Tess

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Ockham's Razor Tess Home, Manchester 7 Jun 2025, 19:30

Last night, I finally got to see Tess.  I was supposed to see it at the Leeds Playhouse on 31 May 2025, but the show was cancelled at the last minute owing to staff illness. I was sorry to learn of that illness and hope that the person(s) affected made a full recovery.  I managed to get a ticket for a performance at the Home, a new arts complex just off Whitworth Street in Manchester.  It was my first opportunity to visit that venue, and I liked that arts complex a lot.

Ockham's Razor, the company that stages Tess, introduced themselves as "a contemporary circus company" on the home page of their website. They describe Tess as weaving "together acrobatics, aerial, physical theatre, spoken word and an inventive, evocative set to conjure Hardy’s world."  I agree with that. The was a lot of dance but it was not a ballet.  There was a spoken narrative, but it was not a play.  There were also a lot of acrobatics, precarious balancing on planks of wood and feats of amazing strength.  At one point, a single performer bore the weight of three others on her shoulders.  The women seemed as strong as the men, lifting the men as easily as the men had lifted them.  The performers shaped their bodies into all sorts of forms, even resembling a horse and cart at one point.

Although contemporary circus has much in common with dance and drama, it is best considered as an art form in its own right. I have seen only one other performance which I can compare with Tess.   That was Citrus Arts' Savage Hart in the grounds of Oakwell Hall in Birstall, which I reviewed in  Citrus Arts' Savage Hart on 23 July 2017.  Although contemporary circus is a separate art form, it tells a story through dance, mime and movement just like ballet. Indeed, one of the performers in Savage Hart was Krystal Lowe who had been a dancer with Ballet Cymru.  In fact, Darius James and Amy  Doughty of Ballet Cymru have collaborated with Citrus Arts and incorporated circus into their productions of Cinderella and The Light Princess. 

Tess followed Hardy's novel pretty faithfully.   For those who have not read it, a digital copy of Tess of the D'Urbervilles can be downloaded from Project Gutenberg's site.  There is also a good summary in Wikipedia.  The phases of Tess's life in the novel - "The Maiden", "Maiden No More", "The Rally" et cetera - were flashed onto the backdrop together with the occasional quotation.  Planks of wood were arranged to create scenes such as the dairy in "The Rally" and Stonehenge and, chillingly, the gallows of Wintoncester gaol in "Fulfilment".  

Telling a story which once appeared in a 3-volume novel with 7 performers must have been a challenge for the directors, Alex Harvey and Charlotte Mooney and the producers, Alison King and Carina Simões. The role of Tess was divided between the narrator, Lila Naruse, and Anna Critchlow, who danced, mimed and otherwise represented Tess on stage.  There were powerful performances by Joshua Fraser as Alec D'Urberville (Tess's seducer) and Nat Whittingham as Angel (her husband).  Lauren Jamieson, Victoria Skillen and Leah Wallings played several parts in the show.  They raised a laugh from the audience with their plaintive sigh to attract Angel Clare's attention.  One of the strengths of the show was its score, an amalgam of several musical genres by composer and sound designer Holly Khan.  Choreographer Nathan Johnston interpreted that music imaginatively and spectacularly.   Another strength was Tina Bicât's designs combined with Aideen Malone's lighting and Daniel Denton's projections.

The audience rewarded the performers with a standing ovation.   I have noticed recently that Mancunian audiences are increasingly inclined to rise to their feet for just about anything, but on this occasion, I think it was justified.  For many, it would have been their first experience of contemporary circus, and there were plenty of spectacular acrobatics and aerial displays to impress them.

Finally, I should say a word about Ockham or Occam's Razor, from which the company that staged Tess appears to take its name.  It is a logical concept with applications in mathematics, natural science and philosophy.  The way it was taught to me is that the best way to solve a problem is to reduce it to the minimum number of variables.   It is attributed to the 14th-century English friar, William of Ockham. For the sake of completeness, Ockham is a village in Surrey.   There is a good introduction to the concept on The New Scientist's website by Chris Sims.

Acosta Dance Centre Update

Author Ethan Doyle White  Licence CC BY-SA 4.0, Source Wikimedia Commons

 

I visited the Acosta Dance Centre with Melissa Rayne in September 2023 and wrote about my visit in My Visit to the Acosta Dance Centre on 28 Nov 2025.  Since then, I have been keeping in touch with the Centre through its newsletter ADC Express.

The latest issue of that newsletter announces some fascinating workshops, including in particular A Journey into Afro-Brazilian Arts on Sunday, 15 Jun 2025 between 10:00 and 19:00, the “Alafia” 2025 Afro Cuban Dance Festival between 10:00 on Friday, 11 Jul 2025 and 17:00 on Sunday, 13 July 2025 and Tango Puro between 10:00 on Saturday 9 Aug 2025 and 17:00 on Sunday 10 Aug 2025.  The fee for the last course has been reduced from £120 to £90.  There are also lots of classes from floor barre at 11:00 today to pointe work at 13:15 on 28 Jun.

The Acosta Dance Centre differs from other studios in that it is linked to the Acosta Danza company, the Acosta Dance Foundation and the Academy in Cuba.  It seems to have a dual mission to promote dance at all levels in Cuba as well as the UK.

The Centre is very close to Woolwich Elizabeth line station and a short walk from Woolwich railway and Docklands Light  Railway station.

Let Amsterdam Dance

Amsterdam

Author Benutzer:AlterVista  Licence CC BY-SA 3,0 Source Wikimedia Commons

On 27 Oct 2025, the city of Amsterdam will celebrate the 750th anniversary of its foundation.  Just now, it is in the middle of a year-long festival called "Amsterdam 750" which started on 27 Oct 2024.  As part of the festival, the Dutch National Ballet is presenting a programme of dance called "Heel Amsterdam Danst" which ranges from free performances in the city's districts to a spectacular finale in the Music Theatre.

The performance in the Music Theatre is called "Let Amsterdam Dance".   According to the Dutch National Ballet's website:

"From each of Amsterdam’s eight districts, a group of residents—of all ages and backgrounds, with or without dance experience—will learn a section of In C, a ballet by Sasha Waltz that blends improvisation with choreography. Each group will first present its own unique performance at a festive (and free!) event in their district. Then, on 15 June, all groups will unite for one spectacular final performance on the stage of Dutch National Opera & Ballet."

