Chantry Dance Summer School

In "Chantry Dance Associates: Lots of Promise" 28 July 2014 I mentioned that the company was about to start a week long summer school in Grantham. Yesterday was the last day and it ended with a performance and presentations. As Mel and the two other other young women, Yi Ann and Fiona, who had danced with us in May were taking part in the course I drove down from Holmfirth to support them.

Unfortunately, I missed the dancing, Even though I gave myself extra time for what Google maps had estimated would be a 1 hour and 38 minutes journey I found myself in heavy, slow moving traffic almost all the way while Grantham itself was gridlocked. After parking in a car park where the ticket machine gobbled my coins but refused me a ticket I slunk into the back of the Dance Pointe studio just as Paul Chantry and Rae Piper were handing out certificates.

It was good to see Fiona, Mel and Yi Ann again. Paul videoed the show and will no doubt post it to the company's website. To get some idea of what it must have been like I have embedded the YouTube video of Vincent last year's summer school performance.  According to the company's website:

"'Vincent' is a piece created for and by the CDC 2013 Summer School students. In the piece we see Vincent Van Gogh experiencing depression and a creative block. All around him things are falling down, until his muse arrives and brings him visions of three of his most famous paintings - Starry Night, Haystacks and Sunflowers. This gives Vincent the inspiration he needs. We see the paint dance over the canvas as he starts creating a new painting."

The students who performed that work ranged in age from 11-33 and in experience from improver to professional. The summer school gave them a taste of what it is like to work in a professional contemporary ballet company.

The summer school is just one of a number of educational and outreach activities that brings dance to everybody.  The following video summarizes the company's work:


Chantry Dance Company Education and Outreach work from Rae Piper on Vimeo.

I appear on that video and I can tell you that taking part in one of the company's workshops with Fiona, Mel and Yi Ann gave me enormous pleasure, self-confidence and personal satisfaction. It was clear from the faces of the associates last Sunday and the summer school participants yesterday that they felt the same way. The company goes everywhere - even prisons and care homes - and it does wonderful work. It deserves our support and we can help it.  Here are some of the ways:

• becoming a Friend, 
• sponsoring one of their productions, 
• sponsoring an educational programme place (perhaps for a kid from your home town or one of your pupils, apprentices or employees) or 
• supporting its outreach work and perhaps turning round someone's life or giving some other person joy and hope.

On 26 Aug 2014 Chantry Dance are hosting a lunch time event called "Making Connections" for leading regional and national business figures, as well as individuals with a vision for a creative future, to make connections with Chantry Dance Company". During the event they will explain what the company does, what they can do to support businesses and individuals, and what business and individuals can do reciprocally. Chantry Dance is aiming to build positive, productive relationships with others, leading to mutually beneficial outcomes. They will consider how art and business can work together, and how each can liberate areas of untapped potential in the other. This is an excellent idea and something that I have been rabbiting on about for ages (see "Ballet as a Brand? How to bring More Money into Dance for Companies and Dancers" 13 March 2013). This is something that big companies already do (see "The Things I do for my Art: Northern Ballet's Breakfast Meeting" 23 Sept 2013). It is encouraging that one of the smaller companies is doing similar things.

Post script
Mel has just written about her experience of Chantry Dance's summer school in her own blog.

The Things I do for my Art: Northern Ballet's Breakfast Meeting

Northern Ballet

This morning I rose while the wilis were still abroad and drove 26 miles to meet some of these lovely people. They are the staff of Northern Ballet and this morning they invited us to breakfast and a show at their magnificent premises at Quarry Hill in Leeds.

"Set the alarm at 05:30 for tomorrow morning. Better be worth it @northernballet". 

I had tweeted peevishly the night before.   Well I am glad to tell you that it was worth it.  Refreshments were waiting for us on arrival as we waited to be shepherded into the Stanley and Audrey Burton Theatre for the show.

As you have often been told, there is no such thing as a free lunch. Well we learned from Leanne Kirkham that there is no such things as a free breakfast either. "You can't come to a ballet school and not expect to move" said Leanne, "especially after a free breakfast." So she had us sitting up straight in our seats, reaching for the ceiling and stretching our arms.  "Eight to the right! Eight to the left" "Then four and four." "Two and two," And finally "Four singles to right and left."  Just as in glissés.  "But I only had a bacon  butty and a cup of coffee" I said to myself.

Leanne was followed by Mark Skipper, the company's Chief Executive Officer. who belted out an impressive list of achievements. Taking London by storm with Gatsby. The best ballet centre in Europe with 7 studios.  Tours in every part of the UK and many overseas,. And a remarkable return on investment for  Ugly Duckling.

Next we had interviews with Pippa Moore and Matthew Topliss who demonstrated some of the lifts that we see in a pas de deux.  Moore is one of my favourite dancers and she was wonderful in Midsummer Night's Dream. I can't think of a better way to start the week than watching her and Topliss.

Last on the bill was the Technical Director Andy Waddington who took us through the 2 year long process of building a ballet in 10 minutes.

At the end of the presentations we got an opportunity for questions. In my review of Midsummer Night's Dream I mentioned a video in which the dancers acted one of the scenes that they were about to dance. As Moore was one of the dancers in that sequence I asked her whether that dialogue was a one off or whether they exchanged a dialogue in every ballet.  "Oh we do that all the time" said Moore.  "We act it first and then dance the steps."

