Birmingham Royal Ballet: An Evening of Music and Dance, May 2022

[MaddieRose]

This evening I was at Nottingham's Royal Concert Hall to see the BRB's Evening of Music and Dance. I was lucky enough to be sitting in the front row of the stalls. It was an evening that had it's ups and downs, but with more ups than downs.

 

Coppélia: Céline Gittens and Brandon Lawrence danced the Wedding Pas de Deux from Act III. I thought they were both brilliant, and did well conveying their characters outside of the framing of the full ballet. What I noticed first was that they were that harmonised it was like one dancers was moving across the stage, not two. There was some very shaky arm-holding in the part that resembles the Rose Adagio balances, but I couldn't say whether it was normal, nerves or just based on how close I was sitting. All in all they did a brilliant job and were beaming ear to ear at the end. I hope they get a chance to perform together in the October run. 
 

The next dance piece was due to be the Red Pas de Deux from Our Waltzes danced by Momoko Hirata and César Morales, but it was unfortunately announced that Hirata was injured. Luckily it seemed to be something they'd planned ahead for, as the piece was replaced by the Act III Entracte of Carmen. I was a bit sad, but what can you do? 
 

Bluebird Pas de Deux: When I saw the BRB for the first time, the lady next to me pointed out Miki Mizutani, who was dancing one of Juliet's Friends. This evening she was an elegantly exquisite Princess Florine. Her posture was brilliant, and it was easy to believe she was a lightweight princess. The Bluebird was Max Maslen, who looked somewhat Nureyev-esque in the wig (though I wouldn't call them lookalikes in daily life). He was brilliant, making the jumps look effortless, and making the most of the fact that the stage was his. There was a little stumble, but luckily it was right before a partnering step, so Maslen covered it by just moving to Mizutani's side a bit quicker. it was wonderful to see the pair. 
 

End of Time: This is a Ben Stevenson piece from the 80s, inspired by an apocalypse film, and has the dancers in skintight long-sleeved unitards. 'Oh well', I thought, 'at least I can listen to Rachmaninoff (his Sonata in G minor for Cello and Piano specifically)'. But this piece blew me away. It was danced by Brandon Lawrence and Yijing Zhang, and they were both spectacular. The movements show the survivors of the apocalypse coming to terms with the fact that they only have each other. There was a bit of dragging, but not in a horrible way, more in a 'come on we have to live' way. And there was a moment, when both dancers are lay on the floor, and Zhang cups Lawrence's face with her hands. All the distress in his face melted away. To see that up close, about 6 feet away from you, was amazing. They got the biggest applause of the night, and they deserved it. 
 

Majisimo: This piece is to music from Massenet's Le Cid, and was choreographed by Jorge Garcia (who's name is spelt at leat three different ways in the programme). It's a Spanish-infused piece. It was due to be performed with Hirata and Mathias Dingman, but Yaoqian Shang (who is second cast) stepped in. The other soloists were Tzu-Chao Chou, Shuailun Wu, Alexander Yap, Karla Doorbar, Yu Kurihara and Beatrice Parma. It was an excellent choice to end the night on. There's elements of the Spanish flamboyance, with pirouettes across the stage, and leaps for the men, solos which all received applause. Dingman, Chou, Wu and Yap were having a lot of fun. I couldn't pick a standout from the latter three; all of them were jumping in sync and beaming. Shang was excellently fierce in the lead role, especially as I don't think her and Dingman would've had much rehearsal together. Doorbar deserves particular mention for perfectly pulling off the diagonal pirouettes across the stage, and the fan work and the Spanish claps were to be found all over this piece. It's pieces like this when you can see just how much fun the dancers are having, and it was the best choice to finish the evening on. 
 

In between there were music pieces by the wonderful Sinfonia. My favourite was Wagner's Ride of the Valkyries, but the pieces were the Nabucco Overture (Verdi), Carmen Act III Overture (Bizet), Eugene Onegin Waltz (Tchaikovsky) and Samson et Dalila Bacchanale (Saint-Saëns). There were also two soloists (Helsa Townsend and Samantha Lewis) from the Birmingham Conservatoire, who performed the Evening Prayer and Pantomime from Humperdinck's Hansel and Gretl, and the Lakmé Flower Duet. 
 

The End of Time piece, set to Rachmaninoff, is just piano and cello, and Jeanette Wong (Piano) and Antonio Novais (Cello) was excellent (my musician Mother was singing their praises all the way home). The conductor Paul Murphy was not only doing his job but also having fun, and the compère, Dominic Heale of East Midlands News, was surprisingly knowledgeable.
 