Sasha Waltz is a German dancer and choreographer, and the founder of the company Sasha Waltz & Guests.

One of the company's works is In C, and it is easier for them than me to explain the piece in their own words in the YouTube video  »In C« by Sasha Waltz & Guests - about the project.  There is more information in The Cosmos of »In C« on the company's website.   The Dutch National Ballet adds:

"Sasha Waltz’s In C consists of 53 choreographic ‘figures’ and gives the dancers both the freedom and the responsibility to experiment with them. All dancers start at figure 1 and end at figure 53, but they may repeat any phrase as often as they like, as long as they don’t drift more than a few phrases apart from each other. Waltz: “As a result, every performance is different, and each dancer is also a choreographer at the same time.”

The Dutch National Ballet also states that In C earned Sasha Waltz the Deutscher Tanzpreis, which is Germany's most prestigious dance award.

The score was composed by the US composer Terry Riley.   Wikipedia describes it as "one of the most successful works by an American composer and a seminal example of minimalism."  When one considers the sheer number of distinguished American composers from Bernstein to Copland, that is saying something.  Designs are by Jasmin Lepore.   Of course, the choreography is by Sasha Waltz.

I have spent many pleasant days in Amsterdam, mostly at the Music Theatre but also at its other auditoriums, museums, historic buildings and restaurants.  I wish all its residents, and in particular the National Ballet a happy 750th anniversary.

The Tempest from Caliban's Perspective

Fyodor Paramonov as Caliban 

 

Shobana Jeyasingh first came to my attention with Bayadère – The Ninth Life, which I saw just over 10 years ago.  In my review, I wrote that Jeyasingh's work "compared and contrasted a modern Indian's perception of one of the classics of Western dance with Théophile Gautier's perception of Indian classical dance." I have recently received a notification from Shobana Jeyasingh Dance about another work by Jeyasingh, which explores the relationship between Europeans and the original inhabitants of the places they enter.

The work is called We Caliban and the company describes it as an "inventive, sideways look at Shakespeare’s The Tempest."  The description continues:

"Shakespeare’s brilliant last play, The Tempest, written as Europe was taking its first step towards colonialism, is a tale about power – exercised weakly, usurped violently, and regained through strategy and showmanship."

It promises to tell the story of The Tempest through the eyes of Caliban, "a minor character in the play whose life is changed forever when the power games of distant lands and unknown peoples are played out in his own remote island, making him a 'monstrous' servant to a new master and his young daughter."

The score is by Thierry Pécou, the designs are by Mayou Trikerioti, the lighting is by Floriaan Ganzevoor and the projections are by Will Duke.  Uzma Hameed is the dramaturge.

The show will open at Snape Maltings on 20 Sep 2025 and then tour Portsmouth, Southampton, York and Warwick.   The performance at York will take place on 17 and 18 Oct 2025 at the Theatre Royal.

Jack White - Composer of Ballet Cymru's "Cinderella" and "Stick in the Mud"

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A few weeks ago, I had the pleasure and privilege of interviewing the Welsh composer Jack White for the Menai Science Park (Bangor University's science park at Gaerwen on Ynys Môn or the Isle of Anglesey). The occasion was World Intellectual Property Day, with the theme IP and Music: Feel the Beat of IP.  My interview with Jack formed part of a webinar which I chaired and reported in Best World IP Day Ever on 8 May 2025 in NIPC Cymru.  The science park very kindly made a YouTube video of my interview entitled Jack White and Jane Lambert.

Jack told me that he was a Newport man.  He was born and went to school in that city.  He read music at Somerville College, Oxford and carried out his doctoral research at Cardiff University.  He first came to my attention when I saw Marc Brew's Stuck in the Mud in Llandudno (see An Explosion of Joy 21 June 2014).  Jack wrote the score for that work, and I have been one of his fans ever since.  My second opportunity to hear Jack's work was in Cinderella, which I reviewed in Ballet Cymru's Cinderella on 15 June 2015.  I loved his score.  Although I admire Prokofiev's score very much, I can understand why Darius James and Amy Doughty commissioned a new score from Jack for their production.  As I said in my review:

"it fitted the ballet like a glove. An arranger or even a musicologist would have had to have taken a meat cleaver to Prokofiev and the result might have been no more satisfactory than the operation on the feet of Cas and Seren."

I wrote a feature on Jack on 6 May 2017. 

Since that feature, Jack has won the Manchester Chorale's contest to find a new work to celebrate its 40th anniversary.  His winning entry, When Voices Rise, was recorded in St Ann's Church, Manchester and appears on the choir's YouTube channel.  This is my favourite work from Jack.   As I said in the interview,  I particularly enjoy the crescendos and cadences in the piece.

Jack is doing a lot of work for choirs now by adapting well-known songs like Love a Lady Tonight for choral use which he mentions in more detail in my interview. 

 

Powerhouse Ballet's Swan Lake Intensive Workshop

Jane Tucker and the Members of Powerhouse Ballet  

Author Gita Mistry  Reproduced with the author's kind permission

 

On Sunday, 25 May 2025, Powerhouse Ballet held an intensive workshop on Swan Lake at Dance Studio Leeds which proved to be one of its most successful events ever.   Many thanks to our guest ballet mistresses, Sara Horner and Jane Tucker of the Academy of Northern Ballet, and to everyone who turned up for making the day so pleasant and memorable.

Sara Horner and the |Dancers at 13:15

Author Sue Pritchard   Reproduced with the author s kind permission

Sara started our workshop at 10:00 with breathing and stretching exercises on pilates mats and towels.  As soon as she judged that we were ready for 3 hours of demanding barre and centre exercises, we brought out the travelling barres.   Sara took us through the usual exercises - pliés, tendus, glissés, ronds de jambe, frappés et cetera.   After cloches and grands battements, we removed the travelling barres and started the centre exercises with tendus and glissés. Sara taught us a beautiful adagio, and we finished with temps levés in anticipation of the grande entrée of the swans in the first lakeside scene of Swan Lake. The last half hour of Sara's slot consisted of pointework exercises for members who had received pointe training and brought their pointe shoes.  The rest of us followed the class on demi-pointe.

