Melbourne City of Dance

Photo © The Australian Ballet Studios

Since arriving in Australia, the last three weeks have flown by and I have settled into life in Melbourne. Melbourne is a really cool city, very clean, easy to navigate and arty. But the biggest thing I have noticed is that there is a massive dance scene here. There are adult classes in everything from ballroom to hip-hop to ballet, and a good range of levels.  

Obviously, I’ve come to Australia for my placement in costume department at the Australian Ballet and Opera Australia, gaining industry experience for when I graduate. But that hasn’t stopped me from taking the opportunity to take class out here; because of course it is important to take class to keep good form.

The first dance class I took part in was actually a Salsa class at The Salsa Foundation. I was invited to join in by a guy I met on my flight to Melbourne from Hong Kong.  Having touched the basics of Salsa whilst on holiday in Cuba three years ago, I was a little apprehensive as to whether I would be able to keep up with the class. Especially as I took part in a Level 1.5 class – focussing on teaching partner work, lots of turns and cross body leads – so the basic steps are essential!

The class was extremely busy, there was a surprising male turn out, but as to be expected women dominated the class.  

They split the group into three lines of men and women. The excess women were spaced in-between couples, so at points you would dance by yourself, as the women would rotate and change partners roughly every 5 minutes or so. I feel this is a good way to learn the steps as you’re not always with the same partner. I also think it is great that rather than some women learning the male steps you really had a chance to get the female steps ingrained into your mind. It was a fun evening, I managed to keep up and it was enjoyable to let my body move loosely and freely for a change. Rather relaxing. The class cost $15, which I think is pretty reasonable, as the instructors are really informative and entertaining. The beginner’s class is also free. 

Following this, I have taken a few weekly ballet classes, repertoire classes and pointe classes. The classes I have attended are at the Australian Ballet Studios and City Dance Centre in Armadale (south Melbourne).

The Australian Ballet Studios is a great option when looking for classes in the city centre of Melbourne, they offer Pilates, Jazz, Contemporary, Ballet and Repertoire.  They also have a fantastic set of teachers – incredibly knowledgeable professionals. You really are getting your moneys worth here. When you register to take classes, your first week with them is absolutely free, which is why I took the opportunity to get involved in so many classes after that each class has a set price. A ballet class is $28, but you can buy class passes, which work out cheaper in the long run.

To take part in repertoire class you have to take a Level 2 or Level 3 ballet class beforehand – this is important so that you obviously warm up, but also so that you can keep up with learning the choreography.  I’ve been taking the level 2 classes, which is the equivalent of an intermediate class. Technically challenging but not too overwhelming. Like in any class you start at the barre with plies and tendus, grand battements and frappes too, amongst other steps.  After the barre, we then move into the centre and do a lovely port de bras, a variation of turns and jumps. The truly wonderful thing about the classes here is that there is a live piano accompaniment – something I haven’t experienced much, so that really has given me the opportunity to work on my musicality.

The teachers I’ve had for repertoire and ballet have been Jessica Thompson, Justine Miles and Roland Cox. In repertoire with Justine Miles we have been learning Balanchine’s Serenade and with Jessica Thompson we have been learning Seguidilla from Don Quixote. Both are very challenging pieces but fun to learn.

On a Saturdays, I have been attending ballet class and pointe class at City Dance Centre. The classes cost $20 for ballet and $10 for pointe (this however is the student price, a full price list is available here). The classes are taught by Sakura Shimizu who has danced with the Hamburg Ballet and Singapore Dance Theatre to name a few. Ballet class again as to be expected starts with barre and works into the centre with a variety of travelling sequences.

Pointe class has been particularly enjoyable for me and I feel I have made a lot of progress. I only started doing pointe in November, doing only 10 minutes at the end of class, so I feel rather pleased that I am able to keep up with a 30-minute class.  We start pointe facing the barre with tendus working our intrinsic muscles and getting our feet warm. Then rises and relevsés in first and second position, followed by échappés and rises in fifth.  Next we pas de boureé with the foot coming to sur le cou-de-pied (Not necessarily the correct name for the step – but that was the only way I could think of how to describe it!). We then turn side on to the barre and pique to retire travelling forward three times. On the final piqué  we come up to arabesque. Following this we move into the centre and do rises in first and échappés again – this I find particularly challenging without the barre but I feel I am making progress and getting stronger. We have then been doing preparation for pique turns and courus across the floor. I really love doing the courus as I feel so elegant and dainty, like a fairy (despite the loud noise my Grishko's make).

