asked which adaptations were best and one said West Side Story (sadly not referring to Robbins, whose concept it was, but referring to the other contributors) and ballets to Tchaikovsky (not sure we see many of this nowadays although I did see one when young) and, of course, Prokofiev. (The third referred to a film). It's well worth listening to. A slightly shorter version is repeated tonight (R4, 9.30) and a longer version will be on BBC Sounds, presumably for 30 days.

They performed Heart of Chaos in York in November at both performances and it is really good. The whole programme is excellent- very varied, well balanced, with a nice selection of pieces, some dramatic, some humorous, from different stages of the company's history. And all have good choreography. The dancers are committed. All in all, well worth seeing on the regional tour or at the Peacock in London.

Yesterday the delayed gala celebrating the 40th anniversary took place at the Yorkshire Playhouse. It comprised a wealth of dance, from ballet to contemporary to other modern techniques, from 8 companies in addition to Phoenix itself. It was introduced, inspiringly, by the founder, David Hamilton, who commented on the early struggles but also the initial achievements, including securing the first dance officer for Leeds and the West Yorkshire region. I thought back to the first time I saw them, nearly 40 years ago, at that point three energetic young men, on a small stage in a community centre in Saltburn, not far from Teesside. It has evolved many times since, through varied directors. The ballet highlights included a wonderful duet by Robert Cohan, from his ballet Nympheas, which was revived for the recent Cohan celebration. It was again fluently danced by Romany Pajdak and Matthew Ball. More virile ballet came from eight male dancers from Northern Ballet, in the first live performance of Men Dances by Mlindi Kulashe: it had been choreographed in lockdown and performed in a zoom. An exhilarating start to the second half. Scottish Ballet contributed a duet by Sophie Laplane, Dextera, performed vividly by Jerome Barnes and Anna Williams, to Mozart. Other contributions came from Yorke Dance Project (which had also been responsible for the Nympheas piece), a solo created on Dane Hurst (still, it seems, artistic director of Phoenix) and danced by Luke Ahmet. Another of my favourite small groups, the Mark Bruce company (which never normally performs in the North, we have to travel to London to see them), ended the main programme with a duet, Green Apples, to The White Stripes music. Other duets explored conflictual relationships ; male/female from Company Chamelon and male/male from Denada Dance Theatre. Very different was an excerpt from Mana, by Ace Dance and Music, exploring African religious traditions. The programme ended with a performance of one of the pieces in Phoenix's current programme celebrating past choreography. It should have been Heart of Chaos, the piece by one of their best previous directors, Darshan Singh Bhuller, about the first African American heavyweight champion, no less, Jack Johnson, but because of injury it had to be substituted by another dance piece from the programme. Sadly I couldn't watch it all as I had to make my way to the station (by then the performance had taken almost twice as long a scheduled!) to cope with a disrupted journey due to the East Coast line being out of action north of York (you people in Brighton are not the only ones with travel problems!)

Not altogether a vote of confidence in his own dancers! And Nela and Vadim won't be doing it for love- where's the extra money coming from?

I'm also very pleased for Rory MacKay. I have loved him as a character since I interviewed him in Sunderland, quite soon after he joined the company. He spoke very freely; too freely from a PR point of view, of his attitude, then, to his career, even using a swear word at a time when swearing in public was less common, but no-one in the audience minded as he came across as such a great bloke! (He did apologise as soon as he realised what he had inadvertently done). Since then he has matured as a performer and always has a different 'take' on every role he performs so that I am always pleased when I see his name on the cast list, he's never bland.

I do agree, she has such a lovely quality to her dancing that it would be great if she can continue as a dancer as well as taking character roles. But she is so multi-talented that she will be a good repeititeur too.

Yes, Janet, they were excellent in the MacMIllan programme, but MacMIllan rep requires distinctly different qualities from Robbins (indeed in my personal view, one of the RB dancers, excellent in other ballets, did not ‘get’ Robbins in Dances). I agree that they did Giselle pretty well, I was very disappointed that they weren’t able to do more performances, especially as Pippa was good as Giselle. But the company has rightly always prided itself, through all its permutations, as offering something different from other ballet companies.

It was BRB that did the Cage. Although a long time friend, and former volunteer archivist, of Northern Ballet, I am not sure their dancers have all the necessary qualities for Robbins; it's not just about technique. And their rep is rather different from that of classical companies such as RB, BRB, ENB; even ballets like Swan Lake are different from the traditional productions. It will be very interesting to see how Bonelli develops the company rep.

Far from ditching the classics, BRB are going to do Coppelia, in addition to Nutcracker and Swan Lake. They are taking Don Q to Sadler's Wells in July, and even doing a wonderful Kylian ballet (Forgotten Land) in Birmingham in October. Quite a variety of other offerings, things are looking up a bit!

I don't know how to edit this but I realise my wording may be confusing. Dane was in Bruce's last show at Wilton's, I didn't mean he was ever involved in Phantom.

Phantom will be on at Wilton's in London from 24 February to 5 March. Booking has been open for weeks, I booked ages ago. Yes, Jonathan Goddard is one of the dancers, such a pity Dane Hurst is no longer involved.

In an email from BRB, Christopher Saunders is listed as staging Don Q for them. Which makes me wonder just how different the 'new' production will be. It may become clearer tomorrow when Saunders is one of three speakers in a zoomed discussion of the new Don Q for BRB supporters.

I've had an email from Sadler's Wells stating that as compensation for the shorter programme I can receive a free programme on the night. No hint that I can return the tickets and get a refund or voucher.

I've seen Blake Works in Paris and it is good, dynamic, another reason for wanting to go. If the reason really is due to an overseas tour then it's yet another example of how in recent years there has been a change in balance between national and international touring, to the disadvantage of the taxpayer and English ballet lovers.

I was very disappointed when I got the email. I booked months ago for a ticket for me and my daughter to attend on my birthday. After all 3 performances of Raymonda I had booked were cancelled, this was the last straw. As Approximate Sonata was already in their rep I find it hard to believe they can't stage it, there are 9 weeks before the SWT programme. There was no hint in the email of a substitution. And still no news of a likely regional tour, not that they come anywhere near where I live.

I've had an email from the Balanchine Trust today; apparently it's Balanchine's birthday. There were short videos of the wonderful Jacques d'Amboise rehearsing dancers in some key Balanchine roles. But then a clip came on of Wendy Whelan interviewing d'Amboise and Merrill Ashley discussing Jewels. D'Amboise reported that Balanchine said that Emeralds represents the French countryside in summer; Rubies represents 42nd Street at midnight on New Year's Eve; Diamonds represents the court of the Czar. They talked most about Diamonds as d'Amboise had created the male role, partnering Suzanne Farrell, and Ashley had first danced it while still in the corps, before Farrell came back to the company. It had also been Whelan's first classical role, as a soloist. Farrell had recently returned to coach principals in the role and Whelan commented on how different her approach to the ballet was to how she'd been coached when learning it. They commented on how the ballerina is supposed to be elusive and indecisive, uncertain whether to give in to love or not as an element of passion is hinted at, and there are suggestions of Odette. Apparently initially there were more variations in Diamonds than we see today. Modern dancers take a while to learn how to dance off balance, whereas it was second nature to Farrell. Altogether a very interesting discussion.