Jane took over from Sara at 13:15.  She began by telling us a little bit of the history of Swan Lake. The ballet had not been an immediate success when it was premiered in Moscow.  She told us that critics had complained that Tchaikovsky's music had been too symphonic for ballet.  They had plenty of other niggles before Marius Petipa and Lev Ivanov got to work on the ballet for the Imperial Ballet in St Petersburg. Since then, it has been a favourite of audiences all over the world.

Jane had selected three of my favourite pieces from the ballet: the grande entrée that I mentioned before, the pas de trois from Prince Siegfried's birthday party and the cygnets' dance.  A few years ago, I had dinner with the distinguished dancer Terry Hyde.  He told me on the good authority of Mrs Hyde, who was also a dancer, that members of the corps de ballet have been known to whisper under their breath as they enter the stage:

"I hate Swan Lake! I hate Swan Lake!  It's a terrible bore,"

And then words to the effect that they can't wait for the season to end.  I hasten to add that that story was news to Jane Tucker and also Yvonne Charlton.   Anyway, we loved the swans' entry and other pieces amd can't wait to perform them.  That could be on 15 Nov 2025 at the Chroma Q theatre in Leeds, or possibly even earlier if KNT invite us back to dance in one of their shows.  However, Lauren Savage has just proposed another lovely piece for members to consider. 

We now have something on which to build. Our plans for a summer school in Bangor or York, our own mixed bill and full-length ballet and, eventually, a salaried artistic director are becoming realizable.  However, if we are going to implement any of those plans, we shall need some additional revenues. Up to now, I have sponsored all the company's activities, and I will continue to do so to the same extent as before.  But we can do so much more if others contribute.   Earlier this year, I circulated a business plan to members that contained details of a subscription and charges for some merchandise and services.  Nobody objected to the proposals, and I shall consult on ways of implementing them.  At this point, I stress that members' contributions will fund new services and not those that were previously free. We shall also set up a friends scheme for those who want to support the company but not necessarily dance with us.  Later, we shall canvass for advertising, business sponsorship and grant funding.

We have much to look forward to, including a 2-hour class with Rachel Hickey of the Czech National Ballet at KNT Danceworks on 20 July starting at 14:00. Rachel is a fellow Mancunian who trained at Elmhurst before starting her career in the Olomouc ballet, which was also Emily Joy Smith's company.  Many thanks to Emily Joy for introducing us to Rachel.  I will post a registration card in the next few days.

Life with the Ribbon

Kimberley Hattersley-Barton and the Cast of Life with the Ribbon

© 2025 Kimberley Hattersley-Barton,  All rights reserved. 

 

Kimberley Hattersley-Barton and Friends Life with the Ribbon Unity Hall, Wakefield, 18:00 10 May 2025

For several years, I attended Jane Tucker's improvers class at Northern Ballet.  Although I had studied ballet for many years, I had never been very good at it even when I was young.  I had become even worse by the time I was taking Jane's classes because of the ravages of old age.  Nobody ever said anything to me, but I felt very much like Danny Kaye's ugly duckling.   But there was one young woman who always made me feel welcome, even though she was one of the better dancers.   Her infectious smile and occasional cheery wave across the studio immediately put me at my ease and emboldened me to persevere.  I shall always be grateful to her for her encouragement.

I learned that the young woman's name was Kimberley Hattersley-Barton and that she had been ill for much of her life.   It was only when she posted a notice on Facebook about a charity gala at the Unity Hall in Wakefield that I discovered the precise nature and full extent of her illness.  In her 27 years, she has already had no less than 5 cancer diagnoses, the first of which was when she was just a few months old. The purpose of the gala was to raise funds for three charities, Willow, Beads of Courage and When You Wish Upon a Star.  Each of those charities improves the lives of young persons who are suffering from serious illnesses.

For those who don't know Wakefield, Unity Hall is a prominent 3 storey building off Westgate.  Wakefield's main thoroughfare.  I have learnt that the building used to be the central stores of the Wakefield Industrial Society, which seems to have been some sort of cooperative society. Possibly because the building had been used as a storehouse, there is a cavernous space on the top floor which has been turned into an auditorium.   It was in that space that the gala took place.

The gala consisted of songs and dance routines arranged in two parts and interspersed with speeches and conversations.   There was rather more song than dance, but the dance contributions were impressive.  A troupe of young women referred to in the programme as the "Gala Dance Team" opened and closed the show. They also danced at several other points during the evening. If I am not mistaken, they are the women dressed in pink kneeling in the front row of the photo.   Kimberley joined in at least one of the Gala Dance Team's routines.  There was a remarkably talented young artist called Meg Finan who danced El Tango de Roxanne from Moulin Rouge as a solo.   She also danced to Bring Him Home from Les Misérables sung by Tyler Warren.  Finally, contemporary dance students from the Academy of Northern Ballet performed Revolve. 

Halfway through the first part, a ballet teacher and former dancer called Nic Smart, introduced himself as Kimberley's mentor, who had become a close friend.  Ballet is a tough and demanding discipline.  I once overheard Fiona Noonan (the teacher who led me back to the barre) tell another student that ballet is a tough taskmistress willing you to fail.   The physical and mental skills required to master the art form are valuable life skills.  Dance is obviously important to Kimberley.   It may well be one of the reasons for her resilience

Although this is primarily a dance blog, I must acknowledge the singers, who were also excellent. In the first part of the show, Jemma Alexander sang Let's Hear It for the Boy from Footloose and Take Me or Leave Me from Rent as a duet with Laura Pick.  In the second, she sang As If We Never Said Goodbye from Sunset Boulevard as a solo and For Good from Wicked as a duet with Laura Pick.  Laura Pick also sang No Good Deed and Defying Gravity from the same musical. Michael Markey sang All Coming Back to Me and Oh What A Night.   Aimée Good and Isabel Canning sang That's Life together.   Aimée Good had known Kimberley at secondary school, and she paid a very moving tribute to her former schoolmate. Isabel Canning sang Don't Rain on My Parade from Funny Girl.  Elliott Lee sang Stars from Les Misérables and You'll Be Back from Hamilton.   Tyler Lee sang Power of Love from Back to the Future.  Finally, Matthew Roddis belted our Cry Me A River in part 1 and Sweet Caroline in part 2 so compellingly that he brought many audience members to their feet.

