Light of Passage - new Crystal Pite ballet

[JohnS]

3 hours ago, alison said:

Trouble is that rail tickets have to be booked weeks, if not months, in advance.

 
If only that were possible but Avanti isn’t releasing tickets for weekend travel until the Thursday or Friday beforehand and weekday tickets are released only a few days in advance. Some services are currently showing as ‘sold out’ but Penrith railway staff tell me they’ve not yet been released.

 

I’m hoping to see the Light of Passage matinee on 22 October before Mayerling but doubt I’ll be able to get my rail tickets until a day or two beforehand.

[Jan McNulty]

1 hour ago, JohnS said:

 
If only that were possible but Avanti isn’t releasing tickets for weekend travel until the Thursday or Friday beforehand and weekday tickets are released only a few days in advance. Some services are currently showing as ‘sold out’ but Penrith railway staff tell me they’ve not yet been released.

 

I’m hoping to see the Light of Passage matinee on 22 October before Mayerling but doubt I’ll be able to get my rail tickets until a day or two beforehand.

The joys of the West Coast Mainline!!

[Sim]

18 minutes ago, Jan McNulty said:

The joys of the West Coast Mainline!!

How can it be so hard to run a train line???  

[Jan McNulty]

34 minutes ago, Sim said:

How can it be so hard to run a train line???  

Exactly - I know all the trains are having issues but Avanti are so awful I believe they should have their franchise removed with immediate effect.  I feel very sorry for the staff who probably feel the full brunt of passenger dissatisfaction.

[AnneL]

On 02/10/2022 at 20:57, MJW said:

 

For similar reasons, that's why I have booked for the rehearsal on Tuesday 17th (£20 ticket for a decent seat)

Me too!

[JNC]

I can see the benefit of a shorter evening, it could facilitate those not living in London getting a train home rather than staying overnight, if this is 1.5 hours it means people probably will be able to catch the last train back north etc (usually around 9.30pm I think?). 
 

On the flip side, travel and expense incurred for one hour of ballet at similar ticket prices (and you may save a hotel but train prices will be with the same) to a full evening of ballet (usually at least two hours or more, either split across two roughly one hour acts like Giselle or even for shorter triple bills with two intervals you generally get around 2.5 hours overall including intervals) means unless you’re really keen it’s tricky to justify the expense, particularly for a new work you’re not sure you would want to see. 
 

It should either have been priced accordingly, or another one act added on - as someone suggested if Pite really didn’t want to share the bill

 how about one of her other works (something not performed in London before to entice?) or another contemporary work. 
 

also without being overly critical it’s not even a fully new work, given it’s a reworking/addition to Flight Pattern! So it’s almost not quite even world premiere (I appreciate it probably is on the balance of things but it does feel a little fudge). 

 

I’m not sure if she did dictate she wished this to be performed alone but if it did, that really shouldn’t have allowed to happen. 

[MAX]

Regarding the number of tickets sold I think the fact that Flight Pattern is mainly a group piece does not help.

[jmhopton]

10 hours ago, alison said:

Trouble is that rail tickets have to be booked weeks, if not months, in advance.

Alison,  that used to be the case but as one of those people currently at the mercy of Avanti West Coast, I am still waiting to hear when I can actually book my return ticket back to Preston on Oct 22nd after Vadim's first night. Also, I currently can't book at all for my journey on Oct 29/30 to see Matthew and Laura. There is currently no booking between 22-30th Oct, and is this half term week? I registered for their alerts system but if its anything like last time I won't be able to book until less than a week beforehand. 

Ridiculous!

Sorry, hadn't seen JohnS reply when I did mine. Fellow sufferers! 

I can only hope Avantis franchise isn't renewed. I think its due this month.  Bring back Virgin!

Edited October 4, 2022 by jmhopton
Add info.

[Kate_N]

8 hours ago, jmhopton said:

Bring back Virgin!

 

And that's SAYING something - Virgin were pretty terrible in the first place. It once took me from 7pm to 5am to get home Euston-Lancaster. And another time it was 8 hours from Birmingham to Lancaster.

[The Sitter In]

Quote

I’m genuinely intrigued as to how you can have half a star. Either they’re a star or they are not?  Is it just the dancer’s face, shoulders (epaulement) and arms? Or the legs? 😂 It’s fair enough to have exacting standards but if the dancer can’t be a star in all his or her roles, or in all aspects of the dancing, then they’re by definition surely not in one’s opinion a star. If it’s a student, child or character artist, they most definitely can be a star, although admittedly rare for a student and even rarer for a child. 

