Why British ballet is dancing with death

[Bruce Wall]

Surely - and MOST crucially - the THREE resident choreographers at the Royal Ballet are ALL BRITISH BORN ... These are the people actually creating the dance.  That was NOT true of the days when BOTH Ashton and MacMillan were in operation regardless of how many British born dancers there may have been at the time. Ashton was, of course, BORN in Ecuador.  Indeed if Scotland separates then the UK will no longer be able to arguably claim MacMillan as their own given that he was BORN in Fife.  I note too that MacGregor has been consistent in his use of Ed Watson.  They are an excellent match which has proven most beneficial.  That surely is a positive to be applauded.

[Pas de Quatre]

I think Ribbons has a point - it is the way the ties between the company and the school seemed to be fading that worried many people.  Happily it seems the tide may be turning over the last couple of years.

[Bruce]

Things have not changed as much as some would have us think. In 1956, often considered a "golden age " for the RB, the line-up of ballerinas for Ashton's "Birthday Offering" was as follows: Fonteyn - English father but Brazilian/Irish mother. Nerina - South African. Fifield - Australian. Jackson - New Zealander. Beriosova - Lithuanian. Elvin - Russian. Grey - English. And come to that, de Valois herself was Irish.

Well said Wulff. I think the Empire, rightly or wrongly, has always seen us with a 'world view' and many of the best from around the world have seen London/UK as a 'happening' place in which to immerse themselves and train or whatever. It's clearly not the only way to run ballet companies but I think our culture is one of welcoming the worlds best.

 

I don't think it's that White Lodge don't train what they take in well enough so much as White Lodge students are to a degree up against the world, and not just the UK, in looking for places at the next level. And it can also be that those who travel around the world to train are that extra bit hungry. To get into a good company and then progress you don't just need to be very, very, very, very, very, good. That's normal and the best are better than that. It's a hard life but that is competition for you and many more are attracted to dancing then there are jobs. It's an age old question about giving jobs to your own or to the best.

[restor]

More in the Telegraph:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/theatre/dance/10054812/Bryony-Brind-foreign-ballet-dancers-risk-loss-of-British-quirks.html

 

Nothing is too good for the British taxpayer we want to see the best!   A pity the English style is so diluted now though -  perhaps there should be more engagement between companies and British ballet schools.

[Anna C]

Well this statement - IMHO - is nonsense: "We need to get more young British dancers encouraged like the Olympics did with young sportsmen and women by having more on stage. That way we'll get more of the Billy Elliots we want."

 

There is absolutely no shortage of prospective dancers - she'd only need to turn up at auditions for Vocational schools and Associate programmes to know that. There's no shortage of young British talent out there!

 

And don't even get me started on "Billy Elliotts"....

[Marieve]

Things have not changed as much as some would have us think. In 1956, often considered a "golden age " for the RB, the line-up of ballerinas for Ashton's "Birthday Offering" was as follows: Fonteyn - English father but Brazilian/Irish mother. Nerina - South African. Fifield - Australian. Jackson - New Zealander. Beriosova - Lithuanian. Elvin - Russian. Grey - English. And come to that, de Valois herself was Irish.

That's an interesting point but it does seem a little like splitting hairs to say that Margot Fonteyn couldn't be classed as British because she had a foreign parent.

 

Does this mean that young UK born dancers don't count as British dancers if one or both of their parents is foreign born?

 

(Just editing to say that I didn't mean that to come across as rude or argumentative - apologies if it does! Can be very hard to get the tone right when writing )

Edited May 14, 2013 by Marieve

[aileen]

London (and the UK) has long attracted talent in many fields of activity from all over the world. As Spanner says, there is no shortage of British children and young people aspiring towards a career in classical ballet (although there are far fewer boys and young men wanting such a career). The question is: are they less talented as a group (there will always be the outliers) than their foreign peers WHO SEEK TO COME TO THE UK TO TRAIN OR WORK or not? In the UK, not unreasonably, parents and the vocational schools try to keep a balance between academic studies, dance and other activities. There is a disapproval of hot-housing children. I suspect that overseas ballet takes precedence over everything else from a young age. I mentioned Marienela Nunez earlier. As she was dancing professionally at 14 her formal education must have (largely) stopped then, if not earlier. I rather suppose that many other foreign born dancers had little academic education after they started full-time training, but perhaps I'm wrong about this.

