Royal Ballet's Rehearsals of Marguerite and Armand.and The Dream

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I skipped class on Wednesday night to watch the live streaming of rehearsals for two of the ballets in the Royal Ballet's Ashton triple bill of Marguerite and Armand. Symphonic Variations and The Dream at Covent Garden. The programme will only appear between the 2 and 10 June and all but two of the performances are already sold out. However, it will be streamed live to cinemas in the United Kingdom and elsewhere on 7 June thereby providing welcome relief from this already very depressing general election campaign.

Being very long in the tooth I know all three works very well and love them very much.

I shall always associate The Dream with Dame Antoinette Sibley who is my all time favourite ballerina by a country mile (see Sibley 17 Dec 2013) and her noble partner Sir Anthony Dowell  and visions of them in the reconciliation scene rush to mind causing me to forget whatever I am doing whenever I hear Mendelssohn's glorious score (see the RAD's tribute to Dame Antoinette on YouTube and if you have any heart I defy you to keep a dry eye). I remember hearing it in Leeds in the next rehearsal studio as our teacher patiently gave instructions for an enchainment which completely washed over me as I listened to the music.

Almost as dear to me is Marguerite and Armand in which I saw Nureyev dance with Fonteyn whom I also loved and admired (see Margot Fonteyn 18 May 2015). Fonteyn was also one of the original dancers in Symphonic Variations along with Moira Shearer, Pamela May, Michael Somes, Brian Shaw and Henry Danton. Although it was first staged even before my time Somes and Shaw were still dancing when I first took an interest in ballet. Danton was the only one I missed even though - ironically and praise is - he is still very much with us.

Those ballets are the very finest examples of Ashton's work which is discussed in a talk by Prof. Stephanie Jordan that you can hear in the above video. Also in the video is a Q & A by Kevin O'Hare, Lesley Collier, yet another all-time favourite ballerina and the gracious Zenaida Yanowsky. 43 minutes and 29 seconds into that session Yanowsky demonstrated the famous "Fred Step". The reason I know that timing so precisely is that I have been practising the Fred Step. There are two lovely rehearsals in the film. One by Yanowsky as Marguerite and Gary Avis as Armand's father in the scene where Armand's dad warns Marguerite to stay away from his boy. The other is Francesca Hayward and Marcelino Sambé in the quarrel scene over the changeling boy and the reconciliation. They are nothing like Sibley and Dowell but I think they are just as beautiful in the way they interpret this work.  At the end of the Marguerite and Armand rehearsal, Avis said some lovely things about Yanowsky which made me admire both of them even more than I already did. The whole video is presented and moderated by Alexander Campbell who did a really first class job.

I have said enough, ladies and gentlemen.  I will leave you to watch this gorgeous video.

Swan Lake in Paris - A Christmas Eve Treat

Karl Paquette, Myriam Ould-Braham and Mathias Heymann

Photo Helen McDonough
(c) 2016 Helen McDonough: all rights reserved
Reproduced with kind permission of the author

Paris Opera Ballet, Swan Lake Opera Bastille, 24 Dec 2016

Here is the New Year treat I promised you. My fellow blogger and ballet goer, Helen McDonough, who tweets as @Scarfie1, went to Paris for Christmas. While there she attended the Paris Opera's performances of Swan Lake which she agreed to review for us.  I think you will agree she has done a very good job.

"On Christmas Eve I set out from Manchester Airport for Paris although the aeroplane did try to hamper this by requiring a wheel change which delayed me by 3 hours! However, I eventually got to Paris in good time for 2 performances of Swan Lake.

The Paris Opera Swan Lake is choreographed by Nureyev after Petipa and Ivanov and after watching 2 performances you can really see his stamp on it for reasons which will become clear.

Act 1 opens with the Prince asleep on a throne played by the very elegant Mathias Heymann. While the Prince dreams, Rothbart (Karl Paquette) appears at the rear of the stage in a large cape which he sweeps over Odette who has been dancing towards the back of the stage, turns her into a swan and makes off with her.   It is not clear who danced Odette's steps in this prologue as Myriam Ould-Braham is not due on stage for some time yet! The dramatic scene has Rothbart in black and Odette in white being lifted high up into the fly area.

 Rothbart then reappears as the tutor to the Prince (who makes a habit of whispering to the Prince throughout). With the Prince now awake the corps de ballet appear on stage and perform several ensemble dances.  There follows a lovely solo for the Prince and then a Pas de Trois for him with some of his lady friends.

 Mathias Heymann is a beautiful dancer to watch: one of those men with exquisite line and movement and lovely hands/fingers.

 I personally found the corps de ballet a little ragged at points but what I found very refreshing was that Nureyev has decided to employ the male element of the corps quite heavily in Act 1 - and Act 3 for that matter. It was a real “dancer’s ballet” for the men if you see what I mean!

