Ballet in Ireland

My interest in Ireland was stimulated by an email from Northern Ballet about the "Big Ballet" series on Channel 4 which started last Thursday.  I missed last week's programme because it clashed with "Inside Science" and "In Our Time" and I am going to miss next week's because a friend is taking me to see "Coriolanus" for a birthday treat. I love ballet but I am also interested in science, history and drama. As my time, like everybody's, is limited I judged I might get more satisfaction from Radio 4 than Channel 4 on the Jeremy Bentham measure. I might also add that as a somewhat unpromising and over mature ballet student I do not see anything weird or even unusual about people who are less or more than the optimum shape and size for a career in ballet getting as much enjoyment as they can from the art, as I do, and I wish them all well.

The email explained that while the programme was not about Northern Ballet, much of the filming takes place in Quarry Hill and the Northern Ballet Sinfonia will accompany the live performances at the end of the series.  The bit that startled me however was the reference to Wayne Sleep and "prima ballerina Monica Loughman". Now I have seen Wayne Sleep many times and I remember his Neapolitan dance with particular affection but I had not heard of Monica Loughman. Now although I do not know everything about ballet I do get to about 20 shows a year and I read the ballet columns of The Guardian, Independent and FT as well as Dancing Times and dip into Ballet News and the other blogs. Even though I have not seen every ballerina or even every prima ballerina I have usually heard of them and the name Monica Loughman did not ring any bells.

So I googled her. The first five results were:

• Monica Loughman - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
• Irish ballet starlet Monica Loughman found love at Tesco checkout ...
• Big Ballet: Wayne Sleep & Monica Loughman stage Swan Lake using only plus-size dancers
Big Ballet's plus-size swans step out to prove dance suits all shapes, and 
• Monica Loughman Ballet - Ireland's Ballet Company

I had a look at her Wikipedia entry and found:

"Monica Loughman is now best known in Ireland for establishing a National ballet company. Ireland was one of the only countries in the world (apart from Liechtenstein) that did not have a full-time professional ballet company."

 Now I found that rather surprising because I spent my honeymoon in Ireland in 1982 and I remember an evening at either the Gate or the Abbey when my late spouse and I watched a very polished performance by a company that called itself the National Ballet of Ireland. Moreover, my teacher comes from Ireland though she trained in Brisbane, and Dame Ninette de Valois who founded the Royal Ballet came from the Emerald Isle.

So I checked out YouTube and found the footage of The Dying Swan from RTE above. Now although I was initially put off by the Tesco checkout story, Big Ballet and another TV show in Ireland called Ballet Chancers it is clear from this footage that Monica Loughman knows what she is doing.  So I scrolled down to the entry for Monica Loughman Ballet.

It appears that the company has four ballets in its repertoire:  The Nutcracker, La Sylphide, Giselle and Masterpieces of World Opera and Ballet. It has just finished touring the Irish Republic with The Nutcracker and it is planning to dance Swan Lake this year. I searched YouTube again and found these clips of Part I and Part II of La Sylphide from 2012 which I would gladly have crossed the Irish Sea to see had I been aware of those performances.  I should add that I much prefer La Sylphide to Giselle because it is set in Scotland which is still part of the United Kingdom (at least for now) and not in the Vosges or Black Forest and there is no monkeying about with the spirit world which gives me the creeps (see "Reflections on Gisellle" 29 Jan 2014).

Incidentally, while carrying out my searches I found the website for the National Ballet of Ireland which shows that I wasn't imagining things. It will dance Carmen in Limerick on 29 and 30 May 2014 and with tickets priced between 10 and 20 euros it seems very good value even after taking account of the Ryanair fair to get there.

Now a limerick

"Now there once was a Scotsman called James
With whom Madge had some fun and some games.
She gave him a scarf
For the sylph for a laugh.
Who died and Gurn took Effie back hame." 

"Hame" I think is how they pronounce home in Scotland (see The Steamie by Tony Roper).  Yeah I know it's terrible but you try and find a better rhyme for "James" and "games".

Post Script 9 Feb 2014

There will be a chance to see Monica Loughman's company, if not Loughman herself, as it will dance Giselle at the Lyric Theatre in Belfast on 4 or 5 April 2014, As I am curious and will qualify for a concessionary ticket I think I may just slip over.