[Jan McNulty]

I think Kevin O'Hare has made one good point:

 

"The question about the Britishness of the dancers is a much bigger one; about access to dance education from an early age, training and funding.”  (I've put the bold in).

[Mayerling79]

I sort of agree with Janet on this. There is a good proportion of British and Commonwealth dancers both at the RB and the NB and Rupert/Lauren/Edward are a trio that i hugely respect and adore.

I think it is great that the RB brings in dancers from all over Europe and all over the world! Mix is a good thing and that's what makes a company so strong and able to radiate all over the world.

The energy, the creativity, the influencial exposure that is generated from this is considerable both for the dancers themselves and for us spectators.

[A frog]

You have to feel bad for the Royal Ballet, the right-wing papers are writing articles to bemoan that there aren't enough British dancers, the left-wing papers are writing articles to complain that there isn't enough diversity (which I suppose does mean British, just probably not the same kind of people Bryony Brind has in mind), in the end they just want to have the best dancers possible and are doing a rather good job at it.

Could anyone around here who has been watching the RB for a long time give their opinion on whether something had been lost in Ashton performances?
My two sources would be articles from Alistair Macaulay and Clement Crisp, I definitely recall the former stating La Fille for instance was definitely no longer performed how he remembered it from early performances, but it seemed to have more to do with the heritage and transmission being in his opinion not necessarily well managed, he was for instance worried about the consequences of the death of Alexander Grant.
I was initially going to write that Clement Crisp doesn't seem to write about the performances having lost something, but I'm not so sure anymore, he is definitely very effusive in his praise of Marianela Nunez in this repertoire.

[taxi4ballet]

At a time when the government is looking to cut funding for the arts everywhere it possibly can, is it a strange coincidence that there is a debate in the press about British dance schools not producing the type of dancer that the companies are looking for.

 

Am I being cynical, or will this result in cuts to funding for dance training?

[Dischuffed]

I think what has become very confused about this debate is the notion that one's nationality is somehow linked to one's ability to dance in what is called "the British style".  This seems to be a bogus assumption which one often comes across in discussions of many art forms.  For example, my husband (a pianist) learned from a Hungarian teacher at Juilliard who had learned from Bartok.  Does that mean he now plays in the Hungarian style?  No, he makes his own artistic decisions and hones his technique in a way which is informed by what he has learned.  Would his reaction be any different if he had Hungarian blood? Is it true that only Russian pianists can truly play in the Russian style because they have "the spirit/sense of Mother Russia in their blood...blah blah blah"?  Or could an English, French or German pianist who was taught by a long line of Moscow conservatoire graduates (which happens a LOT in western European and north American conservatoires) produce the same smooth, rubato effect?  Of course they could.

 

To say that only "British" dancers can dance in a particular style takes away from the equation any sense of agency and decision-making by the individual dancer.  Now I must say that I do not ever remember Ms Brind displaying the slightest intelligence as a dancer so maybe she was simply a vehicle for whatever training she had been given, but I would hope that the best dancers thoughtfully blend their training and role coaching with the choreography, the music and their own personal style and interpretation.  Given the international nature of the teaching staff at most major ballet schools and the coaching staff in companies nowadays, very little of this can be pinned down to a dancer's nationality.  This whole argument is based on a myth about "innate national characteristics" which is misinformed at best, and slightly sinister at worst.......

[Pas de Quatre]

I am not sure that it is just that nuances of the English Style have been lost, I think it is that the type of dancers and technical demands that have changed.  In Wayne Sleep's autobiography he says (I can't remember exactly which chapter) that it was considered vulgar to lift the legs higher than the shoulders - this was for circus performers.  The type of dancers in demand then were often more tightly knit physiques good for jumps & turns - and the famous changes of direction.  Epaulement & upper body use comes from training and is not so determined by physique but I do think dancers are often "flat" to the audience and I put this down to over-use of mirrors in training!