 Over and over through this ballet one sees geometric formations. A lot of work in groups of 4 and 6 went on. For example, with the men the front 4 at the front right of a group would move out of the main group of 16 and move across the stage and then the next group of 4 would follow until all 4 groups of 4 had move around whichever way required etc... There were also joint male and female dances as well in Act 1. At times the large Bastille stage looked a tad overcrowded!

The jewel in this performance’s crown (never mind just Act 1) was the Pas de Trois. I give you Francois Alu! Wowzer! What an amazing dancer! Not since I saw Ivan Vasiliev explode onto the stage in Don Quixote with the Bolshoi years ago, or saw ENB’s young Cesar Corrales in Le Corsaire as Ali, have I been this trilled by a dancer. He was ably partnered by lovely Leonore Baulac and Hannah O'Neill. Both of whom are great to watch but Francois Alu really stole the PdT in my eyes! His circle of 12 tours en l'air had each one as exact as the next right to the end. No slacking. He put his own stamp on the turns as he had one leg slightly straighter. It  looked really difficult to do. His other jumps and cabrioles were similarly high and powerful. He was on fire! I am so pleased I got to see him as it was totally unexpected! He danced again in Act 3 in the Czardas which was great too.

In this version there is no interval between Act1 and 2 (great) so we moved swiftly on to Act 2 where Odette appears and meets the Prince. The mime was good and I could see it clearly even from my eagle’s nest of a seat! Ould-Braham has lovely soft arms, but I did not get much emotion – I think because I was so far away in this huge theatre! However, the “piece de resistance” were the swans:-

Corps de Ballet

Photo Helen McDonough

(c) 2016 Helen McDonough: all rights reserved
Reproduced with kind permission of the author 

Corps de Ballet

Photo Helen McDonough

(c) 2016 Helen McDonough: all rights reserved
Reproduced with kind permission of the author 

I especially adored the choreography for the swans. I was seated in the 2nd tier - so very very high up – but it was the perfect place to see all the details of the choreography and detailed it was. There were 32 swans at times on the stage and it was sight to savour – thankfully Paris Opera Ballet utilise proper “pancake” tutus so all the better for effect. The swans entered the stage very much like the Shades in La Bayadere as they snaked across and down the stage to form their bolt straight lines. The swans were really well “together”, moving as one with lines so straight and moves so well executed that there can only be the Mariinsky that is better when it comes to swans, in my humble opinion. The swans moved as if on air around the stage going from a circle to a pointed V moving forward towards the audience. 

Then they would divide up into groups and make 4 smaller Vs with the points to the middle of the stage so making a square and then they moved again into another shape - I was totally immersed in this geometry and symmetry! Quite how Nureyev managed this I do not know – genius perhaps?

The 4 cygnets were danced very competently and were followed by the 4 big swans doing their piece – all really lovely.

I’m afraid I am not well versed enough to say much about Ould-Braham and Heymann other than that they were very good as you would expect from Etoiles of the POB! My attention was 100% absorbed with the swans! 

 Ending Act 2 though the Prince swore his love to Odette as per usual....

After the single interval we moved on to Act 3 and all the national dances and a Queen desperate for her son to marry.

The dances were very nice and well danced but none of them particularly stood out for me. Rothbart dances a solo piece just before the Prince and Odile do their fireworks so that altered the flow of the story for me a little bit BUT on the plus side it made good use of Rothbart (see more male dancing - Nureyev’s touch?). This allowed Karl Paquette to show that he still has what it takes.  

Miriam Ould-Braham did her 32 fouettes although I found that she did travel quite a bit across the stage if I am being picky, and her "error" was to do a double right at the end, after having done singles, so she landed a little untidily. Mathias Heymann whipped off his 16 turns perfectly and it was all quite the thrill to see. 

Once the Prince realises he has been duped when he sees the vision of the real Odette there was a brief pause and then Act 4 began. 

The fabulous swans returned to the stage and were just as amazing as before in Act 2 with their precise lines and wonderful patterns.

The ending is quite tragic as Odette throws herself off a cliff closely followed by Rothbart and the two of them go up to heaven whilst the Prince is left lying on the stage - I presume dead."

HELEN McDONOUGH

Helen also attended the Christmas day performance and has reviewed it for us.   I will publish it tomorrow.

My Visit to La Scala

The auditorium of La Scala, setting the stage for Swan Lake 28 June 2016

(c) 2016 Gita Mistry: all rights reserved

La Scala Theatre is one of the great opera houses of the world and its ballet company one of the world's finest (see Marinella Guatterini Ballet History). Carlotta Grisi trained at its ballet school as stars of our own times such as Carla Fracci, Alessandra Ferri and Roberto Bolle. I was very impressed by the young dancers in the Dutch National Ballet who had trained there such as Cristiano Principato and Emilie Tassinari. On Tuesday at the Gala for Alessia I saw for the first time, and made the acquaintance of, other young dancers who had trained at La Scala Ballet School who were dancing in Milan and Vienna and they impressed me too (see From Italy with Love 1 July 2016).