The Life with the Ribbon gala was a resounding success, for which its producer, Kimberley, deserves much of the credit.   Everything had been rehearsed well.  The show ran to time, each item following on slickly from the one before.   The applause that the artists received at the curtain call was thunderous.  A lot of happy people descended onto Westgate that evening,

Here Be Dragons

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Eun-Me Ahn Dance Company Dragons Alhambra Theatre, Bradford 22 Mar 2025 19:30

The phrase "Hic Sunt Dracones" (Here be Dragons) appeared on an early 16th-century globe to indicate unexplored regions. I mention it because the show is called Dragons.   That early cartographer's term is apt to describe the performance of the Eun-Me Ahn Dance Company at the Bradford Alhambra on 22 Mar 2025 because it defied classification.  It was presented by Dance Consortium as contemporary dance, but it was also a light show with holograms and special effects.

Eun Me Ahn, who was born in Seoul in 1963, is a South Korean dancer and choreographer. Her company consists of 7 Korean dancers.   She describes her company's work in an interview for Dance Consortium on YouTube.  For its tour of the UK, her company has teamed up with 5 young artists from other East Asian countries, all of whom were born at the turn of the millennium.

The show starts quietly with a single figure slowly crossing the stage, manipulating what seems to be a pneumatic tube.   After exiting to the right, a second figure appears and then more.  In the course of the show, still and moving images are projected onto a gauze screen at the front of the stage.  These seem to mingle with the dancers so that it is impossible to distinguish between illusion and reality.

To describe the show as controversial would be an understatement.   A couple from Skegness whom I had met in the bar before the show did not appreciate it at all.  Others found it exhilarating.  Like the unknown regions in the 16th-century globe, it was on the edge of expectations.   

I wish I could say more about Eun-Me Ahn and her company. I could not buy a programme in the theatre and I found very little on the internet.   My most intriguing find is a page of links to Dragons and other works on the Gadja Productions website.   Some of these have very odd names like "Dancing Grandmothers" and "Dancing Middle-Aged Men".  I recommend North Korea Dance, which combines marching with fan and other traditional folk dances.

Cinders in Sunderland

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Birmingham Royal Ballet Cinderella Sunderland Empire 15 Mar 2025 14:00 

Between 6 Feb and 12 Apr 2025, the Birmingham Royal Ballet took Sir David Bintley's Cinderella on a nationwide tour.  I caught it at the Sunderland Empire on 15 March 2025.  I had already reviewed it in Bintley's Best on 2 Mar 2017.  I wrote in that article that I liked everything that I had seen of Bintley's work, but I thought Cinderella was the best.  That is still my view now. 

The reason I admire the ballet so much is that it tells the Grimm brothers' story (with a few variations) through Bintley's spectacular choreography to Prokofiev's beautiful music with John Macfarlane's sumptuous designs and David Finn's ingenious lighting. The Cinderella Relaxed Performance YouTube video is a good introduction to and overview of the ballet.   In Cinderella: An Interview with Sir David Bintley. Sir David confirms Mark Monahan's programme notes that Sir David agreed to create the ballet if Macfarlane agreed to do the designs. Monahan reports: "Lo and behold, John said yes."  Readers will recall that Macfarlane designed Liam Scarlett's Swan Lake, a recording of which I mentioned in Swan Lake at the Leeds Showcase on 30 May 2025.  The importance of those designs is explained in Cinderella: John Macfarlane's Designs.

In his programme notes, Mark Monahan observed that many choreographers had created versions of Cinderella, but it was Sir Frederick Ashton's for the Royal Ballet that "cast the longest shadow". It was important to Bintley that his company's Cinderella should be distinctive.  One important difference is that Bintley's stepsisters are danced by two young women, whereas Sir Frederick and Sir Robert Helpmann danced the stepsisters in the tradition of the English pantomime dame. As the stepsisters' video shows, those young women were quite beastly to Cinderella and, sometimes, even to each other. Ashton and Helpmann were absurd but far from menacing.  Bintley retained the fairy godmother, tradesmen and seasonal fairies (or at least the seasons) in his ballet, introducing also a frog coachman and lizard attendants.

Beatrice Parma danced the title role with flair and grace.  One of the most satisfying moments in the show is when she momentarily turned on her tormentors with a broom.  Others were, of course, her arrival at the ball, her duet with the prince, her producing the missing slipper and her final dance with the prince. Enrique Bejarano Vidal was an impressive prince with his sweeping lifts and powerful jumps.  Isabella Howard was a dazzling fairy godmother.  Having seen Oscar Kempsey-Fagg at An Evening with Ashton on 24 Jan 2023 in Elmhurst Ballet School, which I discussed in An "Evening with Ashton" and the Launch of an English Junior Company on 30 Jan 2023, it is good to see his progress in the company.

Sunderland has a beautiful Edwardian theatre capable of accommodating an audience of 2,200.  It was opened by Vesta Tilly in 1907.  It has a massive stage and excellent acoustics.  It is said to be haunted by the ghosts of Sid James and Vesta Tilly.  Neither spectre appeared on my visit.   Sunderland has a population of just over 277,000.  It used to be known for shipbuilding.  Nowadays, it is better known for making Nissan cars.   It has a university, a football club and beaches.

Attending My First Friends' Rehearsal

 

Royal Ballet Romeo and Juliet (Rehearsal) Royal Ballet & Opera, 4 March 2025, 12:30

I have been a Friend of the Royal Ballet & Opera off and on for nearly 60 years, but I had never attended a Friends' rehearsal before 4 Mar 2025.  That is because I have spent most of my life outside London, and Friends' rehearsals tend to take place on weekdays during working hours.  

On 23 Feb 2025, I was invited to give a talk to the students at  King's College at 18:30 on 4 Mar 2025.  As this was an evening event, I felt justified in taking the afternoon off in lieu.  I checked the Friends' page of the Royal Ballet & Opera's website.  There seemed to be a few spare seats scattered about the auditorium, but the website would not let me book any of them.   I called the box office and was told that the rehearsal was sold out, but a few returns might come back on sale.  That proved to be the case and I secured the very last standing room only place at the very top of the auditorium.   