 

The dancer I have in mind is technically highly accomplished but neither moves me nor offers any particular insight into character.  I think it comes from them thinking they are a different type of dancer from what they actually are.  I disagree that you can be a star in some roles and not others…some don’t suit, but that doesn’t detract from their underling star quality.

Regarding your comment re. Monotones, I simply chose it as something that requires no set and only six dancers…I agree, it would sit oddly alongside the Pite, but then the days of stimulating and contrasting triple bills are also long dead at the RB and meat for another discussion thread.

[bridiem]

I think that most of the RB principals have star quality; a few are full-blown stars in the sense that they have fully realised their potential and have also received international recognition (though that doesn't of course mean that they aren't still growing and evolving). Others will achieve that status in time. Some have a quieter star quality that may never quite gain them the same level of international recognition, but it's star quality nonetheless. At any rate, Flight Pattern (and so I assume Light of Passage) requires dancers who are prepared to allow their light to be diffused so that the body of dancers can blaze forth together.

[The Sitter In]

I’m afraid I disagree wholeheartedly bridiem - I don’t subscribe to the ‘everyone’s a winner’ philosophy of life in any way.  If all the RB principals are stars, then it will be for the first time ever, anywhere.  The reality is that ballet companies have a majority of OK dancers who come and go - only look at rosters from, say, 30 years ago and I defy most people to know more than a couple of names.  As for the RB, no, at present, it is very light on true talents of the art form.  No-one’s fault, but nice, polite dancing and doing what you are told to do a true étoile do not make… sorry.

[Emeralds]

If any members have a petition or something that needs signatures calling for improvement to Avanti’s train service, I would be very happy to sign it or publicise it!  I remember having Virgin Trains on some routes, and some were not the best, but others were surprisingly great when I used them. It annoys me that the company are doing such a terrible job as not only is it extremely inconvenient and stressful for residents that need it, but for those who end up driving because it’s unreliable, it’s not only expensive but more polluting and increases road congestion for everyone, when a decent rail service could have avoided all that.

 

Fingers crossed they either get their act together or the franchise is given to someone else. (But I will sign a petition too!) Fingers crossed for JohnS, Jmhopton and everyone else who is using it to come for RB/BRB/ENB & other performances. 🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀

 

Jmhopton, yes, 22-30 Oct is half term (or rather, it is in my borough). 

[Emeralds]

20 hours ago, JNC said:

I can see the benefit of a shorter evening, it could facilitate those not living in London getting a train home rather than staying overnight, if this is 1.5 hours it means people probably will be able to catch the last train back north etc (usually around 9.30pm I think?). 
 

On the flip side, travel and expense incurred for one hour of ballet at similar ticket prices (and you may save a hotel but train prices will be with the same) to a full evening of ballet (usually at least two hours or more, either split across two roughly one hour acts like Giselle or even for shorter triple bills with two intervals you generally get around 2.5 hours overall including intervals) means unless you’re really keen it’s tricky to justify the expense, particularly for a new work you’re not sure you would want to see. 
 

It should either have been priced accordingly, or another one act added on - as someone suggested if Pite really didn’t want to share the bill

 how about one of her other works (something not performed in London before to entice?) or another contemporary work. 
 

also without being overly critical it’s not even a fully new work, given it’s a reworking/addition to Flight Pattern! So it’s almost not quite even world premiere (I appreciate it probably is on the balance of things but it does feel a little fudge). 

 

I’m not sure if she did dictate she wished this to be performed alone but if it did, that really shouldn’t have allowed to happen. 

I think while we can all add up the numbers of minutes and try to predict what the new section will be like by assuming it is the same as Flight Pattern, only more of it, the fact is we have no idea what the whole thing will be like at all. 

 

The closest example I can suggest is when MacMillan made his full length Anastasia in 1971 after creating Anastasia Act 3 (which of course was called just “Anastasia” at the premiere) for the Deutsche Oper Berlin before that. There were probably discussions like ours here - “how can he create a whole evening of more dark and bleak emoting?”, “how can that fill an entire evening?”, etc. The first two acts couldn’t be more different from the one act he made earlier!  (You could argue he shouldn’t have bothered to extend it, or you could say you don’t like any of it at all, but you can’t deny that Acts 1 & 2 are nothing like the last section that was created first.)

 

Even if we think we can predict the ballet because it’s the same symphony, we can’t guess what Pite will do with it. If I had seen only her multi-award winning  Betroffenheit and nothing else of hers before booking Flight Pattern, I’d probably have refused to watch Flight Pattern at all.....lol. (Even though I do agree Betroffenheit is powerful and remarkable.) 