There are many other dance schools in Melbourne that offer ballet classes, but as I don’t have a lot of money and I like repetition, I have happily settled into taking the classes at the Australian Ballet Studios and City Dance Centre.

With just a week and a half left in Melbourne I will be sad to leave these classes behind. I’m also incredibly sad that my placement with the Australian Ballet is coming to a close at the end of this week. I have loved every minute working with the wonderful wardrobe department, gaining incredible experience, which I will value for the rest of my life. Unfortunately, although I would love to be able to share what costumes I have been working on for the ballet, I am not publicly allowed to do so. I would hope that you as readers would respect and understand this. 

Most importantly, I hope that this post will give you a good insight into the dance scene in Melbourne.

Amelia x

CinemaLive's Coppelia

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The Australian Ballet, Coppelia, 12 Dec 2016, Sydney Opera House

Yesterday, I sacrificed my Wednesday evening ballet class at Northern Ballet Academy to see a performance of Coppelia by the Australian Ballet that had been recorded at the Sydney Opera House on 12 Dec 2016. Because of the time difference between Sydney and Leeds I did not expect it to be a live performance. We or the Australian performers and audience would have to get up at some unearthly hour for that to be possible and what would be the point as it would still be images on a screen rather than the interaction between artist and audience which make live performances so precious. Nevertheless, I did expect it to be more like an encore screening of a live performance by say Pathé Live or the Royal Opera House rather than just another ballet film.

The film was distributed by CinemaLive which describes itself on its About Us page as "leading producers and distributors of Event Cinema, reaching thousands of screens worldwide, allowing fans to see world-class music, theatre, opera, arts and other special live events at their local cinema." The company was founded in 2008 and holds a number of industry records including the highest grossing music event at the British and Irish box office which happened to be André Rieu: Christmas with André. Although CinemaLive resisted the temptation to flood the screen with gushing twitter messages and irritating presenters that mar other some of their competitors' transmissions they still have a lot to learn about filming ballet.

The screening started with an aerial view of Sydney with the camera zooming into the Opera House followed by a greeting from Ako Kondo and Chengwu Guo who danced Swanilda and Franz in the performance. After a few words from each of them, they turned and walked towards the theatre arm in arm at one point. We saw them again in the interval when the artistic director, David McAllister and others spoke about the importance of Coppelia in the history of the company. McAllister explained that the ballet was the last work that the late Peggy van Praagh had created for the company. One of those who had helped to stage the ballet in 1979 spoke of the applause on the first night with the observation that "they seemed to like it."

Not everyone likes the story of Coppelia but I do, possibly because it is an early essay on the social consequences of robotics and artificial intelligence. Birmingham Royal Ballet has a great Coppelia (see Sensational 6 March 2015) which I am glad to see that it is re-staging at Birmingham and Bristol in June and July (see the company's website). So, too, does English National Ballet (see Coppelia in Oxford 2 Nov 2014). But I think my favourite is Ted Brandsen's where Zwaantje (Swanilde) works in a juice bar, Franz in a gym, Dr Coppelius runs a chain of beauty clinics and Coppelia has to do more than read a book and make a few jerky movements (see Brandsen's Coppelia 12 Dec 2016).

Van Praagh's Coppelia is of the traditional kind set in Galicia with lots of peasant dancing and a pageant staged for the presentation of a new bell. One interesting feature that I noticed in van Praagh's version was that Dr Coppelius possessed some kind of hypnotic power that reduced Franz to his knees in act I. All the rest of the story was there including the listening to the ear of corn for a rattle. The only bit that does not appear in the Australian story is the burgomaster's compensating Dr Coppelius for the wrecking of his laboratory and his invitation to the wedding reception.

Kondo and Guo danced well in the performance, particularly the pas de deux in the last act. I do not recall seeing them in either Cinderella or Swan Lake when the Australian Ballet visited London last year (see Ratmansky's Razzamatazz  24 July 2016 and The Australian Ballet's Swan Lake - Murphy won me over 17 July 2016). The absence of a cast list with more than three names on it (one of the many things CinemaLive has to learn) means that I cannot be sure whom I saw in the recording but I think I recognized Robyn Hendricks who had danced Odette in Graeme Murphy's Swan Lake in Prayer. The Australian Ballet is a magnificent company with an abundance of talent that shone through despite everything yesterday evening.