The view of the stage from that eyrie was surprisingly good. I have always enjoyed good eyesight, and I could recognize some of the more distinctive dancers and follow their movements, though obviously not their expressions. Had I been casting the show, I would have selected Francesca Hayward and Cesar Corrales for the title roles.  It was they whom we got. Of all the principals in the Royal Ballet, they are the ones who most closely look the part.   I remember Christopher Gable and Lynn Seymour in those roles when I first took an interest in ballet.  Though I have never seen a better Romeo than Gable or indeed a better Juliet than Seymour, several other dancers have come close.  Hayward and Corrales are among the closest.

The rest of the cast was also impressive.  Christopher Saunders was an imperious Lord Capulet full of gravitas and swagger.   Also full of swagger was  Benet Gartside as Tybalt.   Even though everyone in the audience knew the outcome, Tybalt's sword fights with Mercutio (Daichi Ikarashi) and Romeo were gripping.  Mercutio's death throes as he stumbled around the stage, mistaking his sword for a lute or mandolin, were poignant. The role of the nurse is often overlooked in many productions, but it is important.  It is she who shares Juliet's excitement at her first grown-up ball.  She delivers Juliet's note to Romeo and is mobbed by the Montagues for her pains.  She accompanies Juliet to Friar Lawrence.  She tries to defend Juliet from a bigamous marriage.   Kristen McNally discharged that role perfectly.

It had been some years since I had last seen the Royal Ballet's Romeo and Juliet, and one of the features that I remember from previous times was a gorgeous backcloth by Nicholas Georgiadis that reminded me of the work of Leon Bakst. I was looking out for that backcloth, but couldn't spot it.  That made me wonder whether Georgiadis had redesigned the set or whether I had imagined that backcloth. 

As always, the orchestra was magnificent.   The conductor on this occasion was Koen Kessels.  

I was unable to return to London to see a live performance of Romeo and Juliet at Covent Garden, but I did see a recording of the live broadcast on 23 March 2025 at the Leeds Showcase.  That was another polished production with a different cast.  Fumi Kaneko was Juliet, Vadim Muntagirov was Romeo, Benet Gartside was Lord Capulet, Ryoichi Hirano was Tybalt, Francisco Serrano was Mercutio, Thomas Whitehead doubled as Friar Lawrence and Lord Montague and Olivia Cowley was the nurse.  Kessels also conducted the orchestra.

As I said in Swan Lake at the Leeds Showcase on 30 May 2024, a screening is not the same as a live performance (probably because there is no interaction between artists and audience) but there are compensations.  We could follow Juliet's emotions through the expressions on Kaneko's face.  It was clear from her interview that she understands Juliet very well.  It was also good to hear Lady MacMillan.  The Friends' rehearsal combined with the film was the next best thing to seeing the ballet live on stage. 

Swan Lake at the Leeds Showcase

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Royal Ballet Swan Lake  Leeds Showcase, 2 March 2025, 14:00

On 27 Feb and 2 Mar 2025, cinemas across the United Kingdom screened a recording of Liam Scarlett's Swan Lake that had been made at the Royal Ballet and Opera House on 24 Apr 2024.  With Yasmine Naghdi as Odette-Odile, Matthew Ball as Siegfried and Thomas Whitehead as von Rothbart, it was a very polished production.  I saw it at the Leeds Showcase, a multiscreen complex in a shopping and entertainment centre a short distance from the M62. 

Watching images of dancers on a screen reminds me of the prisoners in Plato's cave, but the screen has a few advantages.  One is an opportunity to hear the artists discuss their work.  That was something that the Bolshoi did exceptionally well because they employed the TV journalist Katerina Novikova to interview dancers and others in three languages.  The quality of the Royal Ballet's interviews has improved significantly since Petroc Trelawny was engaged.  Trelawny also brings out the best in Darcey Bussell, who contributes her memories of her performances.

One illuminating interview was with Naghbi.   She discussed Legnani's 32 fouettés in the seduction scene, which is the most spectacular bit of the ballet.  She likened the movement to that of a plane and herself to a pilot.  Naghdi was a powerful Odile but also a sensitive Odette.  Not every ballerina can carry off the two roles equally well, but Naghdi was one who did.

Naghdi was supported gallantly by Ball, a strong but graceful dancer. The role of Rothbart has been greatly extended by Scarlett in that he is head of the royal household as well as an evil magician.  His appearance reminds me of President Putin, whoever dances the role. This is a great character role, which Whitehead performs well.

Swan Lake has divertissements throughout the show.  I particularly liked the cygnets (Mica Bradbury, Ashley Dean, Sae Maeda and Yu Hang), the older swans (Hannah Grennell and Olivia Cowley), the national dances and especially the Neapolitans (Isabella Gasparini and Leo Dixon).

Sadly, the producer of this version of Swan Lake is no longer with us, but Gary Avis, Laura Morera and Samantha Raine have implemented Scarlett's vision. Often overlooked is the orchestra which is one of the strengths of the Royal Ballet. It was as impressive as ever conducted on this occasion by Martin Georgiev. 

Should this recording ever be screened again or otherwise made available it is well worth watching.

Factory International Hosts Crystal Pite and Simon McBurney

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Nederlands Dans Theater and Complicité  Figures in Extinction  Aviva Studios, Factory International, Manchester 21 Feb 2025, 19:30

I had been looking forward to a show like Nederlands Dans Theater's Figures in Extinction in Manchester's Factory International ever since 7 Dec 2014, when George Osborn announced a £78 million investment in a new arts venue for Manchester as part of the Coalition Government's Northern Powerhouse initiative (see Factory To Go Ahead  13 Jan 2017 and the posts linked to that article).   I had high hopes on 11 Dec 2014 when I wrote  Let's bring the Royal Ballet to The Factory, Manchester.  They were exceeded by the premiere of Requiem, the third part of Crystal Pite and Simon McBurney's collaboration at Factory International's Aviva Studios on 19 Feb 2025.

I attended the evening performance of Figures in Extinction on 21 Feb 2025.   It was my first visit to Factory International. According to Wikipedia, the venue can accommodate up to 7,000 people in its "5,000 flexible 'warehouse' space" and 2,000-seat auditorium.  There is no shortage of bars, merchandise outlets and other attractions to explore during intervals.  The show took place in the Avviva Studios auditorium.  Although I was in the back row, I had an excellent view of the stage, and the acoustics were excellent.   Even though my mobility is limited, I had no trouble accessing my seat.  There were plenty of lifts and escalators as well as helpful and courteous ushers.