Gala for Ghana

Last Sunday some of our finest performers gave up their evening (and no doubt a lot more rehearsal time) to dance, sing and make music at a gala at the Britten Theatre for Ashanti Development. This is a charity set up by Ghanaians living in London to raise money for development in the Ashanti region of Ghana. It has done some remarkable work in health care, sanitation, education and income generation. It was a wonderful evening and I for one am doubly grateful to the artists not only for their magnificent performances but also for supporting a very worthwhile cause.

The evening consisted of 14 items introduced by Harriet Thorpe.  Though now an actor Thorpe said that she had studied at the Royal Ballet School. "That training never leaves you" said Thorpe and she offered to stand in for any dancer who might be indisposed. Happily, nobody was indisposed  but I have no reason to doubt that she would have risen to the occasion had she been put to the test.

The works were as follows:

• Chroma by Dawid Trzensimiech, Paul Kay and Luca Acri choreographed by Wayne McGregor to Joby Talbot's music;
• The Dying Swan by Elena Glurdjidze
• In Treibhaus sung by Maria Jones;
• Improvisation Andante Cantabile from Richard Straus's Violin Concerto in E Flat Op 18 by Robert Gibbs on the violin and Oliver Davies on the piano;
• Avant La Haine by Camille Bracher and Thomas Whitehead choreographed by Ludovic Ondiviela to Ólafur Arnalds's music;
• Unfinished Business by Elly Braund and James Muller choreographed by Richard Alston to Mozart;
• Requiem Pie Jesu by Lauren Cuthbertson to MacMillan's choreography and Fauré's music;
• Yuhui Choe dancing Aurora's Act 1 variation from The Sleeping Beauty;
• Polyphonia by Beatriz Stix Brunell and Nicol Edwards choreographed by Christopher Wheeldon to  György Ligeti's music;
• the Duett and Finale from Schumann's Phantasierstuecke Op 88 by Gibbs and Davies joined by Adrian Bradbury on the cello;
• Volver, Volver by Edward Watson choreographed by Arthur Pita from MEN IN MOTION;
• Clair de Lune by Gina Sturm Jensen and Reece Clarke choreographed by Valentino Zuchetti to Debussy's music;
• Ceremony of Innocence by Marcelino Sambé choreographed by Valentino Zucchetti to Benjamin Britten's Variations on a Theme of Frank Bridge Op 10; and
• Ashton's Rhapsody Pas de Deux by Yuhui Choe and Zucchetti to Rachmaninov's Rhapsody on a Theme by Paganini. 

Two ballets were premièred on Sunday - Avant la Haine and Clair de Lune - and we saw Volver, Volver only a few days after MEN IN MOTION's première and these were three of the works that impressed me most. It was the first time I had seen choreography by Ondiviela and Zucchetti and I am certainly looking froward to seeing more.

Avant la Haine means Before the Hatred and if I understood the ballet correctly it tracks the breakup of a relationship. I had last seen Whitehead in Giselle (see "Giselle - Royal Ballet 18 Jan 2014" 20 Jan 2014) and I may be biased because he comes from Bradford but Whitehead has become one of my favourite dancers. In this ballet he appears to fight with Bracher actually delivering what seemed to be a rabbit punch. Far worse than just spilling the beans about a philanderer but don't get me started on Giselle because I know my views are unpopular.

Zucchetti's Clair de Lune was one of the most delightful new ballets I have seen for some time. Part of the credit must go to Debussy whose music like Aaron Copland's is particularly apt for ballet but much must got to the lyrical choreography and the elegance by which it was interpreted by the dancers. I hope to see this work again.

Watson was, of course, magnificent. It devolved in a fascinating way which I won't reveal from those who are to see MEN IN MOTION. I was urged to go by Susan Dalgetty who pressed a flyer into my hands at the London Ballet Circle AGM. I did not buy a ticket largely because one can't see everything, especially if it means trekking to London but I think I made the wrong choice. When I see a dancer like Watson I am reminded of the remark attributed to Einstein about dancers being "the athletes of God."