The biggest problem of the evening was not one on stage, but the fact that a lot of the seats were empty. The Royal Concert Hall is a big theatre (roughly 2,500 seats), but it was still sparse. While the audience did make up for it with loud applause, I hope it doesn't mean that BRB won't tour to Nottingham for another six years. A lot of the people around me were theatre regulars who just thought it would be an interesting evening, and I'm happy to report they enjoyed themselves as much as I did. 

 

 

[Emeralds]

Thanks for your great review and photo, MaddieRose! I’ve wanted to attend one of these for a few years but it always clashes with something else we have to go to. Hopefully one day soon.

 

I think the attendance (and perishability of unoccupied seats) could be improved by changing the way it’s marketed- they seem to be unsure whom to offer them to: strict classical music devotees won’t be keen that it’s only excerpts of music, strict ballet devotees often won’t be keen that there are no sets and that the stage is being apparently “split” with an orchestra (although in fact dancers and dance audiences are used to many iconic solos and pas de deux  not actually needing a big stage space....and those who sit in restricted view seats will appreciate any dance that is centre stage all or most of the time 😉). 

 

I think the ideal audiences for this would be families or groups of friends that contain children or adults who are new to ballet. The ballet devotees in the family/group will appreciate the quality dancing from BRB principals and rising stars, the music devotees will appreciate the quality playing and programming from Rachmaninov to Tchaikovsky to Saint-Sean’s, while the novices and children get introduced to the delights of each work as short highlights without having to sit through a long act of an art form they are unfamiliar with and don’t have the stamina for. Once they know whom exactly they’re pitching it to, the rest who don’t fall into the “target group” can decide if they want to join in if the show sounds good. 

 

The title could do with some reworking, as it seems to say “we’re not very good, you won’t be impressed by us”, and “it’s not particularly for anybody really”. Even if I didn’t have children or newcomers and was a music or ballet fan going by myself, I wouldn’t want to go if the organisers weren’t very confident about their own artists!  

 

I wouldn’t hesitate to market it as “Stars of the Birmingham Royal Ballet and Friends” which is what I think this turned out to be, and call the programme “An evening of spectacular Classical Music and Ballet highlights” or “Ballet and music delights for all the family” in the information.  Just look how many top principals and soloists danced in the programme.

 

However when I previously picked up leaflets or clicked on the website, the programming was often incomplete, and apart from a photo of Morales and Hirata, nothing about casting or how many items would be danced. As our discussions about casting on this forum have often shown, we don’t mind if some casting has to change at the last minute as long as there is some casting before we buy the ticket. But it does make a difference if I knew that a number of principals and soloists were dancing quality choreography (which they did here), as opposed to inexperienced freelance performers in not very good choreography (although with BRB that is highly unlikely) and many non-dance fans would go if they recognised the names of pieces, eg Carmen overture, Lakme Flower Duet, Sleeping Beauty. 

 

Good ballet music does sell- some of Royal Festival Hall and Barbican Hall’s bestseller shows for symphony orchestras have been entire evenings of Prokofiev or Tchaikovsky ballet music, and many music listeners love Delibes’ ballets way more than some ballet company artistic directors nowadays do! I think it’s a very balanced programme with lots to enjoy. It seems a bit of an opportunity missed, except for those who did get the tickets and attended.  Am very pleased that you went and enjoyed it! 

Edited May 8, 2022 by Emeralds

[Emeralds]

PS I believe Hirata and Morales’ pas de deux from Vicente Nebrada’s Our Waltzes is online on either Facebook, or YouTube, or both, if you’d like to see what you missed. I saw Our Waltzes abroad by a different company, a bit of a nostalgic favourite for me- very Latin American, swishy, and dramatic (nothing at all like what is currently in the RB & ENB repertoire), and they are both wonderful in it. 

[MaddieRose]

32 minutes ago, Emeralds said:

However when I previously picked up leaflets or clicked on the website, the programming was often incomplete, and apart from a photo of Morales and Hirata, nothing about casting or how many items would be danced. As our discussions about casting on this forum have often shown, we don’t mind if some casting has to change at the last minute as long as there is some casting before we buy the ticket. But it does make a difference if I knew that a number of principals and soloists were dancing quality choreography (which they did here), as opposed to inexperienced freelance performers in not very good choreography (although with BRB that is highly unlikely) and many non-dance fans would go if they recognised the names of pieces, eg Carmen overture, Lakme Flower Duet, Sleeping Beauty. 

