Houston Ballet

Houston Ballet's Centre for Dance

Author Marshall Strabala
Licence Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported

Although I sympathize with everybody in the USA who has been bereaved, injured, displaced, inconvenienced or in any way affected adversely by Hurricane Harvey and the subsequent flooding, I have a particular concern for Houston Ballet, its dancers and other staff. There are two reasons for my concern: the first is that this is an important company with close links to this country through its former artistic director Ben Stevenson; and, secondly, one of my favourite young dancers, Emilie Tassinari, has recently joined the company's corps de ballet. 

The pictures and press reports from Houston are horrendous.  According to the Houston Press, Houston's theatre district had taken a serious hit from the hurricane (see Natalie de la Garza Houston's Theater District Takes Serious Hit From Harvey 29 Aug 2017 Houston Press). One of the photos to Ms de la Garza's report shows flood waters lapping the walls of the company's studios. I see from the company's website that the company suffered a power outage and water damage and that its offices will be closed until after Labour Day which is a public holiday that falls on the first Monday of September and that it has had to cancel its opening performances of Poetry in Motion that was scheduled to start the new ballet season (see Hurricane Update, a message from Jim Nelson and Staunton Welch).

Although we have been spared weather as intemperate as Hurricane Harvey, we in Yorkshire know the damage that water can do to a ballet company's costumes and properties. On 26 Dec 2015, the River Aire burst its banks and flooded the warehouse where our regional ballet company, Northern Ballet, stored many of its sets and costumes (see Northern Ballet's press release Flood Update 21 Jan 2016). Northern Ballet is a company to which I am particularly close as it was formed in Manchester, my home town, and is now based in Leeds which is my nearest big city. I have followed its productions for many years and support both the company and the academy (of which I am an adult ballet student) financially. Many of the productions were salvaged but some were lost, including Peter Pan which I enjoyed very much (see Not too sure about Fairies but I certainly believe in Rachael Gillespie 21 Dec 2014).

Happily, Messrs Nelson and Welch have reported that the dancers, artists, and staff are safe, although many have been displaced and otherwise affected by this terrible storm.  I was in touch with Emilie through Facebook on Sunday morning. She replied that her district was unaffected and that she was safe and well. She responded very quickly indicating that she still had electricity and access to the internet.  I wondered whether that was still the case but I am very glad to report that she marked herself safe on Facebook 21 minutes ago.

Northern Ballet recovered from the flood and is now as strong as ever. This year it will have created three new ballets including Kenneth Tindall's excellent Casanova (see Casanova - "it has been a long time since I enjoyed a show by Northern Ballet as much as I enjoyed Casanova last night" 12 March 2017). I am sure Houston Ballet will do the same.  They will probably need a little bit of extra help from ballet fans around the world.  If you want to lend them a hand they have a donations page though it is not open yet. I am sure it will be very soon.

How Nikiya must have felt when she saw a snake

Gutted for @BRB having to pull staging of #LaBayadere due to funding cut of 62% by @BhamCityCouncil this is tragic news for the arts world😢😢

— Scarfie (@Scarfie1) January 21, 2017

I want to make clear that I have not been able to confirm this news. Nobody from the Birmingham Royal Ballet has been in touch with me about the cancellation of La Bayadѐre even though I encouraged readers to donate to The Big Give appeal to stage that ballet in A Birmingham Bayadere on 28 Nov. There is nothing about the cancellation on Birmingham Royal Ballet's website.  Indeed, the Big Give page on its website still bears a picture of the golden idol with the words

"La Bayadère to Birmingham, and beyond...
In autumn 2017 we will be performing Stanton Welch's amazing staging of La Bayadère. Featuring a fire god, fantastical dream sequences and a collapsing temple, La Bayadère is a classical ballet with a touch of Bollywood flair. This exciting ballet tells the story of Nikiya, a temple dancer, her lover Solor, and the terrible vengeance that keeps them apart. La Bayadère sits alongside Swan Lake and Giselle as one of the great 19th-century classics and one not so far performed by Birmingham Royal Ballet. This Christmas, please make a donation to help us bring this cornerstone of the repertory to Birmingham and our wonderful tour venues."

However, several subscribers to BaletcoForum seem to have received letters from the company advising them that La Bayadère has been cancelled owing to an unexpectedly large cut in Birmingham City Council's grant and that Birmingham Royal Ballet intends to revive Aladdin (which I reviewed in Birmingham Royal Ballet's Aladdin on 1 March 2013) instead.

If the story proves to be true I apologize to any reader who was persuaded to donate to BRB's Big Give appeal by my article. I am acutely aware that BRB competed for funds with English National Ballet and BalletBoyz who were raising money in the Big Give for their classes for patients suffering from Parkinson's disease (see ENB's Big Give to Dance for Parkinson's 25 Nov 2016) and also with Ballet Cymru which sought contributions for a new roof for its premises in Newport (see Ballet Cymru's Big Give Appeal 29 Nov 2016). Scottish Ballet was also appealing for funds for its young dancer mentoring scheme though not in the Big Give (see Scottish Ballet's Young Dancer Mentoring Scheme 10 Nov 2011). Northern Ballet had a Christmas appeal too.

