Ballet Central Spring Tour 2016

[Jan McNulty]

I was very lucky to be able to catch up with the Ballet Central Spring Tour at Leeds' Stanley & Audrey Burton Theatre last night.  It's always such a pleasure to see the young dancers as they are about to fledge and last night was no exception.

 

The evening started with Christopher Gable's Celebration, a delightful classical piece for four couples.  What I liked, apart from the lovely, lyrical choreography, was that you can imagine little stories being enacted out between the couples in the duets.  It was danced with beautiful emotion.

 

Next up was Insinuare by Leanne King - a great duet for the 2 dancers.

 

I loved Repetition (2) Change by Sharon Watson for 6 dancers.  According to the programme it is about DNA but the costumes (red or black voluminous short dresses for all the dancers) reminded me of sculptures of Greek Philosophers and the choreography reminded me of them perhaps postulating in the Acropolis.  The dresses were quite a feature - almost part of the action.  It was sharply danced by all the dancers.

 

Superstruct by Sara Matthews showed off the technical skills of all the 6 dancers involved with its edgy choreography.

 

The first half of the evening was completed by the Pas de Trois from Laquita, devilishly difficult and very well danced - an uber-classical finish to this act.

 

Act 2 was devoted to Christopher Marney's delightful War Letters a series of vignettes for 12 dancers based on the premise of letters written in war time.  It had a narrative feel to it and you could read as much into the back stories as you wanted, loneliness, yearning, joy, sadness and more.  I found it rather moving and again the young dancers gave their all and showed their acting strengths.

 

I thought this was a great programme that gave us the opportunity to see these young dancers in a variety of styles.

 

You should go and see Ballet Central if you can - it is a great night out!

[simonbfisher]

I can certainly endorse Janet's enthusiasm. Do catch them if you can. Luckily for us, they'll be in Newbury on May 10th. Very much looking forward to seeing them again.

[Jan McNulty]

A review from Leeds:

 

http://www.thereviewshub.com/ballet-central-2016-tour-stanley-audrey-burton-theatre-leeds/