My time in Italy was very short so I did not have time to see any performances but I did manage to visit the Theatre Museum at La Scala. I had been there once before in 1974 before the theatre had been renovated. I was impressed then and was even more so now. Before my visit I had planned to explore the cathedral, Brera and the Theatre Museum but there was so much to see that there was barely time for anything else. All we could manage after our tour was the briefest of visits to the magnificent Duomo. Most of the exhibits in the Museum relate to the opera, the composers of the scores for the great operas and the singers who performed at La Scala but there are some real ballet treasures such as a fine portrait of Rudolf Nureyev.

However, the greatest treat was to enter the auditorium and watch the preparation of the stage for Thursday's performance of Swan Lake. This is Ratmansky's staging and is a co-production with Zurich Opera House. The stage is massive and so is the orchestra pit which must make it very difficult for the audience to see the dancers' faces even from the front row of the stalls. A box on the second and third levels might be better but one would be no closer than the front row of the amphitheatre in Covent Garden. For the folk in the gods the stage must seem as remote as the sea off St Anns at low tide.

The Author 29 June 2016

(c) 2015 Gita Mistry:
all rights reserved

That is of course beside the point. One comes to La Scala for history, tradition, excellence and the sense of occasion where all those things are to be found in abundance. You can see my sense of elation from my arabesque in the photo.

Milan is the second city of Italy as Manchester is the second city of the United Kingdom but the contrast between the two was palpable. The Victor Emanuel arcade with its Prada, Gucci and other premium retailers knocked Sr Ann's Square and Police Street into a cocked hat. Instead of a clanking tram there is a fast and frequent underground to most parts of the city. Fast, clean electric trains sped us from and to Trecate some 26 miles away in contrast to the noisy diesel that laboured back to Huddersfield from Manchester airport. Italy has had a glorious history ever since classical times, its art and architecture are everywhere and it is the first port of call for refugees and migrants from Africa yet I saw and heard none of the ugly calls "To Take Control" or "Get our Country Back" which erupted during and continue to fester as a result of out mean spirited and inglorious referendum campaign. In short, the journey back from Italy to post Brexit Britain was not just an 800 mile flight but a lurch back 50 years in time.

Paris Opera 2015 and 2016 Season

The Palais Garnier, also known as the Opéra Garnier 

Photo Svein-Magne Tunli Source Wikipedia

The Ballet of the Paris Opera is the oldest ballet company in the world.  Although it has had its ups and downs since its foundation in 1689 it is still somehow special. Something that every choreographer, dancer, teacher and student around the world acknowledges tacitly by continuing to use French terminology rather than English or even Russian. Yesterday I received an email from Paris with details of the new season.

There are three works in particular that I should like to see:

• Rudolf Nureyev's La Bayadère;
• Nureyev's Romeo and Juliet; and
• Giselle.

As I have mentioned before La Bayadère is not performed very often in this country (see La Bayadère 31 March 2015. The first time audiences in the West saw the show was when the Kirov brought it to Europe in 1961 and it was on this visit that Nureyev defected to the West. With the score adapted by John Lanchberry, sets by Ezio Frigerio, costumes by Franca Squarciapino and lighting by Vinicio Cheli, the website describes this productions as

"une fête pour les yeux, avec ses morceaux de bravoure et ses grands mouvements d'ensemble."

The production runs at the Opéra Bastille from 17 Nov to 31 Dec 2015.

Romeo and Juliet is another work that Nureyev knew in Russia. He introduced it to the Paris Opera in 1984. The website promises

"Dans les somptueux décors et costumes d'Ezio Frigerio et Mauro Pagano inspirés de la Renaissance italienne, il parvient à rendre le raffinement et la sensualité du drame élisabéthain, mais aussi toute sa cruauté."

This production also runs at the Bastille from the 19 March to 16 April 2016.

Giselle was first performed by the Ballet of the Paris Opera in 1841 so Paris is its home and that is why I want to see it there. This version was adapted from the original choreography of Coralli and Perrot by Patrice Bart (who worked very closely with Nureyev) and Eugene Polyakov. It will be danced at the Palais Garnier (the historic stage of the Paris Opera) from 27 May to 14 June 2016.

Several foreign companies will visit Paris in the new season including the English National Ballet. They will bring their version of Le Corsaire which I saw in Manchester on my birthday last year (see English National Ballet's Le Corsaire - a Valentine's Day Treat 16 Feb 2014). This is the only British company with that ballet in its repertoire and it will be interesting to see how a French audience receives it. If anyone wants to join me in supporting them while they are playing away they will be at the Garnier from 21 to 25 June 2016.