I am glad to say that ENB, BalletBoyz and Ballet Cymru all met their targets as did BRB with a generous surplus so no harm would have been done. I contributed to ENB's appeal in the Big Give because it was the only cause that still had match funding just before the Big Give closed. I seem to remember from my classes at law school that gifts to a charity differ from contributions to other good causes in that they can be applied to the charity's other work by a doctrine known as cy près.  Such gifts do not have to be held on resulting trust for the contributors. I am sure that everybody in BRB acted with the best of intentions and in good faith. I will see and review Aladdin when it comes to the Lowry and BRB remains one of my favourite companies. But that does not stop me feeling very sad and not a little embarrassed about the cancellation of La Bayadѐre. I do wish the company would make a public announcement about the cancellation and not just write to some of its supporters. Above all, I do wish it would remove references to La Bayadere from the Big Give page of its website.

Postscript 23 Jan 2017

I am glad to report that Birmingham Royal Ballet has removed the reference to La Bayadère from its Big Give page. In fact, it has taken down the page altogether.

Romeo and Juliet in the Cinema - the Royal Opera House gets it right

Embedded pursuant to the standard YouTube licence


In the past I have been rather critical of the Royal Opera House's live ballet transmissions to cinemas. In The Royal Ballet's Swan Lake - that's more like it 25 March 2015 I wrote:

"I have not been too kind about HDTV transmissions of the Royal Ballet's performances from Covent Garden ("¡Por favor! Don Quixote streamed to Huddersfield" 13 Oct 2013, Good Quality Hamburger at the Very Least - Giselle streamed from Covent Garden 27 Jan 2014" and "Manon Encore at the Huddersfield Odeon" 20 Oct 2014) though I recanted slightly over The Winter's Tale ("The Winter's Tale - Time to eat my Hat" 29 April 2014). In general I have much preferred Pathe-Live's transmissions from Moscow."

March's Swan Lake was much better and yesterday's Romeo and Juliet was just right. It was as good as anything that has been transmitted from Moscow and I congratulate Ross MacGibbon and his team on the screening.

A large part of the reason for last night's success was the engagement of Ore Oduba. He is a skilled TV presenter in a way that Darcey Bussell is not. He has an easy manner and conveyed the sense of excitement and occasion of the man on the Clapham smartphone so much better than the stream of gushing tweets that had irritated me so much on previous occasions.   Oduba also freed up Bussell for some important interviews.  There were some interesting contributions from Lady MacMillan and Donald MacLeary whom I saw last year at the London Jewish Cultural Centre (see A Minor Miracle - Bringing Le Baiser de la fée back to Life 2 June 2015). I was also impressed by the interview with Garbiel Prokofiev who wrote the music for Shobana Jeyasingh's La Bayadère - the Ninth Life (see La Bayadère - The Ninth Life 29 March 2015). I also enjoyed the conversations with Koen Kessels and Kevin O'Hare as well as the snippets form Steven McRae, Sarah Lamb and others.

The great advantage of live transmissions is that you get to see the detail of the ballet from the close ups. These include facial expressions such as the shame on the faces of Romeo and his mates when they are ticked for brawling off by Escalus, the parties' disdain when they are forced to reconcile, Tybalt's permanent sneer and the vengeful grief of Lady Capulet. Cinema audiences also got a chance to examine the props such as Juliet's poppet in Act I and the vial of liquid that would suspend her animation which she approached with such enormous trepidation. The close ups also allowed me to concentrate on important parts of the choreography such as the courous en pointe as Juliet recoils from Paris the significance of which I had never appreciated on all the occasions that I have seen it on stage.

McRae and Lamb were magnificent in the title roles. I have always liked them in every ballet in which I have seen them perform. A special word of praise is due to Gary Avis who is another of my favourites. He danced Tybalt and was excellent.  All were good -  especially Alexander Campbell as Mercutio, Ryoichi Hirano as Paris, Elizabeth McGorian as Lady Capulet, Genesia Rosato as the nurse, Alastair Marriott as Friar Lawrence and Bennet Gatside as Escalus. It was also great to see Nicholas Georgiadis's rich designs again. They are as awesome now as they were when I first saw that ballet four and a half decades ago.

Romeo and Juliet is not a short ballet but seldom has an evening passed so quickly. Finally, although I promoted the screening in Centenary Square (see Ballet for Everybody in Centenary Square 4 June 2015) I actually saw it in the Pictureville cinema at the National Media Museum a few hundred yards away. There may well have been a party atmosphere in the Square and other big screens up and down the country and you can get in for free but it was a bit chilly on the first night of Autumn, the seats are hard and the screen and audio leave a lot to be desired.  I like my comfort at my time of life and the Museum with its bar, restaurant and convenient parking is one of the most civilized venues I know anywhere in the world.

Postscript

Alison Penfold who lives in London drew my attention to the fact that the big screen in Centenary Square was out of action on Tuesday night.   In response to my post:

"There was a quite a lot of price variation in Bradford where there was a big screen in Centenary Square and folk could see the show for free."

She wrote:

"Except they couldn't: I believe there was some problem and the screening was cancelled?"

That was news to me and I was only a few hundred yards from Centenary Square. It turns out that Alison was right. The Royal Opera House tweeted

The #BPBigScreens at Centenary Square Bradford has been cancelled due to technical difficulties. Apologies for the inconvenience ^H

— Royal Opera House (@RoyalOperaHouse) September 22, 2015

It is  a great shame that that happened. Bradford has many different communities and cultures and Tuesday would have been a great opportunity to introduce ballet to folk who would never otherwise see it.

Further Information

See Live Performances from the Bolshoi and Covent Garden 20 Sept 2015