 

I would add that I did complain before (and after) watching ENB’s Forsythe Evening at Sadler’s Wells in April about the cancellation of Approximate Sonata from the programme with nothing to replace it (not even a brief pas de deux or solo), feeling that Playlist (EP) and Blake Works I were too short and light to constitute a full show. (Even if they are very outstanding examples of short and light ballets!)

 

After watching the programme (twice), it did indeed look and feel too short, given that other companies that premiered those works combined them with ballets that lasted longer than an hour of total dance -Playlist (EP) was premiered by Boston Ballet while the shorter initial Playlist (Track 1,2) had been premiered by ENB a few years earlier, while BW 1 was a Paris Opera production. As both are plotless, upbeat works, they do feel much too short and one-track as a full programme, as though it were a finale and middle that was missing an opener, or an opener and finale missing a contrasting middle piece.

 

I’m not terribly keen either on how short some orchestral concerts are nowadays (the recent BBC Proms had some shows that were just 50 minutes, and it wasn’t just one person singing or playing nonstop). 

 

I am in favour of Pite presenting her show like this though, as nobody has actually seen the finished work yet (even dancers and repetiteurs at rehearsals won’t know what the effect of the  finished product will be like until the costumes, sets, lighting, musicians and singer come together).

 

I’d rather have a short but effective ballet that works and produces a powerful impact, than an overly long piece with padding added to it “to stretch it out to at least 90 minutes of dance on stage” and people feeling, “oh dear- that went on far too long”. I know of too many long theatre, musical or dance works that dragged on and really needed pruning, where our quips afterwards of “well that was value for money” was actually a polite way of saying “Grr- 2 hours of my life I’ll never get back!” (and a couple of friends did actually say those exact words).

 

I doubt very much that she insisted or even requested that nothing else be combined with her ballet- my guess is that she said “As a response to events that are happening in the world right now, I would like to make a full length ballet or show that builds on Flight Pattern” and Kevin O’Hare’s response was   something like, “Go for it- 6 dates will be all yours” and that was that.

 

Before she made Flight Pattern, the Royal Ballet dancers - some of whom obviously weren’t even picked to be in the ballet - were abuzz and very excited to have her create something on the company. And whether or not viewers are fans of her work, Pite is very much a dancer’s choreographer-like Alexei Ratmansky, she has a great rapport with the dancers she works with whether the company is small, medium or large, and dancers are often very keen to have her back to create more works. 

 

I would be happy for the work to have another piece or pieces added subsequently if the end result looked like it would benefit from a companion piece/pieces on a mixed bill. But it may be that like Bejart’s L’Heure Exquise that Alessandra Ferri and Carsten Jung recently performed at ROH, it may end up being short yet best not added to. 

Edited October 5, 2022 by Emeralds

[bridiem]

1 hour ago, The Sitter In said:

I’m afraid I disagree wholeheartedly bridiem - I don’t subscribe to the ‘everyone’s a winner’ philosophy of life in any way.  If all the RB principals are stars, then it will be for the first time ever, anywhere.  The reality is that ballet companies have a majority of OK dancers who come and go - only look at rosters from, say, 30 years ago and I defy most people to know more than a couple of names.  As for the RB, no, at present, it is very light on true talents of the art form.  No-one’s fault, but nice, polite dancing and doing what you are told to do a true étoile do not make… sorry.

 

Well we'll just have to agree to disagree about the quality of the current RB principals! (And indeed those of 30 years ago.) But regardless of who should or should not be called a 'star', as far as I'm concerned if you reach principal rank at the RB, you're a winner.

[JohnS]

Astonishingly some good news from Avanti. My ticket alert for 15/16 October was triggered and I’ve been able to book rail tickets. Looking forward to double Mayerling and the Sunday morning Friends event.

[bridiem]

3 minutes ago, JohnS said:

Astonishingly some good news from Avanti. My ticket alert for 15/16 October was triggered and I’ve been able to book rail tickets. Looking forward to double Mayerling and the Sunday morning Friends event.

 

Great news!

[Emeralds]

14 minutes ago, JohnS said:

Astonishingly some good news from Avanti. My ticket alert for 15/16 October was triggered and I’ve been able to book rail tickets. Looking forward to double Mayerling and the Sunday morning Friends event.

Wow! So four leaf clovers do work after all! 🍀😁 That’s fantastic, JohnS! 