 

These days it is the high extension and ever longer lines that are sought after.  I have noticed that in many of the classics the music is play much slower to the point where sometimes it loses the musical phrasing!  So certainly I would agree that many of the nuances of "English training" have been lost, but technique has advanced.  The same debate is common in music circles, technique is more brilliant than it used to be, but the soul has been lost.

 

Was writing at the same time as you Dischuffed - would you husband agree with my last sentence?

[Dischuffed]

I agree that debate exists in relation to classical music Pas de Quatre, but again I think it is based on a false premise of a mysterious and timeless "soul" which never actually existed.  

 

In the same way that dance technique has changed and people regret the passing of "true" technique, so instruments have developed and in fact the kind of smooth, legato playing, which is often thought of as "soulful" now, would not even have been possible on the pianos which Bach, Beethoven and even Brahms were writing for - it was a creature of early 20th century recordings on modern pianos with sustain pedals which enabled performances to cross boundaries for the first time so people assumed this was what the music was always "meant" to sound like.  

 

I wonder whether ballets of the 50s and 60s - the era of the first decent quality filmings (I understand there are very few films of the 20s and 30s which are of a technical standard to enable the viewer to really see the movement quality) have come to be accepted as "the norm" so that some people think that is the "only" or "real" style of ballet and that everything else is an aberration?

 

In my view, the performing arts, because they are constantly reiterated by each new generation are, by their nature, not fixed and this constant harking back to a "true style" which has been lost is stifling for the art form.  I would agree with Sylvie Guillem that the RB was held back by this kind of thinking during the directorship of Monica Mason.  

 

As a footnote, I would add that in both music and ballet there is an interesting debate to be had about "historical performance practice", exploring how sound/movement would have been produced using the instruments/technique available at any particular era.  However, it is a very different thing to say that a style from an earlier era is the "right" one and that success or otherwise of a modern dancer/company should be defined by reference to that fixed standard.

[LinMM]

With regards only British dancers being able to do Ashton style etc definitely disagree with this....Nunez is wonderful in Fille and although Alexander Grant happens to be my favourite in that role I think other dancers are doing a good job etc. Anyway not sure if Grant was British anyway?!!! A true artist should be able to interpret different styles but each individual may be slightly stronger in particular styles than others no matter what the nationality.

[Ian Macmillan]

I think I've mentioned this before in some similar context - but, when training through the RAD and then Sadlers Wells School/RBS back in the 1950s, my wife assures me that she and others were quite capable of putting a leg by their ears but that any attempt to do so was firmly stamped upon.  What is standard, almost demanded, today was apparently not stylistically acceptable then - and I have to say that, as a belated newcomer to the artform, and used only to what I've seen in the last 10 years, I do find film from back then just a bit quaint.  So, happily, I'm quite relaxed about how things are done today and am sure that, thanks to Wayne McGregor et al, they'll be different again in another 10-20 years.

 

And do you have to be Korean to dance Gangnam Style?

[Pas de Quatre]

I think we all agree that today's dancers do not dance in the same way as those who originally performed the Ashton ballets.  I have never thought "English style" was a product of nationality, but rather of what was the "ideal" at that time in that place.  Ballet like everything else evolves.  The Royal Danish Ballet have a similar problem, how to keep the Bournonville repertoire alive and accurate, whilst at the same time embracing new choreographers and their works.

[Wulff]

This whole question of what constitutes British or English is, I reckon, a minefield best to be avoided. Is it simply a matter of where an individual or his/her parents were born (or naturalized), or does ethnicity play a part? As others have said, it is really a matter of training and performance style and technique, and those have changed over the years as they have done in all other branches of the performing arts. Listen to old recordings of orchestras and singers, for example, and the difference becomes immediately apparent. I recall that when I first saw the Bolshoi and RDB chainés were often performed by women on demi-pointe rather than full pointe, and in the RB it was rare to see a male dancer execute an arabesque at more than 45 degrees, and as for women performing more than triple supported pirouettes, this practice was considered un-English.