And what of the rest? I had decided not to go to this gala until I saw Dave Wilson's post on BalletcoForum that Glurdjidze was to dance the Dying Swan. This was a ballet that I had always wanted to see but have never managed to catch. When she was a little girl my mother saw Pavlova dance it in Leeds and the impression never left her.  I have seen some flickering footage of Pavlova many times but I have always wanted to see it on stage (see "In Leeds of All Places" 18 Sept 2013). Owing to a problem with the Royal College's e-commerce system I feared I would not get a ticket for the show but thanks to Josephine and Bangor Ballet Boy they put me in touch with a lady who had a ticket to sell. It was a good seat too right in the centre of the dress circle. I am so grateful to all concerned.  Well Dying Swan lived up to my expectations. It was danced beautifully. I became pretty emotional earlier in the day when I saw Antoinette Sibley again for the first time in decades. Tears do not come to me easily but I felt the tears welling up when I saw this ballet. It was good that we had Wagner and Strauss before more dancing.

But my favourite work of the evening was Cuthbertson's Requiem.  I admire her greatly.  More perhaps than any ballerina in the Royal Ballet since Sibley. Indeed she reminds me a little of Sibley. She shows the same grace. In this work she danced to a voice that complemented her movement remarkably. I long to see this work again and preferably with the same artists.

The evening was over too quickly. But the show did not exactly end there. On the way out there was more music and dance from two Ghanaian ladies with collection buckets rattling their containers to a rhythm and chant "Thank you! God bless you!" My only surprise and slight regret was that there were no Ghanaians on stage and few even in the audience. Well it was a sell out and ballet is only beginning to establish itself in Sub-Saharan Africa. But it is taking root there as I have mentioned elsewhere (see "Michaela dePrince" 4 April 2013 and "What can be achieved by a good teacher" 3 March 2013). I hope to see a Ghanaian ballerina or premier danseur noble step out on stage in my lifetime. There is already a Sierra Leonean on her way to the Linbury on the 28 and 29 May 2014.

Le jour de gloire est arrive - Dame Antoinette Sibley with Clement Crisp at the Royal Ballet School

The Royal Ballet School     Source Wikipedia

I have said elsewhere how much I admire Dame Antoinette Sibley in "Ballerina" on 1 July 2013 and I announced Ivy House Music and Dance's afternoon with her and Clement Crisp in "Sibley" on 17 Dec 2013. Yesterday the great day came and here is what happened.

The event took place in the theatre of the Royal Ballet School in Floral Street. This was the first time I had entered that building and indeed it is only the second ballet school I have ever seen, the other being the Northern Ballet Academy in Leeds. There were photographs, drawings and other exhibits on the walls which I stopped to regard on the way in and out. They included the designs for The Birds, a ballet performed in 1942, the School's coat of arms and lots of photos of all the great names that had been associated with the school. It felt strangely like my old school save that instead of dancers and choreographers our exhibits were of generals, judges, bishops leavened with the a few poets, musicians and actors. These exhibits reminded me that English ballet is part of a living tradition linked through Dame Ninette de Valois and Sir Fred Ashton to Dighialev's Ballet Russes and through then to Petipa, This was a theme that a gentleman who spoke on behalf of the London Jewish Cultural Centre picked up when he proposed a vote of thanks and Dame Antoinette and Clement Crisp referred to it several times in their discussion,

After tea and biscuits we were ushered into a theatre near with barres which presumably also serves as a rehearsal studio. The theatre was packed but I managed to find a seat in the second row.  Before Dame Antoinette and Clement Crisp entered we were treated to the pas de deux from Act III of The Sleeping Beauty by Hikaru Kobayashi whom I had last seen dance Myrtha in Giselle on 18 January 2013 and Federico Bonelli. I don't think I had ever been so close to such beautiful creatures even in the stalls as there has always been the orchestra between us. Experiencing that proximity and intimacy alone justified the 200 mile trek form Yorkshire but there was far greater delights than that to come.

After the dancers left the stage a screen unfolded, two chairs were produced and Dame Antoinette and Clement Crisp were introduced. Dame Antoinette wore trousers with a tailored jacket and black shores and bag. She was as beautiful as I had remembered her on the stage, The years simply rolled away to 1970 when I first saw her. Clement Crisp was elegant too in his manner as much as his dress. Urbane and generous, Dame Antoinette called him our greatest ballet critic as indeed he is.

The conversation began with a joke. Sibley's first great role had been as Swanhilde in Coppélia but a misprint in the billing had cast her as Swan Hitler instead. I wondered about the tactfulness of that reference before a predominately Jewish audience as some of them were old enough to have lived through the Holocaust but nobody seemed to mind. The conversation passed on to Dame Antoinette's first appearances on stage which began when she was still at school. The first time she came to the attention of the press when they followed her to her home in Kent where she sometimes worked in her parents' restaurant. Her first tour to South Africa. Learning ballerina's roles in a matter of days before appearing on stage. Cranko's choosing her to dance in Harlequin.  