I have a very soft spot for Australia having spent three glorious holidays there during which time I attended an opera at the Sydney Opera House and a concert at the Melbourne Arts Centre.  There is a great appetite for the arts in Australia and an almost evangelical zeal to bring them to every Bruce and Sheila in the outback as well as the great opera houses of the world. Some of my best teachers have been trained in Australia and an attribute that they have in common is an exceptional eye for detail. There are fine companies in Brisbane and Perth as well as the Australian Ballet. My colleague Amelia Sierevogel is about to start a work placement with the Australian Ballet and the Australian Opera as part of her degree course in costume design at Huddersfield. She has promised us reviews and articles on her adventures on the other side of the world.

Introducing Amelia Sierevogel

Amelia Sierevogel when she first attended Fiona Noonan's ballet class

© 2017 Amelia Siervogel: all rights reserved
Reproduction kindly licensed by the copyright owner

Amelia Sierevogel

As a new contributor to this blog, I should like to introduce myself. My name is Amelia Sierevogel and I’m currently on my placement year, studying BA (Hons) Costume with Textiles at the University of Huddersfield.

I’ve always been interested in the world of ballet but never took classes as a child as I studied gymnastics instead. My parents were able to finance only one hobby each for my siblings and me. I gave up gymnastics aged 16. For two years between then and starting university, I was rather unwell. I had contracted glandular fever and was beginning to suffer from severe migraines.

When I moved to university I wanted to find an activity that I could invest myself into both physically and mentally to help improve my health. Of course, I naturally chose ballet having always wanting to learn it.

I took my first ever ballet class aged 18 with Fiona Noonan in Huddersfield. A teacher who is most inspiring. This class was also where I first met the lovely Jane Lambert – a lady I find most knowledgeable and passionate about ballet.

When I first started ballet I used to sickle my feet, twist and sit in my hips and my jumps were awful – I was like a spring that couldn’t quite articulate through my feet! However, I still had flexibility from being a gymnast as a child and with strengthening exercises, sheer determination and the help of Fiona I corrected my errors and it’s safe to say I have progressed quickly.

As I am currently on my placement year, I’m not living in Huddersfield at the moment. Instead, I moved home and started to commute to my placements to save money. Of course, this meant I needed to find somewhere to continue taking ballet!

So I enrolled myself at Ripon Dance Academy. I first attended their adult class, which was taken at a steady pace and was enjoyable, but I didn’t find it particularly challenging. Instead, Miss Carole and Miss Laura, the wonderful teachers at RDA, suggested that I attend their intermediate ballet class. I started this class the following week. The age range in the class is from about 14 to 18 and now they have me aged 21. The girls in my class are lovely and so talented, Miss Laura works us hard and I feel that I am being pushed and challenged. I have learnt so many new steps over the last seven months and in November was allowed to start pointe work! – a truly magical experience.

Currently, in class, we are preparing for a Showcase, which will take place at Ripon Grammar School on 2 April 2017. I’m very excited but I’m also quite nervous, as I haven’t performed on a stage for about six years. This performance will be spectacular for Ripon Dance Academy and I’m sad that I will be saying goodbye to them after this performance.

This is because I shall be travelling to Australia for four months to undertake my placements in the costume departments with the Australian Ballet and Opera Australia. This will, of course,l be an amazing experience and I am looking forward to it! Naturally, I will also be looking to take class in Australia and watch performances.

Ever since I started two and a half years ago, I have found my stress relief, health fix, enjoyment and passion in ballet. I strive to improve and become the best dancer I possibly can. None of which would be possible without my amazing teachers or other classmates. I look forward to sharing my experiences with you as a young adult dancer, reflecting on classes, reviews of performances and dance products, and perhaps some insider costume knowledge.

Amelia x

Ratmansky's Razzmatazz

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Australian Ballet, Cinderella, Coliseum, 23 July 2016, 14:00

I had heard a lot about Alexei Ratmansky but had not actually seen much of his work. I doubted that I had seen any of it at all until Janet McNulty reminded me that Lana Jones and Adam Bull had danced the final pas de deux from Ratmansky's Cinderella at the 45th anniversary gala at The Grand last year (see Sapphire 15 March 2015). In his review of the National Ballet of Canada's Romeo and Juliet at Sadler's Wells (Carrying a Torch for Pure Academic Ballet 22 April 2013 New Your Times) the well kniwn US critic Alistair Macaulay described him as "the most gifted choreographer specializing in classical ballet today."

