AnneMarriott

Mummery is a kind of mediaeval street performance of plays or ceremonies. The performers (mummers) wear extravagant costumes which disguise their appearance and the performance is usually of an overwrought, exaggerated and even ridiculous or mocking kind. So in the context of England on Fire the three performers in the rag-and-bell costumes make more sense as mummers than as Morris dancers.

I notice that Louise Leven in her Financial Times review calls them Old English Mummers. Even though I thought of them as Morris dancers, Mummers makes far more sense.

"England is a hothouse flower but all the glass is cracked". This refrain sadly came across to me as "England is a sh*thouse now and her arse is smacked". Sorry if that contravenes Forum rules about language. If the show was supposed to reflect the current wave of creativity, then I missed the point - it just seemed to be an angry rant about what is wrong with the country and I felt thoroughly depressed at the end. I also notice the lack of a standing ovation which surprised me not a little because of the average age of the audience.

The three Morris dancers (which I also assumed they were) were the highlight of the whole thing for me.

Well I would certainly hope that any woman who has mistakenly entered the men's loos and decided to risk staying to use the facilities has the decency to close the cublcle door.

... and the band played "Believe it if you like" ...

No-one who has posted here on this point feels there is a problem. Nor do I personally, and I speak as someone who had a physically and mentally handicapped younger brother (now sadly no longer with us) and witnessed at first hand the mockery he suffered from members of the public. Alain was undoubtedly created as an affectionate depiction of an innocent, unworldly and awkward individual, totally unsuitable as a prospective husband but, as sometimes performed, he can come across as a laughing stock and in these times of political correctness it may be that there is pause for thought before staging a work that COULD cause offence. Of course it's always possible that the problem lies with the participation of the pony - animal exploitation etc.

Last performed by RB in 2012 and before that several times during the noughties.

My fault I think - apologies. I was prompted by Don Q Fan's suggestion above that Cranko's Onegin, a Russian story, may be a victim of the situation in Ukraine. I wanted to point out that there are other considerations than artistic choices or financial constraints, not to mention political sensitivities, to explain the inclusion or omission of pieces from a company's programmes.

Of course the RB could meet any stipulations but may not wish to do so. It may no longer be the case but apparently in the past if a company wanted to put on Onegin they had to commit to doing so for more than one run within a given period.

The problem with Fille is that the character of Alain could be taken as showing disrespect for people with learning difficulties. Recent performances do seem to have over-egged his clumsiness and lack of self-awareness, which I think reflects a modern tendency to coarsen characterisation viz. the stepsisters in Ashton's Cinderella. As far as Onegin is concerned, the owner of the rights to this piece has apparently specified rather strict conditions of performance which may explain why the RB has not put it on recently.

I was unaware of the detail of this history but knew that his work was less appreciated here than in Europe. However I felt that the Evening Standard critic, though harsh, confirmed my impression of Four Last Songs. I wonder if the piece suffers from following on from Les Noces, Ascent to Days. Reading earlier points about Theme and Variations making such heavy demands on the dancers that it would be inappropriate to place it last on the Our Voices programme makes me question the balance of the whole bill.

I hope it helps future audiences but from my impressions of Thursday evening I still don't think I'd have got it!

Nope - not a clue!

"Our Voices". What a strange evening of dance. It's unusual to start a mixed programme with Theme and Variations instead of putting it last as a way of sending everyone home with a feeling of exhilaration. I felt last night's performance was a bit careful, the steps delivered dutifully rather than with sparkle and the smiles a trifle fixed. Then came bewilderment in Les Noces, Ascent to Days. Arriving late, thanks to heavy traffic, and unable to read the programme notes beforehand, I was expecting an update of Nijinska's masterpiece, seen at Covent Garden in, I think, the early nineties. The music was challenging then and even more so last night, and as I'm not a great fan of song (especially of the heavy neoclassical and Lieder kind) as an accompaniment to dance, the programme involved a degree of suffering. Anyhow, Les Noces, Ascent to Days turned out to be a sequel to Nijinsky's Rite of Spring. How odd, as bridiem mentioned above, to use the title and score of a wedding to choreograph the aftermath of a human sacrifice. (I don't pretend to understand what "Ascent to days" means in context but it led to irreverent musings that perhaps "Noces" had been mistaken for Spanish for Night.) The dancers gave it their all but nothing else about it gave me any pleasure. Then, another sung score for David Dawson's Four Last Songs. Wonderful soprano, dancers again giving their all, choreography easy-watching but unvaried in mood and movement - the Songs all looked and sounded similar. So off home with a sense of gloom.

Hoverflies?

Perhaps inspired by those two-for-one offers?

I genuinely do feel your pain!

I think we need to define our terms!

I'm putting parfumiers into Room 101. The blighters will keep discontinuing my favourite perfumes: Antilope (Weill), Ivoire (Balmain) and now, to my bitter disappointment after only 10 years, Iris Prima (Penhaligon), all gone. It's such a difficult business trying to find a replacement. There are no decent perfume retailers near me and my local Boots, despite being a huge store, has a dismal collection, mostly of new(ish) scents allegedly by various celebrities, all behind glass doors with no staff in sight - gone is the counter with bottles for customers to try. I recently got some samples of scents which are supposed to be similar to Iris Prima. They all stink.

I don't use any social media at all but I have found in the past that even interviews in newspapers or word-of-mouth reports from people who have met dancers have coloured my feelings about individual performers, not always positively. I try actively to avoid anything about dancers' personal lives and opinions so I can enjoy their performances neat, as it were.

Couldn't agree more! However let's not be downhearted because, as one pundit put it, "the girls done incredible".

I witnessed his remarkable performance and was amused to read Ismene Brown's review including the memorable comment along the lines of, "when he (Mukahamedov) sniffed the nymph's scarf I nearly fell through my seat".

No it was the reconstructed original.

Ditto