The first clip we were shown was of Sibley dancing Dorabella in The Enigma Variations a lovely ballet which may well have been the first time I saw Sibley. Dorabella is Dora Penny and Elgar himself described the movement as follows in his notes:

"'The movement suggests a dance-like lightness.' An intimate portrait of a gay but pensive girl with an endearing hesitation in her speech."

Well that was Sibley and Ashton brilliantly translated it into movement with short steps on pointe representing a slight stammer. Seeing that footage again after all those years literally brought tears to my eyes, and still more flowed  after Crisp revealed that Ashton had nicknamed Sibley Dorabella.

The conversation moved on to Sibley's other great roles in Manon, Cinderella, Thaïs and of course The Dream which was the first ballet Ashton had created for her and Anthony Dowell.  Dame Antoinette said that she had been concerned that she had been chosen by all the other choreographers of the day but not by Ashton and she wondered whether there was a reason for that. However, one day a notice appeared calling her and Dowell to learn the part for a new ballet based on Midsummer Night's Dream. She thought she would be one of the lovers but in fact she was to be Titania. She spoke about how Ashton always prodded her with his finger because he remembered Pavlova and he wanted his dancers to move like her. But he never prodded Sir Anthony.

She discussed how other dancers have to get used to each other in a pas de duex. Often a ballerina has to ask her partner to make adjustments to accommodate her centre but with Sir Anthony it was natural like hand in glove. She had been Sir Anthony's first partner and he had thought it was always like that until he found the contrary when partnering other ballerinas.

She talked about her relationship with Sir Kenneth MacMillan and how he had announced his intention of creating a ballet for her by leaving a book for her in her dressing room and Dame Antoinette produced that book and read from Sir Kenneth's note in the cover. She spoke of the difficulties of preparing for that role as the time she had set aside was interrupted by illness and a trip to Australia.

At the beginning of this post I mentioned the tradition of ballet. Crisp described Sibley as a "repository" - which set her giggling - of knowledge. She had known so many of the greats and indeed she had been taught by two of them. The great English ballerina Pamela May who taught at the School while appearing regularly at Covent Garden and Tamara Karsavina whom Sibley adored. Karsavina once invited the young Sibley to her home and she cooked a steak for her. Sibley chose a steak because she thought it might be easy - something you just place under a grill - but Karsavina took the same trouble over that steak as she did with everything else. 

As Sibley spoke about her teachers I realized that every teacher represents to his or students every dancer, choreographer and teacher who has gone before. Sibley loved her teachers and I can relate to that because I love every one of mine. Those who have gently corrected my wobbling arabesques and feeble turns. I texted one of them yesterday after the talk from a restaurant where I ordered - guess what - a steak. 

"Oh super jealousy" she replied.

"Don't be jealous" I responded "You are also part of the tradition. You live it, I just see it. And you pass on your gift to others."

"Awwwww Thanku xxxx" 

"When I go to class you or Annemarie represent every dancer, choreographer and teacher who ever lived". 

"Aw Jane! I won't be able to leave the room soon" 

"I am only  paraphrasing Sibley. She should know. Through you I am linked to your teacher who is probably linked to someone at Ballet Russes who is linked to Petipa."

"xxxxx wise woman!"

As indeed Dame Antoinette is. I learned so much from her yesterday for which I shall always be grateful.

As if this was not treat enough I got the chance through the wonderful BalletcoForum and twitter to buy a ticket for the Gala for Ghana but that will be the subject of my next post. I have to teach some law to graduate students before I can turn to that.

Bounden Part II - How it Works

Just before Christmas I mentioned Bounden, a project by Game Oven, a Dutch games developer to create a dance game for smart phones. This project appealed not only to my love of ballet but also to my interest in technology (see "Bounden - Something that appeals to my Interests in Technology and Dance" 17 Dec 2013). As I noted in my previous article, Hans Meisner and the magnificent Junior Company of the Dutch National Ballet, of which he is the artistic director, are participating in this project.