[aileen]

A related question, in relation to the RB and BRB, is whether their dancers, British and/or British trained, are able to perform successfully the body of work which is at the core of those two companies' repertoires namely the Ashton and MacMillan ballets. I felt that the RB did not look comfortable in Birthday Offering last year, and some have expressed concern about some of the RB performances of The Dream. I'm not quite sure what is meant by the "Ashton style" but I do know that the RB's recent performances looked laboured. If the current crop of dancers struggle with this type of work then this must be done to the type of dancer which the RB now prefers (tallish, strong, hyper-flexible and possibly slower) and/or training, whether in the UK or abroad.

[LinMM]

Maybe some dancers are just not suited to certain roles.....it's good that they try them out though but there must be someone in the company who suits Dream. I believe that Yuliana Lopatkina of the Maryyinski refuses to dance certain roles as she feels they just don't suit her and she is very tall for ballet(5ft 10ins)......if this is correct!! If the footwork is particularly quick is this harder for a taller person even at that level of training etc.?

[Jan McNulty]

That's well said Aileen!  I only started watching ballet in 1984 so I have never seen the golden age of, for example, Ashton when he was still alive.  I thought BRB gave some very fine performances of The Dream last year and I always adore the way they do Fille and Enigma but I couldn't say whether they do it in the true Ashton style.

 

PdQ's comment about the RDB was interesting.  I believe the Bournonville classes are still taught and I love what I think is the Bournonville style.

 

I've mentioned a particular performance before but will use it to try and illustrate.  Some years ago RDB performed Alicia Alonso's production of Don Q.  I know reviewers thought that it did not particularly suit the RDB style.  The night we saw it Joel Carreno and Anette Delgado from BNC were guesting and I had never realised just how different styles could be.  It worked well in that performance but I could see that Danish-trained dancers might struggle with Russian style bravura in the leading roles.

 

This must be a dilemma for companies all over the world where they are trying to maintain a heritage while also moving forward with something new and different.

[Jan McNulty]

Maybe some dancers are just not suited to certain roles.....it's good that they try them out though but there must be someone in the company who suits Dream. I believe that Yuliana Lopatkina of the Maryyinski refuses to dance certain roles as she feels they just don't suit her and she is very tall for ballet(5ft 10ins)......if this is correct!! If the footwork is particularly quick is this harder for a taller person even at that level of training etc.?

 

I would agree that some dancers are more suited to certain roles than others and also I agree with the comment that very quick footwork may be harder for a taller dancer.  Out of interest, would Kevin O'Hare have been thought of as a taller dancer?  To this day he is one of my favourite Oberons and he was always very fleet of foot in the scherzo - making it look so easy.

[JulieW]

I stood next to Kevin last summer and can't say I thought of him as tall ;-)

[balletla]

I think style is important and there are clear differences between russian and english style for example, which make the essence of them worth preserving. That is mostly separate to issues of physique and flexibility. However, one's ability to dance in a certain style is down to where you train, not your nationality although there is a huge overlap there obviously. Even if the foreign RB dancers do train at RBS, it is often only for a year before joining the company and that isn't long enough to assimilate the english style. 

 

There are some amazing dancers at RB but you can tell that they have a slightly different way of dancing.

[Sadielou]

Personally I think that it all comes down to the split between WL, the Upper School and the Company as up until very recently there was no love lost between these three establishments. There needs to a total re think and a merging, possibly with one person heading up all three, so all are working with a common goal. If a child has survived five years training at WL then they should, barring injury or lack of desire be guaranteed a place in the Upper section of the school, if not the only people to blame are those who have taught and moulded them for the past five years. As Bryony says, if the students are not up to the standard required then maybe the establishment should employ the audition process, teachers and methods of those that are. I do also think that the WL students are still cosseted in a very small environment and until they reach Upper school standard are still basically unaware of how much talent is out there, and how hungry some of the foreign students are, maybe the RB school should get some of their own dancers out into the world of competition, to give them more of a fighting chance in the years to come. This also seems to be exactly the case in most of our English football schools and their relevant clubs, come sixteen the boys that have trained solidly for the last 5 years are replaced by foreign students who in the managers eyes are better. Is it an English malaise that we always put our home grown talent down in preference for those taught elsewhere or are our children just not good enough ? It just can't be that we as a country are so much less talented than our foreign counterparts can it ?