I agree with your whole post Emeralds, but this snippet the most. When we brought tickets the two advertised pieces were Bluebird and the Pas de Deux from Winter Dreams. I don't mind a programme change, or casting change, but there wasn't much indication as to what would actually be happening, or how weighted it would be between music and dance. 
 

They did do a family 'introduction to ballet' show in the afternoon, which I think had pieces like the Chicken Dance from La fille mal gardée, Bluebird and Majisimo. I don't know how well attended that performance was. 
 

I didn't mind as much as it's my local theatre and wasn't a long way to go, but I don't think I would've booked if it were in Birmingham (they're doing two performances there next week), because of the lack of information initially given. 

[Jan McNulty]

Unfortunately I was otherwise engaged this weekend or I would have tried to get to Nottingham as sadly I can't get to Birmingham Rep either.

 

Up until this year I think there has only been one other year when these evenings haven't been at Birmingham's glorious Symphony Hall.  I didn't go from year 1 but I have been attending for many years now and these evenings in the format advertised have been nearly sold out at Symphony Hall for all those years.  Indeed it has been one of my annual ballet-going highlights.  We have seen so many wonderful performances over the years at Symphony Hall.  Who could ever forget Nao and Chi finishing the evening with Don Q, Diana and Actaeon (a particularly fond memory) Le Corsaire etc and at the last evening a few weeks before we were locked down who could forget Momoko and Mathias ending the evening with Don Q and the full audience going so wild I thought the roof was going to fly off.

 

As far as Nottingham goes as a venue for BRB, on the few times they have been to the Theatre Royal in recent years I can't remember the performances selling particularly well.

 

IIRC it was originally seen as an opportunity for the BRB Sinfonia to show off with some dance thrown in so the title of the evening does what it says on the tin.  Indeed I would be sad if this BRB Sinfonia evening was reshaped to highlight the dancers rather than the musicians.

 

I'm afraid that (following mostly BRB and NB) I just don't have the same attachment to advance casting that followers of London companies have.

 

I sincerely hope that this evening returns to Symphony Hall in the future.

[Pulcinella]

Unfortunately I won't be able to attend either of the B'ham performances but I've just looked at the BRB website and casting is given for both performances. Although the same pieces are being performed there are different casts for the two evenings.

 

https://www.brb.org.uk/whats-on/event/evening-music-dance-2022

[Odyssey]

Like Janet, I have attended many of these evenings- for many years memorably  introduced by David Bintley. Without doubt, the anecdotes he used to entertain us with between the extracts was an important aspect of the evening. I’m not sure the guest compères have worked so well since. I always saw this as a celebration of the Company and its wonderful Sinfonia . The extracts were largely drawn from the current / recent repertoire and reflected both the riches in the Company’s ‘chest’ and the depth of talented  dancers. In recent years, there has been a little more focus on new choreography created by people within the company.  I think I’m right in saying that initially there was just a single performance which  proved so popular that it extended to a second show usually on a second consecutive night.  I last saw it at Warwick Arts Centre - on the occasion Janet refers to when it was staged outside the Symphony Hall. I’d be sad to see it go, but I always got the impression this was  an initiative created and shaped by Bintley and it was an important event in the BRB calendar.  It wasn’t a gala evening - nothing as grand as that, and as such had a unique quality. Perhaps there are other priorities now. 

Edited May 9, 2022 by Odyssey

[Jan McNulty]

I thought David Bentley was a wonderful compere, as was Alan Titchmarsh when I first started going.  Both had a wonderful fund of anecdotes about the danced pieces we were seeing.

 

On 07/05/2022 at 23:39, MaddieRose said:

This evening I was at Nottingham's Royal Concert Hall to see the BRB's Evening of Music and Dance. I was lucky enough to be sitting in the front row of the stalls. It was an evening that had it's ups and downs, but with more ups than downs.

 

 

Was there a compere at this performance MaddieRose?

[MaddieRose]

30 minutes ago, Jan McNulty said:

Was there a compere at this performance MaddieRose?

Yes, Dominic Heale of East Midlands News. I don't know much about him but his biography said he's interested in music. Most of his jokes (relying on referencing things I'm not aware of) went over my head, but my Mum and the lady next to me thought they were funny so I'll assume they were funny. 
 

He didn't say much about each piece, just giving a brief history, and for some of them talking about what was going on in the world of dance and opera at the time of their premiere. He also managed to pronounce everything correctly, so he'd obviously done his research. I think he was happy to be there and I think it was a wonderful idea to have a compère, especially for those who hadn't bought a programme.