Game Oven and the Dutch National Ballet have just released another video showing how the game works. The idea is to get a ball into the cross hairs of the screen and in order to achieve that object the person holding the phone has to follow a prescribed path. That is to say he or she has to dance.

Although I believe that the idea is to create a work of art I believe that the app could be a tool in dance education.  For example, I tend to wobble like a jelly in arabesque and my pirouettes are terrible. That is because it is not easy for me to find the point of balance in my fat, old body.  Properly programmed I think it could help me find that point of balance and through repeated use train me in time to reach that point instinctively.  I am sure that ballet teachers could find plenty of other uses for the tool.

In one of recent classes in Huddersfield two young women were recording the movements of each student. I think they must have been learning Benesh notation and I am sure that my clumsiness gave them a lot to laugh about. However, it got me thinking about Bounden. If the movement of the ball on the screen follows a path that has been choreographed by Meisner it should surely be possible to reverse the process: that is say digitize the movements of a dancer's body and convert them into points of the stave. If I am right it could also be a tool for dancers, choreologists and choreographers.  In Scottish Ballet's programme for Cinderella Christopher Hampson wrote how he dreads the first day of the creation of a ballet. Well, maybe the technology behind Bounded could make his life easier.

I am something of a fan of the Junior Company and made a special trip to Amsterdam for their opening night (see "The Junior Company of the Dutch National Ballet - Stadsshouwburg Amsterdam 24 Nov 2013" 25 Nov 2013). Meisner has brought twelve of the world's most talented young dancers to the Netherlands where he has prepared them for what are likely to be glittering careers (see "The Dutch National Ballet Junior Company - more than just dePrince" 20 Nov 2013). This company is coming to London on the 28 and 29 May 2014 (see "If you see no other ballet this year this is the one you must see - Dutch National Ballet Junior Company, Linbury 28-29 May 2014 14 Jan 2014). If there are still tickets left do yourself a favour and buy one. I will be there on the 29 May 2014 clapping and cheering as I did in Amsterdam. Only the third time in my life that I have seen a standing ovation for a ballet.

Lear with a Happy Ending - Birmingham Royal Ballet's Prince of the Pagodas 30 Jan 2014

Prince of the Pagodas  The Lowry, 30 Jan 2014

I have just returned from watching the first performance in the UK of David Bintley's Prince of the Pagodas. When I get back from a show at this time of night I usually make straight for bed and leave the review till at least the morning. But this performance was so good that a review won't wait until morning. I am so excited about it that I will not be able to sleep until I have written it out of my system.

The Prince of the Pagodas is not a new ballet. It was created by John Cranko in 1957, a choreographer for whom I have a particularly high regard (see "Cranko's "Taming of the Shrew": Now's our chance to see one of the Ballets everyone should see before they die" 21 Sept 2013) and has been revised by Kenneth MacMillan and Monica Mason. Bintley created the work that we saw last night for the National Ballet of Japan  in 2011.  He has now brought his work home to the Birmingham Royal Ballet. 

As you can see from the synopses of the National Ballet of Japan and the Birmingham Royal Ballet the story is based very loosely on King Lear. Bintley has made a number of modifications to the plot that distance it still further from Lear in that he substitutes a wicked stepmother for a wicked sister and the Cordelia character is called not Rose but Sakura which means Cherry Blossom. But the essentials from Lear of an ill used and ailing father and a devoted but alienated daughter are retained by Bintley.

Both the Japanese and Birmingham synopses omit important details.  Immediately before the curtain rose Tzu-Chao Chou sat in the centre of the stage.  He danced the jester or fool and was the link for each stage of the story from the welcome of the conductor to the rostrum to attending and supporting the imprisoned emperor in his confinement. A remarkable character artist  he brought humour to the ballet.  The kings of the cardinal points were dressed respectively as Uncle Sam, a Russian, a Zulu and something else which I am still trying to ascertain from the company's website, the "Creating Pagodas" blog and programme. Possibly a Pacific islander or a native American  Each bought a gift representing his culture: an elephant tusk from the African, a miniature oil well from the Russian, a cache of guns from the American and a long pipe from the fourth cardinal point.  Those characters appeared again as demons in red as Princess Sakura and her brother, the salamander, passed through fire on their escape from their wicked stepmother.