[Jan McNulty]

"It just can't be that we as a country are so much less talented than our foreign counterparts can it ?"

 

Sadielou, that is a very thoughtful post.  The quote I have used above reminds me so much of a situation you see so often within government departments who would rather use very expensive consultants to tell them what their own staff could have told them at no extra cost.

 

Perhaps it is the case that the British, as a nation, seem to think that the grass is always greener elsewhere.  I certainly don't believe we are any less talented as a nation.

[Bruce Wall]

Sadielou you reminded me of something my mother, herself a judge, used to say:  'In England the concept of 'success' can often be seen as something rather dirty, much like 'filthy lucre'.  I had always thought this remark was, in and of itself, somewhat peculiar to her (as opposed, say, to the then popular verbiage emanating from Mrs. Thatcher and her kind).  From your well balanced comments, Sadielou, perhaps I was wrong in that perception.  Thank you for (i) reminding me and (ii) making me think.  

Edited May 15, 2013 by Meunier

[taxi4ballet]

I have always (possibly somewhat naively) assumed that the Royal Ballet School would be producing dancers trained in the Royal Ballet style, and would be exactly what the company would be looking for: ie: that the progression from school to company would be a natural one, and the expected outcome following years of training.

 

I'm puzzled to find that this isn't necessarily the case. If not, why not? I genuinely can't fathom it out.

[Bruce]

I have always (possibly somewhat naively) assumed that the Royal Ballet School would be producing dancers trained in the Royal Ballet style, and would be exactly what the company would be looking for: ie: that the progression from school to company would be a natural one, and the expected outcome following years of training.

 

I'm puzzled to find that this isn't necessarily the case. If not, why not? I genuinely can't fathom it out.

I'm not sure that it is correct to imply that RB routinely takes dancers in straight from other schools. Most years some RBS students get RB contracts. I don't think this can generally be said of students in other schools. Of course subsequent promotion within the company is a different thing (and much argued in itself).

[Dance*is*life]

One of the things missing from modern interpretations of Ashton's ballets for me is understatement and delicacy. Big and bold and over-the-top has eclipsed this. I watched Fille with Nadia Nerina a few weeks ago on youtube and the humour was so charming and understated and the acting in general was simply delightful. I rather felt sorry for poor silly Alain, rather than laughing uproariously at his antics, I smiled compassionately! Cinderella too - the original ugly sisters of Helpman and Ashton were real people rather than characatures from pantomime. For me this is what is missing. It's true that I don't like gymnastically high legs when they spoil the beauty of the lines, but I very much appreciate the advances in technique and do not bemoan the passing of the 60 degree arabesque etc. What I do find sad is this lack of quintessentially English understated quality, but perhaps I'm clinging on to something that doesn't really exist anymore?

[Jan McNulty]

Exactly DiL - understated is exactly what I like!  We've had some wonderful exponents of "understated" over the years at BRB and I hope that will continue for many years to come.  IN the acting stakes - less is definitely more!

[MAB]

They dance Fille very well in Paris; they see it from a different point of view but stay truer to the original than casts I've seen in London.  It is possible to put a personal stamp on a role without distorting the choreographer's ideas.

 

My great fear for ballet is that they will continue throwing their feet at the ceiling, endlessly posing and never getting out of first gear, the way the Russians are going (yes I know there are honourable exceptions, one is making her way to London), but is that really what modern audiences want to see?

If anyone watched that RT documentary about Oksana Skorik last week, they'll know exactly what I'm alluding to.

[Anna C]

Which documentary was that, MAB?