Ratmansky has created works for the Mariinsky, the Royal Danish Ballet, the Royal Swedish Ballet, the Dutch National Ballet New York City Ballet, San Francisco Ballet, The Australian Ballet, the Kiev Ballet and the State Ballet of Georgia but, so far as I can recall, not for any company in this country.  Perhaps we just can't afford him - particularly not in these horizon narrowing and increasingly austere and nasty post-Brexit days. In Working with the Master, one of the notes in the programme, Deborah Jones, mentions his arrival at the Australian Ballet's studios in a Ferrari (or was it a Lamborghini?). Certainly a fabulously expensive motor car obviously chosen to make an impression on the dancers and their management.

This show had everything: ocean liners, express trains, a Citroën Traction Avant prowling the poplar trees of Picardy, bushes that morph into metronomes and the most fabulous costumes with men in what appeared to be tutus representing the planets and the fairy godmother in a bowler hat. There were some breathtaking lifts as well as comic clowning by Cinderella's stepmother and sisters, the narcissistic dancing master (reminding me incongruously of Christopher Marney's dalmatian from Dogs Don't Do Ballet), her wino father and his cronies.  Our emotions were tossed everywhere from outrage as the stepmother and her daughters trashed the portrait of Cinderella's mother to elation as the godmother flashed her image everywhere in the kitchen and hoots after said stepmother and stepsisters made one faux pas after another.

Altogether this was a jolly good show. Perhaps not the best Cinderella.  I've yet to see anything that beats Darius James's for Ballet Cymru (see Ballet Cymru's Cinderella  15 June 2015) though Christopher Hampson (see Scottish Ballet's Cinderella 20 Dec 2015) and Christopher Wheeldon (see Wheeldon's Cindereella  13 July 2015) came close largely, I think, thanks to their leading ladies. Bethany Kingsley-Garner was beautiful in her role and Anna Tsygankova amazing in hers.

In praising those dancers, however, I take nothing away from yesterday's cast. Amber Scott sparkled in her dancing as much as her ballgown under the lights. Ty King-Wall was every inch a prince. Amy Harris was a beguiling stepmother. Last week we saw her as Odile (see The Australian Ballet's Swan Lake - Murphy won me over 17 July 2016). Why was that beautiful young woman cast in the villain's role two weeks running? Last week's Siegfried and Odette, Rudy Hawkes and Robyn Hendricks were planets this week. Ingrid Gow and Eloise Fryer, entertained us as the ridiculous dumpy and skinny sisters. I particularly liked their boxing poses. No messing about with those Sheilas. Jasmin Durham delighted us as the fairy godmother. Great character performances also from Steven Heathcote as Cinders's hapless father and Franco Leo as the prince's doddery retainer.

Everyone involved in this production deserves congratulations. Ratmansky, of course. I can quite see why Macaulay wrote what he did. Jerome Kaplan for his fabulous designs. Rachel Burke for her lighting. Wendell Harrington for the ingenious projections. Perhaps most of all Nicolette Fraillon for the gorgeous music that she delivered so well.  I learned a little bit of ballet etiquette yesterday. When the conductor is a lady it is the premier danseur noble and not the principal ballerina who leads her onto the stage to take her bow.

The Australians have now finished their short season in England. They brought their country's sunshine with them just when our poor, dear country needed it most. I shall miss them. Bon Voyage and come back soon.

The Australian Ballet's Swan Lake - Murphy won me over

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The Australian Ballet, Swan Lake, Coliseum, 16 July 2016, 14:00

The synopsis in the programme notes were ominous as were some of the reviews in the papers and on BalletcoForum. A lot of parallels had been drawn between the plot of Graeme Murphy's Swan Lake and Prince Charles and Lady Di though Judith Mackrell thought the story saw closer parallels to Giselle (see Australian Ballet: Swan Lake review – a royal tragedy lifted by its leads 14 July 2016 The Guardian). It all sounded very like change for change's sake which I don't like very much at all (see Up the Swannee 17 March 2016). To my great surprise and delight I enjoyed Murphy's version despite the liberties that he took with the story and the score.

I think the reason why I liked Murphy's Swan Lake  so much more than say David Nixon's is that it was a genuine variation upon a theme with some real innovation and not a completely different story with different characters albeit with some bits of Petipa and Ivannov's choreography such as the cygnets' dance bolted on. That was also true of David Dawson's Swan Lake for Scottish Ballet which I saw in Liverpool last month (see Empire Blanche: Dawson's Swan Lake 4 June 2016). I hesitate to use the expression "traditional Swan Lake" because ballets evolve over time and Geraldine Morris reminded us in Tell Tale Steps 2 that there wasn't much Petipa or Ivanov in the Swan Lake that she danced in the 1960s but if we take Anthony Dowell's production for the Royal Ballet as the meme Murphy did not stray all that far from it.

