Looking forward to the Gala and trying to get the Night Fall Video to work

Standard YouTube Licence

This time next week Team Terpsichore should be in Amsterdam.

We are very excited about it.  One member of our team is an eating expert who can't wait to get her gnashers into riijsttafel, Gouda, Edam, Leerdammer and every other cheese in Holland not to mention Calve peanut butter which you just can't get in this country.

Apart from one meeting with my editor at Kluwer at which we shall probably speculate at great length whether Brexit has torpedoed the unitary patent and the Unified Patent Court, this will be my first opportunity in years to play the tourist and see the bits of Amsterdam that I have never quite got round to before. Top of my list is the van Goch museum having been inspired by Chantry Dance's Vincent (see Duology  29 Sept 2015) and our pals at Casa Alessia in Italy (see From Italy with Love 1 July 2016).

However, we are looking forward to the Gala most of all. I attended it last year and described it as The best evening I have ever spent at the ballet 13 Sept 2015 without the slightest exaggeration. The only comparable event I can remember was Sir Fred's retirement gala at the Royal Opera House on 24 July 1970. This year promises to be even better as it features Igone de Jongh who is one of my favourites in the company.

Having praised the Dutch National Ballet to the rafters I am now going to say something that they probably won't like so much and that is that is that I can't see anything special about Night Fall.  The hype in yesterday's press release would have done credit to Lord Mandeslson:

"In Night Fall, the viewer feels like part of the corps de ballet, entering a world where the boundary between dream and reality seems to vanish. The choreography is inspired by the world-famous ‘white acts’ from Romantic ballets like Swan Lake, La Bayadère and Les Sylphides. The ballet was choreographed by Peter Leung, a former dancer with Dutch National Ballet, to music composed by Robin Rimbaud (Scanner). It was directed by Jip Samhoud and Marijn Korver from &samhoud media. Night Fall is a co-production by Dutch National Ballet, &samhoud media and Chester Music. The Samsung Galaxy S7 and Gear VR provide the technology that makes it possible to produce the first ballet in Virtual Reality."

That may be the idea but it hasn't worked for me up to now. I've tried the YouTube video on my Chromebook and a brand new Huawei Honor smart phone which cost me a lot of lolly. The phone showed everything double. The images were was so small that I could hardly make out any detail. The figures on the YouTube were very dimly lit and seemed to me out of focus. As for the violin I couldn't stop thinking of Sherlock Holmes.

Now it may well be that I don't have the right kit or that I failed to carry out the instructions correctly but I got more and more grumpy as the night wore on. That was a shame because I had such a nice class in Manchester and was in excellent spirits at the start of the evening.  This is not the first time the company has experimented with mobile phone technology. Ernst Mesiner choreographed Bounden for the Game Oven and I actually downloaded the app (see Bounden - Something that appeals to my Interests in Technology and Dance 17 Dec 2013). Mel and I tried very hard to get it to work in a cafe in Sheffield no doubt providing hilarious entertainment for everyone in the eatery - but it just wouldn't.

Now as a patent lawyer (which I do better than shades. swans or even statues) I applaud innovation as it funds my balletomania. But I think a bit more R & D needs to go into Night Fall.  The press release came from Richard Heideman. We'll look out for him on Wednesday. Maybe he or one of his staff can get Night Fall to work for Mevrouw de Eter en me.

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.

The Atkinson

Last Thursday I was the guest of QualitySolicitors Jackson & Canter at a reception that they hosted at The Atkinson arts centre in Southport. I had already seen Ballet Theatre UK's Little Mermaid and Ballet Black's triple bill there and had seen at least some of the exhibits near the auditorium during the intervals but this was the first time I had seen the collection.

The Atkinson was established in 1875 by a gift of £6,000 from William Atkinson, a wealthy Yorkshire industrialist, to provide an art gallery and library for the town. The building opened in 1878. It is now Southport's home for music, theatre, art, poetry, literature and history. Over the years it has acquired a vast collection of works of art and curiosities that it has had to archive. Following extensive recent renovation it now has space to display its collection of Egyptian artefacts, fine art and archaeological and historical items. That part of the museum will open in October 2014.

At the reception I met The Atkinson's Director. I told her that I was a dance fan and that I had already visited the centre recently to see Ballet Theatre UK and Ballet Black. She replied that she had been told that the theatre had one of the finest surfaces for dance in the country and that the Atkinson hoped to attract more dance companies. I noted that there was no ballet at the One City One Summer arts festival which had accompanied the International Festival of Business though there had been other types of dance. I had drawn the absence of ballet to the attention of Paul Kelly of MurleyDance and suggested that might be an opportunity for his company to grow a following since Merseyside is a major conurbation with a massive hinterland that extends well into Lancashire, Cheshire, the Marches and North Wales. Mr Kelly did look into it but had found no suitable venues in greater Liverpool. The Director replied that she would welcome any company that wanted to perform in Southport. She gave me her card which I passed on to Paul Chantry and Rae Piper of the Chantry Dance Company when I saw them on Saturday (see "Chantry Dance Summer School" 2 Aug 2014).

Searching The Atkinson's website I see that Ballet Theatre UK will return on the 11 December 2014 with their production of Swan Lake and that the BalletBoyz will perform on 13 March 2015. The Atkinson will also screen performances of the Bolshoi streamed from Moscow and host the Sereno School of Dance's annual show Dance Matters on 6 Dec 2014.

Having sponsored Liverpool Sound City earlier this year QualitySolicitors Jackson & Canter have already demonstrated their commitment to the performing arts. I understand from Michael Sandys who heads the firm's commercial department that that commitment extends to dance but I must emphasize that there are far more worthy causes in the performing arts than any law firm could possibly support.

After speeches from Michael and the head of wills and probate of his firm and also from the Director of the Atkinson we were led off to tour of the building. We were shown samples of some of the rare Egyptian artefacts and paintings including a gorgeous portrait by Augustus John which will be on display from October. We were also taken around the current Walk on exhibition which actually had some choreography of a kind. There was a film of a a group of soldiers wandering aimlessly round the City of London one Sunday morning carrying firearms. When they met one of their number they formed a file which grew bigger and bigger until a whole platoon marched 8 abreast towards the Thames where they suddenly broke step and dispersed again. I watched it transfixed because there were some lovely shots of the Temple and the Barbican but I could not see how this exercise could be art or made military sense. I couldn't help wondering what one of the theatre companies that lost out on the recent Arts Council funding spree could do with the money but then what do I know about art or the military?

Anyway we all had a good day at The Atkinson especially my foodie friend who took all the delicious cakes and canopies that had been prepared in the centre's bakery off their hands. "It would only be binned if I didn't eat it" she explained. I am sure she will put the food to very good use.