"En Pointe Insights" - The BALLET NIGHTS Autumn Season Blog 2023

[Jamiel Devernay-Laurence]

 

www.BalletNights.com

 

 

En Pointe Insights

with

Steven McRae

 

You were the first headline artist that we approached about the relaunch of BALLET NIGHTS with our Autumn Season 2023. What was it about the project that stood out for you most and why did you choose to join us at our launch?

 

I am always passionate about spreading our art form further, and I was instantly drawn to the energy of the team behind BALLET NIGHTS and their desire to attract and to appeal to new audiences. I also saw it as an incredible platform to start exploring ideas of my own, and those two factors were a very simple reason for me to say yes!

 -

BALLET NIGHTS is a new start-up with an entrepreneurial mindset at its core. You are already known for achieving a business degree and master’s alongside your fulltime career as a Principal dancer at The Royal Ballet, and so what is it about the structure of BALLET NIGHTS that you're interested in from that perspective?

 

Well, I love the idea that everybody behind BALLET NIGHTS is thinking a little bit outside the box and are approaching these series of performances in a different and complimentary way to a more traditional format. Rather than just relying on word of mouth, the team are going out there and reaching beyond the typical circles that go and watch dance, while taking care not alienating the people who are the traditional fanbase. Creating a platform that is thinking of new ways to excite ballet audiences and invite them to buy tickets for the further dance programmes of associated artist goes down to marketing – and I'm obsessed with that - Learning and trying to understand more about what it is that audiences really want and we find that balance of challenging them with new ideas but not pushing them away. I feel that the team behind BALLET NIGHTS are fully aware of this and are doing absolutely everything to branch out as strong as they possibly can.

 -

From tap shoes, surprise guests and featuring live musicians on stage, BALLET NIGHTS is thrilled to welcome your creativity to all 3 of the programmes in our Autumn Season. Why have you chosen to perform these works?

 

BALLET NIGHTS for me is really an opportunity for audiences to have a taste of different voices from our art form, and our art form is the world of dance. I see dance as all styles, and for me is just one word that encapsulates everything, so I've never seen myself as a ballet dancer or a tap dancer or a musical theatre dancer. I'm just a dancer and when I have an opportunity to have another voice of mine heard I want to explore that opportunity to its full potential. Putting the ballet shoes aside and donning my tap shoes for an event like this does not mean putting aside ballet, and I tend to amalgamate the styles into my own unique voice. Having those complimentary opportunities away from the mainstage of the Royal Opera House to explore and still enjoy those other forms of dance is so vital for me.

- 

BALLET NIGHTS is that complementary platform where audiences can go when they aren’t at the Opera House or Sadler’s Wells and experience dance in a different way to what they get on those main stages. One of the things about the format is that alongside telling a narrative story through the dancing, we are also telling the story of the dancers performing. What will you be telling us and what is your story?

 

When they're given the opportunity, dancers are very good at sharing their own stories and what I think you'll see at BALLET NIGHTS it's that chance for all of those individual artists to explore another sides to themselves on stage, aided by the compère, the BALLET NIGHTS Podcast and the behind the scenes moments shared online before and after.

My own story through dance was one of unknowns. I didn't know you could have a career in dance and I didn't know it was a something that you could do for a job until I was 16 years old - and I still have kind of held on to that unknown world as I've developed. Throughout my career I have always tried to keep myself open to the multiple opportunities and possibilities that exist with dance, and I think that's what you really experience and witness when you watch BALLET NIGHTS.

-

 

You can watch Steven perform up close and without compromise in the BALLET NIGHTS Autumn Season 2023

TICKETS

 

Sign up to receive our En Pointe Insights blog, The Ballet Nights Podcast and more, here:

EXCLUSIVE ACCESS