Top Cats: the NSCD and Northern Ballet Academy End of Year Show

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Leeds CAT End of Year Show, 24 June 2017, 15:00 Riley Theatre, Northern School of Contemporary Dance, Leeds


In The Lowry CAT 27 May 2016 I wrote:

"There are in England nine Centres for Advanced Training in Dance ("CAT") which identify children and young people with exceptional talent for dance and develop them through contact with leading dancers, teachers and choreographers."

According to the What are CATS? page of the Dance CATs website, there are now 12 and two of them are in Leeds, namely the Academy of Northern Ballet and the Northern School of Contemporary Dance ("NSCD"). Yesterday the Academy and NSCD held end of year shows at the NSCD's Riley Theatre. As I am a Friend of the Academy as well as the company, I support it in every way I can. Thus, I found myself at the matinee performance at 15:00.

Yesterday's visit was my first to the NSCD and, consequently, I did not know the layout of the theatre when I booked my ticket over the internet.  I had selected D7 in the stalls thinking that it would give me a good view as it was pretty close to the stage. It turned out to be a restricted view because the audience is seated in a semicircle in very solid upright, wooden chairs that are more like church pews than seats in an auditorium. As a result, I had a grandstand view of the wings at stage right but I could see hardly anything of stage left. That was only a problem in the last piece, Echo by Matthew Slater, because the work opens with several dancers' supporting another standing upright. It was a very impressive sight which must have required a lot of practice by the dancers and their choreographer.

The programme consisted of 10 works half of which were presented by the Academy and the other half by the NSCD.  The show opened with Greeting which had been created by Yoko Ichino, Cara O'Shea and Siobhan Camkin for all the Academy's students to music by Ottorino Respighi from La Boutique Fantasque. It introduced the Academy and was the first opportunity for the audience to see the capabilities and discipline of those talented young people. Next came Headspace by the NSCD students who were equally impressive in their genre. The work was choreographed by Krista Vuori of Frantic Assembly and was described as "An exploration into the questions we ask ourselves and thoughts that randomly enter into our mind everyday." There was some speech some of which was inaudible but that did not matter too much because it was a dance piece and the sentiments were clear enough from the dancers' movements. The rest of the show alternated between ballet and contemporary dance and ended with Slater's Echo.

All the contributions were good and I enjoyed them all but there were three works that stood out for me particularly.  One of these was Headspace which I have described above.   Another was The Reel scene from La Sylphide which Cara O'Shea had adapted skilfully. It was pretty faithful to Bournonville's choreography but, whenever I see dancers with folded arms, I ask myself whether that great choreographer had ever actually seen Highland or even Scottish country dancing. Not once since I was dragooned into making up the numbers for a Dashing White Sergeant at the Celtic Society's bejants' ceilidh have I ever seen anyone in Scotland dance like that but I think only someone as august as Bourne (Sir Matthew that is) dare contradict Bournonville (see Sir Matthew Bourne's Highland Fling Montage on YouTube). The last that stood out was Echo which was a perfect way to end the show.

One of the functions of the CATs is to prepare their students for vocational training. The programme listed the destinations of this year's final year students and they are very impressive. Two are off to Northern Ballet School in Manchester which celebrates its 40th anniversary today. Congratulations! Many of my favourite teachers at both KNT and the Academy trained there. Others are going to the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, The Hammond School, Trinity Laban, Urdang Academy and many other famous institutions. And to remind us that dance provides great mental, as well as physical, training, one of the students is on her way to med school at Cambridge (Caius I presume). I wish each and every one of those students well in his or her career and look forward to seeing at least some of them on stage again.

Small Steps and other Pieces - Leeds CAT End of Term Show

Author Ben Btooksbank
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Northern School of Contemporary Dance and Academy of Northern Ballet, End of Year Show, Stanley and Audrey Burton Theatre, Leeds, 25 June 2016

I have mentioned Cara O'Shea in this blog several times since I saw her class at the Northern Ballet and Phoenix Dance Theatre open day on 15 Feb 2014 (see Northern Ballet Open Day 18 Feb 2014). She is an inspiring teacher as I found out for myself a few days later when she taught our Over 55 class (see A Treat For Us Old Ladies 27 Feb 2014). We love Cara as we do all the teachers at Northern Ballet Academy and, in particular, our regular instructor, Annemarie Donoghue, but, on the very rare occasions that Annemarie can't take us, we are always delighted by Cara.

Cara's job title is Head of Lower Level Pre-Professional Programme which places her in charge of the younger pupils of the Academy of Northern Ballet. Occasionally she is asked to coach some of those pupils for ballets such as The Nutcracker where children have a role in the ballet.  When I reviewed Northern Ballet's performance of that ballet on 18 Dec 2015 in Northern's Nutcracker 19 Dec 2015 I wrote:

"there are some delightful touches that one does not see in every other production. There are the mime sequences where Clara recounts the battle with the mice to Drosselmeyer and later her dad and the children's pieces, particularly the little chap with his trumpet whom Gita named "man of the match". Cara O'Shea has to be congratulated for the work she did with the little ones for so often it is they who can make The Nutcracker."