Figures in Extinction started with the list or [1.0].  There was a dialogue on a screen between "Simon" and "Crystal", though I did not recognize the voices as those of McBurney and Pite. Dancers represented the animals, plants and glaciers that have disappeared as a result of climate change.  The animal that has stuck in my memory is the Pyrenean ibex with its distinctive curved horns.  The top photograph in  An Introduction to Figures in Extinction shows how the species was represented on stage.  A child asked plaintively whether the animals had gone away and whether any were ever coming back.   According to the online programme, the text was taken from Why Look at Animals? by John Berger.  The score was composed by Owen Belton, who has collaborated with Pite for many years.  There were also excerpts from Perfume Genius's Normal Song and Blick Bassy's Aké.   A flavour of the work can be savoured from NDT's YouTube video Figures in Extinction [1.0] - by Crystal Pite with Simon McBurney (NDT 1 | Dreams 360).

Figures in Extinction [2.0] but then it comes to the humans explored the possibility of the extinction of our species.  Suuited human beings in their offices were scrutinized just like the disappearing species in the list.   The music was by Benjamin Grant with fragments of Claude Debussy's La Mer, Dmitri Shostakovich's Tenth Symphony, Johan Sebastian Bach's Concerto for 2 Violins in D Minor, Nils Frahm's Less, Alfred Schnittke's Cello Sonata No. 1: I Largo, II Presto, Jim Perkins's The North Wind, Owen Belton's Extinction Crescendo and additional music by Josh Sneesby.   The work was inspired by Iain McGilchrist's The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World, extracts of which were read during the performance.  Some idea of this part of the show can be obtained from the video Figures in Extinction [2.0] but then you come to the humans - Simon McBurney with Crystal Pite

For me, the most disturbing part of the show was Requiem.   A voice spoke about space and time and the relationship between the living and the dead.  It continued that the dead surround the living.   The dead experience timelessness, though, sometimes, so do the living in extreme circumstances, one of which could be dying.  There was a scene of a patient wired up on monitors.  A staff nurse and trainee changed the patient's bedding, almost manhandling him.  A family entered the patient's hospital room, squabbling with each other.  Somehow lifted the mood of an otherwise depressing theme was lifted by a luminous backdrop, a photograph of which appears in the online programme.   The score was by Owen Belton with fragments of Fauré and Mozart's Requiems as well as other works.   A sample of the piece is contained in Figures in Extinction [3.0] requiem,

This is a profound, multi-layered work which cannot be appreciated properly by watching a single performance  (if, indeed, any worthwhile show can).  Figures in Extinction will be performed at the Internationaal Theater in Amsterdam tonight, tomorrow and Saturday before proceeding to Helsinki in April and Luxembourg in June.  It is well worth seeing.

My Third Attendance at the Royal Ballet's "Onegin"

https://www.rbo.org.uk/tickets-and-events/onegin-details

 

Royal Ballet Onegin Royal Ballet and Opera House, 15 Feb 2025, 13:00

Cranko's Onegin is a compelling watch.   its subject is a man who toys with the emotions of two young women and their champion kills a man in a duel without any apparent legal or social consequences and attempts to seduce a married woman in her boudoir whom he had previously humiliated.   An utter rotter who deserves to be horsewhipped and yet his only punishment is to be sent packing.   My sense of justice was outraged.

I had seen the Royal Ballet's production twice before (see Onegin: the most enjoyable performance that I have seen at the House since Sibley and Dowell 21 Feb 2016 and The Royal Ballet's "Onegin" 8 March 2020).  The ballet is performed by many of the world's leading companies and I have published reviews of the Dutch National Ballet's version by Remco van Grevenstein (see Dutch National Ballet's Onegin 11 March 2017) and La Scala's by Helen McDonough (A Tale of Two Onegins 12 Nov 2017).  The aspects of the ballet that had impressed me in the past had been Cranko's choreography, Stolze's score and Rose's designs.  They impressed me again but on this occasion, I also had memories of Matthew Golding and Thiago Soares as Onegin to compare to Matthew Ball who danced the role yesterday.

Ball was a very convincing Onegin.  He is an excellent actor and his looks remind me very much of Alexander Pushkin's image of his creation.  I have learnt a lot about Onegin's character from each of the performances that I have attended but yesterday he came to life to me.  In fact, Ball reminded me of all the Onegins I have met in real life and raised my indignation to the point of anger.  On the train back to Wakefield I posted to Facebook a reflection that cads like Albrecht and Onegin seem to escape the consequences of their wrongdoing.  Sarah Lambert pointed out that Albrecht gets his comeuppance in Dada Masilo's version which I reviewed in A Brace of Giselles while Bo Zhang observed pertinently:

"I don’t see why ballet the artistic form, instead of the dubious ideology of the authors/writers of these stories, has to bear the blame."

Perhaps because he is the most recent Onegin that I have seen, Ball was the most memorable.  But then he must know the ballet like the back of his hand as he danced Lensky when I first saw the workin 2016.

The other leading characters resonated with me too.   Just as Ball had been Lensky 9 years ago Yasmine Naghdi who had been Olga in 2016 became Tatiana yesterday.  I think she was the most memorable Tatiana I have ever seen.   Again because she is a superb dance actor.   Osipova was a great princess and Itziar Mendizabal was a vulnerable and impressionable young woman but Naghdi was impressive both as the young Tatiana and the grown-up one.   Leo Dixon won the audience's hearts as Lensky.  We felt his ire as Onegin flirted with a playful Olga.   In previous reviews, I had overlooked Olga as simply Tataian's empty-headed sister but Olga had to grow up quickly when Onegin picked up Lensky's gauntlet. It is actually quite a substantial role and Anna Rose O’Sullivan who danced Olga explored every aspect of it. I had not previously noted Harris Bell but I shall follow him in future because of his impressive role as Prince Gremin.

I learnt a lot about Pushkin's work yesterday.  Possibly as much as anyone could short of learning Russian and reading the original text.

Hampson's Triumph

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Scottish Ballet The Nutcracker Theatre Royal Newcastle, 6 Feb 2025 19:30

I was so delighted with the first act of Christopher Hampson's production of The Nutcracker that I tweeted in the interval that the company that had brought me my favourite Swan Lake had also created my favourite Nutcracker.  Immediately after I had clicked the "post" button I reflected on my rashness as I had only seen half of the ballet.  I need not have worried because the second act was every bit as good as the first. 