There is a lot of material in this ballet to which a review of a few paragraphs will never do justice so I shall focus on the essentials. First, Benjamin Britten's score has been the subject of more than a little criticism (see, for example, Judith Macrkrell's review of the Mason production in The Guardian of 6 June 2012).  I found it majestic, complex, delicate and varied.  I particularly enjoyed the gamelan sequences. I loved it all and would gladly listen to it again and again. I can see why Britten's music would be difficult to choreograph but I think Bintley has found the way.  The audience's attention was retained through a very complex story by some quite spectacular dancing from the entry of the four kings to a fight scene in the last act where the princess and the salamander rescue their father and send the wicked empress packing. Last but by no means least were Rae Smith's sumptuous designs - glorious backdrops of Mount Fuji, swirling elements and a salamander - and costumes with everything from sea horses to kimonos. I can't remember such a visual feast in any theatrical performance.

Bintley demanded a lot from his dancers but all were equal to the challenge: Joseph Caley and Momoko Hirata who danced the salamander and Sakura, Elisha Willis the wicked stepmother and Rory MacKay the emperor. Each of the four kings was splendid - Mathias Dingman as king of the north, Chi Cao the king of the east, James Barton king of the west and my favourite, Tyrone Singleton king of the south.

In the programme there is an article by Paul Arrowsmith entitled "Transforming and Unloved Prince". It notes that the ballet has never been popular with British audiences even though it was created and revised by a succession of great choreographers and considers why.  I think this version will be the one that sticks.  It certainly deserves to do so and I hope it will.

Reflections on Giselle

Adèle Dumilâtre (1821-1909) as Myrtha, Source Wikipedia

The performances of Giselle with Carlos Acosta and Natalia Osipova that I saw at Covent Garden on the 18 Jan and in the cinema on the 27 Jan were outstanding and will take their place in my memory alongside magnificent performances that I saw over 40 years ago by Margot Fonteyn and Rudolf Nureyev, Antoinette Sibley and Anthony Dowell and Carla Fracci and Erik Bruhn. However, I always feel uneasy after seeing Giselle - not just this performance but any. I hear my father's reproaches that time once lost can never be recovered,

The reason I have a problem with Giselle is the story. It is not that it is a silly story.  Compared to Swan Lake and The Nutcracker it makes perfect sense. An impressionable young girl who has a steady relationship with the village gamekeeper is seduced by a playboy aristocrat in disguise who is already engaged to another woman. She shows him off to her mother and her friends and she is crowned queen of the wine pageant.  The aristocrat's connections visit the village and he is exposed as a philanderer by the gamekeeper.  Betrayed and humiliated the girl loses her reason and goes into a frenzy in which she either dies or kills herself.  So far so good.  The story could have come out of The Archers and I would not be surprised if something like it has not been run at some stage over the last 60 years.

But then the plot loses me because Giselle is buried in unconsecrated ground where her spirit joins those of other women who have been seduced and die before their wedding day. They have it in for men and if any man is unfortunate enough to stray across their path as the gamekeeper did they kill him (though having said that I have seen one performance, though I cannot remember which company, where the gamekeeper survives and the curtain falls on his shaking hands with the playboy).  That is a pretty unpleasant as well as fantastic story and offends my sensibilities as a Quaker as well as an aesthete.

Interestingly I see from the programme notes that Peter Wright had similar reservations about the story when asked to stage Giselle and it is only in the last day or so that I find that he was also brought up as a Quaker. You see the idea of burying in a forest a young woman who has died of a broken heart or even killed herself  appals us and the idea of hateful and vengeful forest spirits is .... well let's not go there.  All this is of course a product of romanticism which produced great art but it also had a dark side which degenerated into nationalism, racism and, ultimately, fascism.

Of course all this was wonderful material for the Soviet authorities.  Look at what used to happen in older superstitious times and count yourselves lucky that you now live in a modern socialist state that has no place for the likes of Albrecht. No wonder Giselle remained in the the repertoires of both the Kirov and Bolshoi and was indeed developed by them.

Yet Adam's music is so beautiful and the choreography of the second act is so compelling that I can't keep away from Giselle. I am ashamed to say it but it is my favourite ballet,  And I leave the theatre after a good performance like the one on the 18 Jan damming the waves of tears. How do I sit through it despising myself for harbouring those emotions yet unable to walk away?  The solution - and it is one that partially works for me any may not for anyone else - is to put the story out of my mind.  To absorb the music and dancing as pure abstraction as though they were the work of Balanchine.