Cara's contribution to the Academy and Company was acknowledged last week by Northern Ballet's Artistic Director, David Nixon, in a brief introduction to the Academy and Northern School of Contemporary Dance Centre for Advanced Training End of Year Show on the 25 June 2016. He mentioned in particular her ballet Small Steps which she had created for the Academy to commemorate the International Holocaust Memorial Day earlier this year (see Small Steps - Northern Ballet Academy's Commemoration of the Kindertransport 21 Jan 2016). I had missed it when it was first performed because it clashed with the live screening of the Bolshoi's performance of The Taming of the Shrew from Moscow. I got my chance last Saturday when it was performed as part of the Academy's end of year show.

Small Steps was a very beautiful work and I was profoundly moved by it for two reasons. The first is that the dancers were about the same age as the children who were sent abroad. They looked so bonny but also so lost and vulnerable. The second is that Cara chose very appropriate music - Arvo Pärt's Für Alina and Spiegel im Spiegel, Lee Holdridge's Into the Arms of Strangers, the intermezzo from Pietro Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana and Paul de Senneville's Marriage d'Amour.  The ballet explored the conflict in the parents' minds and the pain of separation.  Although she challenged her dancers her choreography was restrained and sombre - and as I have said before profoundly beautiful.

Although Small Steps was the high point of the afternoon it was not the only work of excellence. Cara worked with Yoko Ichino, the Academy's Associate Director and the company's Ballet Mistress on Greeting, the grande entree, and with Nixon and Ichino on the Finale. She also created Presentation to Johann Strauss's Napoleon March in which the girls displayed their mastery of technique with considerable grace and Knightsbridge, a bravura piece for the boys to Eric Coates's famous score.

Although the choreography was attributed (quite rightly) to Fokine I am pretty sure that Cara must have had something to do with the more senior students' performance of Chopiniana  (or Les Sylphides as it is called in the programme). It is a very beautiful but also very difficult ballet to perform well and not every professional company gets it right but Cara's girls and boy did and all credit to her and them.

There was excellent contemporary dance too.   I was particularly impressed by the NSCD's performance of Studio Wayne McGregor's Datum towards the end of the show but I admired all the works including Matthew Slater's Converge, Tim Casson's Connect, Holly Noble's Phonic and Gemma Harrison's Another Day. In his speech Nixon stressed the importance of contemporary dance in ballet training and vice versa. Leeds is lucky to have the NCDS and Academy in such close proximity.

As I explained in The Lowry CAT 27 Feb 2016 Centres of Advanced Training provide opportunities for pupils aged 10 to 18 who aspire to a career in dance. The programme was accompanied by a list of student destinations which included some of the top schools in the country - Elmhurst, Central, Ballet West, Royal Conservatory of Scotland and Northern Ballet School where Cara trained.  I am sure all my readers will join me in wishing those students well in their careers.

The Leeds CAT End of Term Show

I mentioned the Centres for Advanced Training in Dance ("CAT") in The Lowry CAT on 27 May 2016. As I said in that post there is also a CAT in Leeds where advanced training is offered to  by the Northern School of Contemporary Dance and Northern Ballet. As a Friend of the Academy of Northern Ballet I have been invited to the end of year show for 2016 this afternoon which I look forward to seeing very much.

The show will take place in the Stanley and Audrey Burton Theatre at 15:00 and 19:30. In previous years the over 55 ballet class and other classes have performed in that show and I took part in those performances (see The Time of My Life 28 June 2014 and My Second Ballet 5 July 2015). Timetabling arrangements at Northern Ballet have prevented our rehearsing to take part in this year's show.

Not a lot of details have been given about this afternoon's show but as the CAT programme aims to attract and develop the talents of some of the best young dancers from Leeds and surrounding districts it should be a very good show indeed.

MOVE IT 2016

Excel Centre, London

Source Wikipedia

Having been billed as "The UK's Biggest Dance Event ...... with 22,000 dancers - three days - performances, classes, career advice, celebrities, interviews and shopping!" Team Terpsichore decided to find out what all the fuss was about. As it was taking place at the ExCel Centre at the base of the M11 and as we were in Essex on  Saturday night for Chelmsford Ballet's The Sleeping Beauty anyway Move It 2016 was not too far out of our way.

We were not sure what to expect because the event website was not too easy to navigate and not particularly informative. We wondered whether we would see anything at all as two of the companies we know well, Phoenix Dance Theatre and Chantry Dance, had already visited the show. However, we rang the event marketing manager to find out whether there would be anything left by Sunday and were assured that it would be as busy as Friday or Saturday.