Scottish Ballet already had a fine version of The Nutcracker that had been created by its founder Peter Darrell in 1972.  I saw it in Edinburgh just over 10 years ago and reviewed it in Like Meeting an Old Friend After So Many Years on 4 Jan 2015.  Hampson seems to have retained the best bits of Darrell's version such as Brotherston's designs while inserting a few innovations like casting Drosselmeyer as a woman.  At this point, I might explain that there is a difference between an innovation which adds a new dimension to a ballet and a gimmick which is simply change for change's sake.  In this production, a female Drosselmeyer brought extra magic and mystery and even a hint of menace to the role possibly because of humankind's inherent fear of witches.

According to the programme notes several of the dancers added to Hampson's choreography.  One of those contributors was Sophie Laplane who has created some unforgettable work for Ballet Black.  Her dialogue between patient and therapist in Click illustrates succinctly the difference between coincidence and causation so absent in contemporary transatlantic political discourse.  She contributed to the Russian divertissement presenting the dancers as playful and slightly chaotic wearing candy cane costumes rather than as slightly sinister Cossacks.  Other contributors were Javier Androu to the Spanish dance, Jessica Fyfe to the French (itself an innovation) and Nicholas Shesmith to the English dance which I think was another innovation.  Their contributions added to the freshness and the exuberance of the second act.

For some reason or other the Arabian dance was dropped from Act II though I think I recognized the music in Act I if my memory is not playing tricks on me. In other productions, it is one of my favourite divertissements.  It is not a long dance and I would love to have seen what Hampson and Co would have made of it.

Turning to last night's show, the Snow Queen was danced by the excellent Marge Hendrick who reminds me so much of the late and great Elaine McDonald.  Hendrick's performance at Northern Ballet's 50th Anniversary Celebration Gala was the high point of that evening for me.   Her performance at that gala moistened my eyes then and her dancing did so again yesterday.  

The other great female role in the traditional Nutcracker is Sugar Plum who is sometimes danced by Clara or Marie in some productions.  It was performed exquisitely by soloist Gina Scott.  

Evan Loudon, another of my favourites, was the gallant Nutcracker.  

I was awed by Madeleine Squire's magic as Madame Drosselmeyer.  She is a magnificent character dancer and I look forward to seeing her in other roles.  

Ava Morrison was a delightful Clara and a realistic one in that she was not all goody-goody unlike her counterpart in other productions, She was as much responsible for damaging the nutcracker as Jamie Drummond, her brother Fritz.  

 My one "bravo" of the evening was directed at Thomas Edwards after some amazing fouettés and sautés.  

I also enjoyed Ishan Mahabir-Stokes's performance as King Rat.   

All danced well in this performance and all deserve congratulations.  Northumbrians are not known for wearing their hearts on their sleeves and the standing ovation that the cast received attests to the excellence of last night's performance.  

The company will remain in Newcastle until tomorrow.   This is the last stop of its Scottish and Newcastle tour,   if you can lay your hands on one of the very scarce remaining tickets for the last few shows you will not be disappointed,

Carlos Acosta's Nutcracker in Havana

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Acosta Danza Nutcracker in Havana The Lowry, 27 Jan 2025, 19:30

Carlos Acosta's Nutcracker in Havana had been promoted as a reimagining of Ivanov's ballet.  That filled me with trepidation as I negotiated Manchester's rush hour traffic because reworking a well-known and well-loved ballet is not easy to do.  David Dawson pulled it off with his Swan Lake for Scottish Ballet as did Ted Brandsen with his Coppelia but I regret that I can't say the same for David Nixon's Swan Lake or the Coppelia of Morgann Runacre-Temple and Jessica Wright.

Although the show started with projections of Havana and an ancient American convertible lumbering across the stage Nutcracker in Havana was not so very different from any other Nutcracker. While the Stahlbaums' Christmas party was set in Havana and the score was orchestrated with Latin American rhythms and harmonies using a lot of percussion and such instruments as the Cuban tres and lute, the story was followed faithfully even down to the snow scene and the children's choir. All the characters were recognizable and the choreography retained such highlights as Sugar Plum's pas de deux with her prince.

The Sugar Plum Fairy in this production was Laura Rodríguez a former principal of Camaguey Ballet,  She was partnered by Alejandro Silva, a former principal of the Cuban National Ballet.  The ballet revolves around the adventures of Clara and Drosselmeyer.  Clara was danced with vivacity and charm by Adria Dia. Drosselmeyer, who was referred to as Tío or Uncle Elías Drosselmeyer in the cast list, was danced by Alexander Verona.  According to the programme notes he had made his way to Miami 30 years earlier where he acquired his fortune.  He performed some spectacular conjuring tricks and it was those tricks that impressed one member of the audience who was otherwise critical of the show.

 

Brandy Martinez was Clara's naughty little brother Frirz who could not keep his fingers off her Christmas present.   He also took part in a very athletic Russian dance in Act II.  Denzel Francis was King Rat, Clara's grandfather, a cook and one of the very energetic and almost aggressive dancers in the Chinese dance.   The other dancer in that divertissement was Leandro Fernandez who was also one of the children.  Everyone in the show danced well and if I were to mention everyone who impressed me this review would look like a telephone directory.

I enjoyed the show and so it seemed did most of the audience who rewarded the cast with a standing ovation. Much of the success should be attributed to Nina Dunn's set designs and projections, Angelo Alberto's costumes and Pepe Gavilondo Péon's arrangements of the score.

I had previously seen Acosta Danza's 100% Cuban in 2022.  That was a mixed bill.  Staging a full-length classical ballet is a more complex proposition. It demonstrates how much the company has developed in the last three years.  Their UK base is the Acosta Dance Centre in Woolwich which I visited in 2023.  Though they are a Cuban company they are contributing much to dance and dance education in this country.  