Someone suggested that Leeds should seek to become European capital of culture on the proposition that it was the second cultural centre after London.  As a proud Mancunian I am not letting anyone get away with that.  Yes Leeds has Northern Ballet and Opera North but we have the Hallé, the Royal Exchange, Media City, The Lowry, The Royal Northern College of Music, Chethams and more museums and theatres than most can shake a stick at. I imagine that Glaswegians who host Scottish Ballet and Scottish Opera and the people of Birmingham with the Birmingham Royal Ballet and the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra might also have a thing or two to say about Leeds's pretensions.

The title of this company is not Leeds Ballet, nor even Yorkshire Ballet but Northern Ballet. It is an institution in which everyone north of the Trent and south of the Cheviots can take pride.   I have often argued that the communities along the M62 corridor should think of themselves as a regional city just as those along the San Diego Freeway do in Southern California. After all the Coastal Range is much higher than the Pennines. Cities like Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester and Bradford should learn to integrate for that is the only way to counter the pull of London. In that regard it should never be forgotten that Northern Ballet started as Northern Dance Theatre in Manchester.

After the presentations we were invited to tour the building starting with the top floor with the familiar Studio 7.  We were taken from there to a board room with swan wallpaper and panoramic views of Leeds. Then to more studios on the floors below with wardrobes, meeting rooms and the technical department.

Finally, some of us had one to one interviews with Mark Skipper, Laraine Penson, head of communications or Jon Ingham, head of fundraising.   I was allocated 10 minutes with Mr. Ingham.  He told me about some of the ways to help the company such as sponsoring a dancer and becoming a friend or patron. Northern Ballet has given so many people so much pleasure over the last 44 years or so. Would it not be nice to do them a good deed in return?

Yorkshire Talking Heads: Mark Skipper

Mark Skipper

My very good friend and client Ed Ryder who set up Biskit Ltd., has invited Mark Skipper, Chief Executive Officer of Northern Ballet, to speak at the Leeds Club on Tuesday 15 Oct 2013.  If you are free that evening I would urge you to attend and you can book on-line through Biskit's Eventbrite page.  You have to hurry because bookings close on 24 Sept 2013.

I am hopelessly torn.  I'm a big fan of Northern Ballet all the more so after being wowed by the company's performance on Saturday (see "Realizing Another Dream" 15 Sept 2013 and "In Leeds of all Places" today) and I really would like to meet the man behind this company but it clashes with my adult ballet class at The Base in Huddersfield (see "Adult Ballet Classes" 7 Sept 2013).

As I am not very good at ballet and as I am going to the "Business of Ballet" breakfast meeting on the 23 Sept 2013 where we are promised  an "inspiring and illuminating session" with Mr. Skipper (see "Business of Ballet: Northern Ballet's bid to educate us Philistines" 28 July 2013) I think I will opt for the class.  But if you don't have a class do go to the Leeds Club. Knowing Ed as I do I am sure he will make it a great evening.

PS. Before I forget, I have added the Northern Ballet blog to my bloggroll. I have read several of their articles and they are very good.

Business of Ballet: Northern Ballet's bid to educate us Philistines

I am not sure what to expect from the Business of Ballet event on 23 Sep 2013. It's absurdly early even for a dancer. To make Quarry Hill by 07:30 I will have to leave Holmfirth by 06:00 the day after a weekend which means getting up at ........... it doesn't bear thinking about. So listen Mr. Nixon it had better be good.

I think it may be good.  According to the blurb

"Since 2011 Northern Ballet has had to respond to devastating cuts in public funding and it has done this by drawing on its strengths – a dedicated and driven team of dancers, technicians, and administrators who have worked hard to respond innovatively to the challenges the company faces whilst remaining true to their artistic vision."

Well I guess that's a business story worth listening to.  

Catering is to be provided by Catering Yorkshire. I hope they are not the same caterers who served a slightly stale chicken coronation sandwich to me when I visited the Stanley & Aubrey Burton Theatre to see the Northern Ballet's Mixed Bill on the 8 June (see "Angelic - Northern Ballet's Mixed Bill"  9 June 2013). The show more than made up for it so never mind.  Perhaps more to the point is that I don't have a dancer's body.  I'm more in the Mma Ramotswe traditional build mould than Martha Leebolt and I like my "Yorkshire nourishment" I do. I can hear Cheryl of Ballet News tut tutting in Surrey not only at my dietary predilections but also at the liberties that I take with her English language.

After breakfast we are to have an "inspiring and illuminating session" with CEO Mark Skipper DL for one and a half hours without an interval.  Actually I am looking forward to it because a ballet company must know a thing or two about logistics if they have to hump props and costumes and herd a troupe of dancers around the country and no doubt, occasionally, other countries.   Then there are the one to ones on "executive and planning, marketing & PR or fundraising and events.".

Actually this is not the first time I have blogged about business and ballet.   In my review of "Beauty and the Beast" 31 Dec 2011 I mentioned the company's excellent facilities for workshops and conferences.   If we could guarantee an audience I would love to stage a seminar there.

If anyone is tempted to attend the event you can book here.