The first thing we found when we arrived at the ExCel Centre car park was that it would be expensive. "£15 flat rate pay and display" said a sign. As you would expect for a car containing two Yorkshire residents it rumbled and virtually levitated.
"By 'eck" said I "I'm not paying that."
"They're having a laugh" said my companion.
"I could get 3 ballet lessons for that from Karen or Ailsa at KNT or Fiona at Team Hud" I fumed.
"Aye or two from Jane Tucker at Northern Ballet with a pound to spare for the meter" added my friend.
We cruised around Plaistow looking for a quite residential street with no yellow lines or resident parking restrictions and eventually found one in Britannia Village on the other side of the Royal Victoria Dock. The ExCel is connected to the village by a footbridge with several flights of stairs and no lift at each end.

Having crossed that bridge we found ourselves walking almost as far in the giant ExCel Centre which resembles an airport terminal or railway station with tables and fast food outlets on each side. At the far end of the building we found a booth with a massive but orderly queue on one side and masses of people milling around on the other. We eventually attracted someone's attention who told us we had to pay £19 simply to get in
........*@^~@*! .......
and anything from £4 to £8.50 for a class.
"Are people happy to pay all that", I wondered, and clearly the answer was "yes" for the place was heaving. "More brass than sense" thought I.

We studied the event catalogue and found we had missed Catalyst Dance's Entrance of the Swans by a few minutes. That was an open class and the only one I really wanted to do having taken Jane Tucker's Swan Lake workshop last summer. I scoured the catalogue for a light blue diamond indicating "Beginner" but other than Flamenco and belly dancing there were none.

There was a big stage at the far end of the exhibition hall and curtained off areas where the classes took place.  Someone had managed to drive a double decker bus into the exhibition hall. There was also a VIP area next to the stage. The rest of the room was occupied by exhibitors which included the RAD and ISTD, a few companies, rather more schools and suppliers of clothing, footwear and sundry equipment such as travelling barres and flooring.

The only ballet company we could find among the exhibitors was Ballet Theatre UK. Its stand was staffed by Christopher Moore. He gave us flyers for Pinocchio which is about to start a gruelling nationwide tour from Coventry tomorrow.
"Will you give out cast lists?" I asked timidly as that had been something of a bug bear for me.
"Yes we will" assured Moore.
He then gave us leaflets for the School of Ballet Theatre UK and its Wizard of Oz Build a Ballet project for young people. I have been a bit of a fan of BTUK for some time and I wish its Pinnochio tour and School all the best.

Middlesex University, Trinity Laban, The Urdang Academy, Northern School of Contemporary Dance and the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland were all there and we stopped to chat with all of them. We also picked up literature from most if not all of the other schools that were exhibiting at the show but did not have time to speak to all. Some of the schools had students on the stands and it was good to talk to them about their courses, why they had chosen them and their aspirations for the future.

We also chatted to the RAD and ISTD and watched some talented young students demonstrating tendus. classical and jazz pirouettes and other exercises. There was dance wear and footwear galore on display a well as Jon Applegate Photography which has uploaded some great photos of the show to its website. Of all the products on display two that caught my eye were Ballet Is Fun's Turnboard (maybe I could use one of those as I still struggle to pirouette) and Hoop Hop's hula hoops.

I had been looking forward to seeing Elena Glurdjidgze at the show as she is one of my all  favourites (see Elena Glurdjidze - So Lovely, So Gracious 11 Feb 2014) but somehow managed to miss her. However, I did see Darcey Bussell on the main stage and also marvelled at Boadacea.

There are worse ways of spending a Sunday afternoon and I did pick up a free copy of The Stage and Dancing Times with a great article by Gavin McCaig in Talking Point which I read over an overpriced burrito  but it was not a cheap afternoon out.

Congratulations Class of 2014!

It's that time of year again when keen and hungry young dancers graduate from their chosen conservatoires and vocational training schools! After 3 plus years of hard work and dedication, the graduation is not just a celebration of work achieved it is also a celebration of hope that these young artists and dancers will keep the flame of dance burning bright in the world! Terpsichore writers extend our warmest congratulations to the dancers who have graduated from their respective training courses this summer!!

Two of the UK's top ballet training schools - The Royal Ballet School and English National Ballet School - have just released their lists of graduate destinations. I'm currently trying to source the same information from Northern School of Contemporary Dance, however from the newsfeeds of my friends who performed in and watched the BA Hons graduation performance in Leeds last night it's safe to assume that a very talented and artistic new generation of contemporary dancers have been developed.

Destination companies for some of the RBS graduates include Covent Garden HQ, Royal Ballet of Flanders, Royal Danish Ballet, Stuttgart Ballet and National Romanian Ballet. The list of ENB's graduate destinations is similarly diverse and includes Scottish Ballet, Ballet Bejart Lausanne and Mystic Ballet. 3 of ENB's grads will be joining our very own Northern Ballet: Gavin McCaig, Luke Francis and Isabelle Clough (who will be joining as a Company Apprentice). Needless to say both Jane and I will be keeping a very close eye on their progress and developments over the coming season!

And by the looks of McCaig's Dissertation choreography, we may even have a budding Kenneth Tindall on our hands