The Other Christmas Carol

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Finnish National Ballet A Christmas Carol YouTube Arte Concert 23 Dec 2024

In this country, we hear much about the Royal Danish Ballet and the Royal Swedish Ballet, but not much about their neighbours across the Gulf of Bothnia.  One of the artists I saw on my recent visit to Tallinn was Francesca Loi who danced Cinders's stepmother in Cristiano Principato's Cinderella.  I looked her up and found that she was with the Finnish National Ballet.  I explored her company's website and discovered it was founded just over 100 years ago.  It performs in a beautiful modern opera house.  It has a very interesting repertoire and its Artistic Director is Javier Torres,  Mr Principato, a soloist with the Estonian Ballet, has urged me to break my journey in Helsinki and watch the Finnish National Ballet on stage the next time I am in his area. 

One of its productions that I would love to have seen is David Bintley's A Christmas Carol.  It was performed in Helsinki between 30 Nov and 30 Dec 2024.  The next best thing to a live performance is watching them on TV.  That has just become possible because a recording of their performance will be hosted on Arte Concdert's YouTube channel until 27 Feb 2925.  I watched the video last night less than a month after seeing Northern Ballet's production at the Leeds Grand Theatre.  As I said in A Christmas Carol - A Reflection of a Golden Age 19 J\n 2025, Northern Ballet's production is one of my favourite ballets.  It is impossible to compare a video with a work on stage but if I could see Bentley's work in a theatre I believe I would admire it just as much.

Apart from the similarities that are to be expected in a ballet that is inspired by the same novella and shares the same leading characters Bintley's ballet is quite different from Gable and Moriconi's.  The score is by Sally Beamish who also wrote the music for David Bintley's The Tempest and David Nixon's The Little Mermaid.  I described her score for The Tempest as "enchanting" in my review of that ballet and I think her score for The Little Mermaid is one of the reasons for my headline Nixon's Little Mermaid - Perhaps His Best Work Yet in my review of Nixon's work.  Beamish discusses her score for A Christmas Carol in From a Sinister Atmosphere to Joyful Christmas Sounds.  The sets, costumes and projection design were by Anna Fleischle and some of the scenes were arresting.  The Christmas Yet To Come scene was literally spine-chilling even on a flat-screen telly.  Mark Henderson designed the lighting which was mood-changing even in the recording and would have been even more so in the theatre,

Bentley followed Dickens's story faithfully but he introduced some additional scenes such as Ali Baba, Long John Silver and Dox Quixote from Scrooge's childhood imaginings.  In his flashbacks to Scrooge's childhood and youth, Bintely explains how Scrooge developed as he did.  Something that I never fully appreciated from the original text.  Bimntley weaves in interesting new characters like three Jack Tars who are introduced by Tiny Tim's "I Saw Three Ships,"   Bintley's divertissements are often the strongest features of his ballets and they certainly distinguished this ballet.

In the film, Paul Murphy of Birmingham Royal Ballet conducted the Finnish National Opera Orchestra but I think Aku Sorensen directed them most other nights,  Scrooge was danced by Johan Pakkanen, Young Scrooge by Martin Nudo, Belle by Abigail Sheppard, Bob Cratchit by Frans Valkama and Tiny Tim by Janne Kouhia. I surmise that he is a student at the National Opera and Ballet School.  He discharged a very demanding role for a young artist with flair.  It included singing the first lines of a traditional English carol and calling for a blessing in a foreign language,  No doubt that is why he warned one of the loudest cheers at the curtain call. 

I strongly recommend this recording to my readers and I hope that the powers that be will bring this interesting company to London one of these days. There are some great photos and videos on the National Ballet's website including a short talk by Bintley.  Bintley comes from the next village but one from mine in the Holme Valley and I have twice had the pleasure of meeting him at the London Ballet Circle.  I was a frequent visitor to the Hippodrome when he was the Birmingham Royal Ballet's Director, and I am probably one of his biggest fans.

Powerhouse Ballet on a Roll

The Cast of Elysian Moments at ChromaQ Theatre, Leeds 23 Nov 2024

 

Last year was Powerhouse Ballet's best ever.  We danced an extract from La Sylphide at KNT Danceworks' 15th-anniversary gala in July and contributed Emily Joy Smith Elysian Moments to Dance Studio Leeds's Celebration of Dance at ChromaQ Theatre in Leeds in November.  

We have now performed nine times in public, twice at the Manchester Dancehouse, 6 times at ChromaQ and once at York St John University.  We have held workshops on The Waltz of the Flowers with Jane Tucker,  The Fairy Variations with  Beth Meadway, Alex Hallas's Concerto Jenkins and Morning from Grieg's Peer Gynt with Yvonne Charlton,  We have hosted Ballet Cymru's workshops on Dylan Thomas and Giselle.  We have held company classes almost every month since we started including during the lockdown when we welcomed Maria Chugai, Shannon Lilly and Krystal Lowe as guest ballet mistresses.

Our next step is to hold our own show which will probably be a mixed bill or a complete act of one of the romantic ballets we have learned.   We shall probably need to do this in conjunction with one or more partners which could be a dance studio or even another small company.   That will require a lot of planning and corporate reorganization.   Right now the company is a group of friends who enjoy dancing but we shall put it on a more formal basis in the course of the year.   I am exploring the possibility of charitable status for the company and converting Terpsichore into a private limited company.

Up to now, the company has relied entirely on sponsorship.  That source of funding will not dry up but we need to supplement it with a Friends scheme whereby we shall invite the company's members and well-wishers around the country to make a modest annual contribution.  We shall also need to monetize some of our services which will include smartening the appearance of this blog, publishing a regular print version, reviving Stage Door and charging for workshops and some of our other activities.

In the longer term, we shall seek grant funding and commercial sponsorship.  I have already made contact with Arts Council England and the Arts Council of Wales.  While it is impractical to expect funding from that quarter in the medium term it is never too early to prepare the ground.   I have also put out feelers to organizations that already fund the arts to find out what we must do to qualify for their patronage.

Dancers need to train regularly with each other which is why every company in the world holds regular company classes.  However, our membership is spread over an area that stretches from Hull to Holyhead.  It is very difficult for members who have demanding professional and domestic commitments to travel long distances.  When I have tried to hold classes in outlying areas in venues like Bolton or Myndd Isa the response has been disappointing.   Obviously, the solution is to hold regular monthly classes in Leeds and Chester as well as in Manchester but these will have to rely on non-sponsorship funding.  If we get that right there is no reason why Powerhouse Ballet branded activities cannot take place anywhere in the UK or beyond and not just Manchester and Leeds.