The plot of Dowell's Swan Lake and of every similar version is Siegfried's betrayal of Odette. Murphy explored that theme as did Dawson though their Odettes were very different. I have to say that I prefer Dawson's as his Odette is nobody's victim but Murphy's is interesting all the same.  She is head over heals in love with her husband but he still hankers after another (hence the parallels with Lady Di). When she realizes that her marriage is somewhat crowded she flirts with just about everything in trousers and creates a terrible scene which ends in her committal to a psychiatric hospital beside a lake staffed by nurses who appear to be members of a religious order with a scary swan like headgear (a bit like the Ursuline sisters though I had always thought they were a teaching order). I think it must be the mad scene that reminded Mackrell of Giselle though Siegfried's philandering reminded me more of James's two timing of Effie and the sylph in La Sylphide. During her stay in the hospital Odette imagines herself swimming on the waters of the lake with its swans and Siegfried coming to look for her.

Odette recovers her sanity. She gatecrashes a party given by Odile where Siegried sees Odette in a new light and falls in love with her. This time it is Odile who loses herself in a frenzy of jealousy. She summonses the psychiatrist and scary nurses but Odette scarpers with Siegfried and the whole court scouring the countryside for her.  I should point out that Odile is never referred to as such in the programme. She is called "Baroness von Rothbart" but that is not such a big departure as it sounds for Odile is Rothbart's daughter in the Dowell version. There is no Rothbart as such but his function is served by a lugubrious psychiatrist in charge of the psychiatric hospital.

There are some interesting transpositions.  It is Odette and not Odile who dances fouettés in the mad scene. The music that announces Rothbart and Odile's arrival in the black act of Dowell announces Odette's presence at the Baroness's party. Odile prowls outside the hospital looking pointedly at her watch as Siegfried visits his wife just as Odette flutters outside the palace as Siegfried declares his love for Odile in Dowell's version. Both Dowell and Murphy end with Odette jumping in the lake. There is a dramatic epaulement in Murphy when Odette and Siegfried spot each other for one last time before Odette is dragged down into the deep taking the draperies representing the water with her.

Several commentators talked about Murphy's use of contemporary dance. I didn't see all that much contemporary as opposed to classical vocabulary and what I did see seemed to work very well.  For instance, I liked some of the more unconventional lifts very much indeed as well as steps that gave the impression of skating.  Having nearly killed myself as a 66 year old Rumpole trying to learn the cygnets' and Hungarian dances and swans' entry at the KNT Swan Lake intensive last year I was pleased to find that they were all there and not too different from the versions that Jane Tucker had taught us unlike Dawson's where the cygnets became a pas de quatre.

For all its cleverness Murphy's Swan Lake would have been nothing without some excellent dancers. Robyn Hendricks was a perfect fit for Murphy's Odette. Tall and commanding but also delicate and vulnerable she was as great an actor as she was a dancer.  The expression "dance-actors" is often used by critics but except for Ed Watson I could think of very few people who merited the description. Ms. Hendricks is certainly one who does.  She was matched by Amy Harris as Baroness Rothbart who was captivating in the jealousy scene.  Earlier this year I saw Ted Brandsen's Mata Hari in Amsterdam (see Brandsen's Masterpiece 14 Feb 2016). That dance is how I imagine Mata Hari in real life. Partnering both Odette and Odile magnificently. Rudy Hawkes was a great Siegfried.  Murphy's Siegfried is a complex character. Not a complete bastard despite the way he treated Odette though someone who needed chastisement. Hawke understood his character well.  Every Swan Lake needs what the Bolshoi call an "evil genius" and that lot fell to Tristram Message as the psychiatrist. Not as big a role as Dowell's Rothbart but just as important to the story.

Looking through the dancers' bios I notice that nearly all of them come from Australia and many of them were trained at the Australian Ballet School. Given its relatively small population, the existence of two other fine companies in Brisbane and Perth and the fact that it continues to export fine dancers like Steven McRae and Jenna Roberts to us, Australia's contribution to dance is massive. I shall return to London for Cinderella next week and I am looking forward to it tremendously.