[San Perregrino]

I’ve just found my cast list for Body & Soul at the Paris Opera Ballet from October 2019. The running time is:

Act I: 30 mins

Interval: 20 mins 

Act II: 27 mins

Pause

Act III: 17 mins

 

Before viewing there was a sense of being “short-changed” as I had previously only attended the longer narrative ballets or triple bills in Paris. However, my memory tells me that this was a complete evening in itself with plenty to enjoy and marvel at and much to process and reflect on afterwards. With hindsight there was no need (or even ‘space’ on my head) for another other work to precede or follow it. Again i think that initial reviews were mixed as can be the case when something new is staged, but subsequent performances and the recent revival sold out quickly. 
I have liked and been moved by the original Flight Pattern such that I am excited to see how this work has evolved.

Here’s wishing that Light of Pattern is another success for Crystal Pite and everyone involved.

Edited October 8, 2022 by PeterS

[Jan McNulty]

I was at The Lowry last night watching Aakash Odedra's Samara.  The performance lasted 65 minutes.  I absolutely did not feel short changed.  Let's hope that Light of Passage has the same effect on people.

[Guest oncnp]

Casting is on the website

 

Light of Passage (roh.org.uk)

 

18 Oct, 22 Oct, 1 Nov, 3 Nov

Kristen McNally, Marcelino Sambé, Madison Bailey, Calvin Richardson, Luca Acri, Benjamin Ella, Ashley Dean, Joseph Sissens, Isabel Lubach, Matthew Ball, The Company

 

19 Oct, 22 Oct, 27 Oct

Ashley Dean, Luca Acri, Amelia Townsend, Lukas B. Brændsrød, Liam Boswell, Joshua Junker, Nadia Mullova-Barley, Francisco Serrano, Hannah Grennell, Harry Churches, The Company

Edited October 11, 2022 by oncnp

[San Perregrino]

1 hour ago, oncnp said:

Casting is on the website

 

Light of Passage (roh.org.uk)

 

18 Oct, 22 Oct, 1 Nov, 3 Nov

Kristen McNally, Marcelino Sambé, Madison Bailey, Calvin Richardson, Luca Acri, Benjamin Ella, Ashley Dean, Joseph Sissens, Isabel Lubach, Matthew Ball, The Company

 

19 Oct, 22 Oct, 27 Oct

Ashley Dean, Luca Acri, Amelia Townsend, Lukas B. Brændsrød, Liam Boswell, Joshua Junker, Nadia Mullova-Barley, Francisco Serrano, Hannah Grennell, Harry Churches, The Company

 

as the General Rehearsal and Opening performance are on the same day, will they both be danced by the same cast i wonder?

[Emeralds]

10 hours ago, PeterS said:

 

as the General Rehearsal and Opening performance are on the same day, will they both be danced by the same cast i wonder?

For the classics or an established production the general rehearsal dancers have often been the second or third cast (whichever has the most people making debuts) but for premieres it’s often been the first cast. Not sure which they’ll pick if the show is half old half new! 

Edited October 11, 2022 by Emeralds

[JNC]

I don’t know if this was sent to everyone or just Friends (email isn’t clear) but it appears they are discounting all amphitheater seats to £15 for the 19th October performance. 
 

I don’t know if I’m allowed to but I am happy to share the code if anyone was on the fence but felt they couldn’t afford it. 

Edited October 14, 2022 by JNC

[Beryl H]

I've just bought one in an old favourite amphi seat that I can no longer afford, £15 instead of £37 not bad, and I would only want to see the second cast anyway. 

[alison]

Ooh, I should be in town that day for work anyway ...

[MJW]

Bit of a shame it has been felt necessary to offer discounts but I suppose it's better that than an array of empty seats.

 

 

[San Perregrino]

13 hours ago, JNC said:

I don’t know if this was sent to everyone or just Friends (email isn’t clear) but it appears they are discounting all amphitheater seats to £15 for the 19th October performance. 
 

I don’t know if I’m allowed to but I am happy to share the code if anyone was on the fence but felt they couldn’t afford it. 

I haven’t received a Friends email with this offer. On the ROH website it says the amphi is off-sale to the public, only available to Young Opera House members…

 

19 OCTOBER 2022

WEDNESDAY, 7.30PM

TICKETS IN THE AMPHITHEATRE ARE ONLY AVAILABLE TO YOUNG ROH MEMBERS

[Guest oncnp]

31 minutes ago, PeterS said:

I haven’t received a Friends email with this offer. On the ROH website it says the amphi is off-sale to the public, only available to Young Opera House members…

 

19 OCTOBER 2022

WEDNESDAY, 7.30PM

TICKETS IN THE AMPHITHEATRE ARE ONLY AVAILABLE TO YOUNG ROH MEMBERS

 

Mine came from the box office with no mention of the Friends.  Perhaps they sent it to those who haven't booked for it at all?  

 

You have to put the code into the "How Would You like to Select Your Seats" page at the bottom and the amphi seats (a lot of them) came up. 