Further Reading

Adult Beginner  Giselle  8 Feb 2014  A very interesting and perceptive view of a performance of the Royal New Zealand Ballet by a blogger from Los Angeles.

See the wonderful Flashmob video of the second act of Giselle danced by the Dutch National Ballet in a Beijing shopping centre ("Now you can see why I am such a fan of the Dutch National Ballet" 8 Dec 2014).

Good Quality Hamburger at the Very Least - Giselle streamed from Covent Garden 27 Jan 2014

Hamburger      Source Wikipedia

In "For those who may be interested ........"  25 Jan 2014 I warned that "an HDTV transmission bears about as much resemblance to the theatrical experience as hamburger does to fillet steak".  The Royal Ballet's Giselle was the third transmission that I have seen this year and it was by far the best. I left the Huddersfield Odeon in a much better humour than I did in October when I watched Don Quixote (see "¡Por favor! Don Quixote streamed to Huddersfield" 17 Oct 2013). I think that is because I learned quite a lot about the ballet yesterday.

The reason I learned so much was that I had already seen this production with almost the same cast on 18 Jan 2014 (see "Giselle - Royal Ballet 18 Jan 2014" 20 Jan 2014). Seeing the same work on a big screen is a bit like watching an action replay in sport.  You see the catch or try on the field but not quite how it happened.  The action replay enables spectators to see how the fielder positioned himself or how the ball passed to the forward who edged over the line.   In very much the same way the broadcast enabled me to appreciate some of the subtleties of the ballet such as the disappointment on Myrtha's face and the relief on Giselle's as the bell tolls 4 and Albrecht escapes.

In my review of the performance of the 18 Jan 2014 I commented on Acosta's presence and Ospiova's virtuosity as an actor as well as a dancer.  Those qualities shone through yesterday too. However, I had not realized just how strikingly beautiful Ospiova is until I saw the footage of her interview and rehearsals before the broadcast.  My admiration for her has soared even higher. I also paid more attention to the other dancers such as Thomas Whitehead who danced Hilarion with grace. Before the show I tweeted

"Heads up for fellow Yorkshire person Thomas Whitehead who dances Hilarion in #ROHgiselle tonight. You lost the lass and died. Not fair!"

To my great surprise the House twitter feed "favorited" (sic) that tweet.

Now for the criticism. Although yesterday's was the best broadcast from Covent Garden so far it still fell short of the Bolshoi's. Their works are presented by Katerina Novikova, an accomplished presenter who is at home in three languages. Last night's ballet was introduced by Darcey Bussell who is a ballerina and not a presenter. While it was lovely to see her and hear her experience of dancing Giselle there were lots of missed opportunities. For instance, interviews with Sir Peter Wright and Kevin O'Hare were compressed into one question each from members of the public. One of those questions from Dave of the Dave Tries Ballet was very interesting. If only there had been time for Sir Peter to develop his answer.

Instead the focus was on the story of the second act and the wicked wilis who have it in for all men.  I really don't think it is necessary to tell the story because the choreography is sufficient in itself. The best way to appreciate the second act of Giselle is the same way as one enjoys Balanchine as pure abstract dance without a story.

A big difference between the Royal Ballet's transmissions and the Bolshoi's is the former's use of twitter. The Royal Ballet suggests a hash-tag and invites the public to tweet where they are from and what they think of the ballet. I am not sure why they do that. You can't say much about a ballet in 140 characters especially after you have identified your cinema so the result is gush.  Superlatives upon the superficial.  Too much attention is given to those voces populorum. That is probably why we did not hear from the conductor or designer at all and why so little time was given to Sir Peter.  Maybe a chance to explore the topic raised by Dave will arise when Sir Peter speaks to the London Ballet Circle on the 14 April.

But the main reason for coming to the cinema yesterday was to see the dancing and hear the music and they were as exquisite on camera as they were on stage.  I think I now know how to use HDTV  to best advantage: see the same production on the stage and in the cinema.  Having seen how well that worked for Giselle I will do the same for Christopher Wheeldon's Winter's Tale. As I said before, HDTV is to a live performance what hamburger is to fillet steak but yesterday's was like a very good hamburger, the sort we used to get at The Great American Disaster.  If you are too young to remember the GAD read Will Self's "A burger with a side order of smugness" 27 Jan 2011 The New Statesman,