Edited October 15, 2022 by oncnp

[bridiem]

37 minutes ago, oncnp said:

 

Mine came from the box office with no mention of the Friends.  Perhaps they sent it to those who haven't booked for it at all?  

 

You have to put the code into the "How Would You like to Select Your Seats" page at the bottom and the amphi seats (a lot of them) came up. 

 

I'm a Friend and haven't booked for it and I didn't get an email. ?

[Mary]

I'm a Friend - sadly not a Young Friend- and I hadn't booked, and I did get the email...

 

 

[JNC]

I haven’t booked for it, I’m a Friend but not Young ROH (which is 25 and under)?

 

odd some friends have received and others haven’t. 
 

I imagine if sales don’t pick up we may see the discount extended. Perhaps they are hopeful of good press reviews that will attract people to the later dates? But given the 19th is only one day after opening reviews won’t have had enough time to affect sales on that date?

[Emeralds]

19 hours ago, JNC said:

I don’t know if this was sent to everyone or just Friends (email isn’t clear) but it appears they are discounting all amphitheater seats to £15 for the 19th October performance. 
 

I don’t know if I’m allowed to but I am happy to share the code if anyone was on the fence but felt they couldn’t afford it. 

Fab! Yes please, JNC.

Sounds like they are offering unsold seats that had been reserved for Young ROH Friends for other Friends.

 

The problem with cordoning off a section for Friends by age is that

a) it’s not a convenient date for university/college age members-university & college age students have just started terms and those who are out of London won’t be able to travel there and back home in time for lectures/class the next day.

b) Many London students will be feeling the pinch of rising food, utilities and travel costs in the capital/within Zone 1-5 and may be apprehensive about spending so early in the year when power and food bills might be unaffordable by January, while Covid measures and Brexit have drastically reduced the numbers of affluent international students in the capital,

c) most school age young members have not started half term yet, so it’s a school night during an important year (they will be GCSE to A level age)

That’s not a lot of working or affluent Young Friends in the southeast left to draw from, who just happen to have nothing else to do on Wednesday night! 

 

And the problem of cordoning off an entire seating section - which I have never agreed with way back when they did it for Woolf Works and other premieres - is that it creates a discrimination problem: Young Friends who want/have to go with family or friends who are older than the cut off age (who are willing to pay full price), or buddies who are interested/encouraged to see this premiere but don’t have the time or money to join as a Young Friend, can’t buy tickets for their family/friends together so they get left out - and the exclusion may cheese them off so much that they don’t book at all (which current sales certainly don’t disagree with). Does the marketing head really think it’s clever practice to sell a premiere by forcing their Friends members to be separated from the rest of their party? 

 

If you put off groups of three or four from attending (that’s a lot of seats), that’s very poor marketing practice. Why not just have a policy that says “All Young Friends get X% discount at all performances” or “Young Friends get tickets at a reduced price of £Z?” Do they think Young Friends don’t know how to behave at ROH and must be corralled into one section like naughty children? What’s with this “seating apartheid”? All the young people in my family and circle of friends attend the theatre with older family members, or if they go without older relatives, their peer groups often have older friends (eg mature students at university). 

 

The less than stellar ticket sales this season are not solely due to cost of living rises or lack of interest/support from audiences, and certainly isn’t due to the quality of performances (which have been outstanding), but are partly (yet significantly) due to poor marketing decisions.

 

In pre Covid times, the premieres of contemporary works (McGregor, Schecter, Pite) were often priced with all top price seats in the Orchestra Stalls, Stalls Circle and Grand Tier reduced down to the same price as the top Balcony Circle price, and the Ampitheatre pricing slightly lower than normal triple bill prices. I remember watching the premiere of Chroma from the Grand Tier (not an area I regularly  purchase) because it was a similar price to my usual (cheaper) seats at the time. (Well worth it!)

 

If you only manage to sell 90 seats priced at £100 (and have to give the rest away as comps), you have earned £5000 less than selling 200 seats priced at £70, so keeping the prices high is a false economy. That’s bearing in mind that a top price of £70 is still out of reach for some, yet affordable for many regulars and fans for whom £105 or £100 is impossible. 

 

I paid my usual prices in my usual seating area because I like Pite’s work and ethos, and am willing to pay significantly more than £15 to see her work presented at Covent Garden, whether or not this new iteration turns out to be a success or not a success, than to save my money and not have her back at all. That’s my personal choice. However, if I were pricing the seats, I would not assume that people think like me but instead consider what would actually sell and at a price that ensures as high as possible returns. 

Edited October 15, 2022 by Emeralds