Hampson's Cinderella: Coming up Roses

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Scottish Ballet Cinderella  Theatre Royal, Newcastle, 1 Feb 2019

I first saw Christopher Hampson's Cinderella in Edinburgh on 19 Dec 2015 and I loved it  (see Scottish Ballet's Cinderella 20 Dec 2015). I saw it again in Newcastle on Friday and loved it all the more.  I have been asking myself why I love it so much.  I think it is because it is multilayered.  Very different from the pantomimes and films of childhood.

At one layer there is the narrative.  The libretto is conventional enough but, to get a better idea of the theme, watch the video, Designing Cinderella.  Hampson and his designer, Tracy Grant Lord. explain the significance of the rose.  That is the second layer.  Roses are even more important than glass slippers because Cinders's slipper is discovered and shredded.  "How is the prince to authenticate his bride?" the audience wonders as the rest of womankind force their hooves and flippers into the discarded shoe.  Happily, Cinderella had another memento of the evening, namely the silver rose that the prince had given her at the ball.  She produced that rose and all was well.  Roses are everywhere. In the backdrop, the clothes and of course the cemetery where Cinderella's mum is buried.

But there is a layer below the roses and I think that it explains why the ballet appeals so much to me.  Hampson's ballet is a study of emotion.  After the death of his first wife, Cinderella's father seeks solace in a second marriage but it fails to work.  Cinderella is a constant reminder.  He takes to drink incurring the contempt of his stepchildren and the despair of his new wife.  Reason enough to explain her resentment of Cinderella.

In most interpretations of the story, Cinderella is a victim. Not so much in this ballet,  Not even as a scullery maid,  She is resourceful.  She has the cash for her mother's portrait which the stepmother is desperate to remove  She can dance in contrast to her stepsisters' stumblings. Even her work clothes eclipse her stepsisters' finery. The prince for all his wealth and power is lonely.  It is Cinderella who rescues him from his loneliness at least as much as he rescues her from her servitude.

Such complex characters are difficult to portray.  When I saw the show in Edinburgh I was enchanted by Bethany Kingsley-Garner and Christopher Harrison.  They were so good I had to see them in those roles a second time. Kingsley-Garner commands a stage like few others.  An actress as much as a dancer and she is a dancer of considerable strength and virtuosity.  Hampson demands a lot from his Cinderellas such as successions of relevés combined with dévelopés and his trade mark backwards jump.  Delightful to watch but probably exhausting to perform.  Another favourite, Araminta Wraith, danced Cinderella's stepmother.  She is also a fine communicator.  She helped me understand and sympathize with her character better than I had ever done before. Nicholas Shoesmith portrayed Cinderella's broken father with pathos.  Claire Souet and Aisling Brangan the ridiculous stepsisters with bathos. Grace Horler charmed us as the fairy godmother.

In my estimation, Hampson is the best narrative ballet choreographer that we have,   He may be less prolific in this genre than other choreographers but everything he produces is good,  Next year he will present The Snow Queen to mark the 50th anniversary of the company's move from Bristol.  With music by Rimsky-Korsakov and designs by Lez Brotherston, it should be splendid.

Newcastle Nutcracker

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Scottish Ballet  The Nutcracker  Theatre Royal Newcastle 2 Feb 2018

I have seen three versions of The Nutcracker over the last few months: the Royal Ballet's at the Royal Opera House, the Birmingham Royal Ballet's at the Hippodrome and Scottish Ballet's at the Theatre Royal Newcastle.  I just can't decide which I like best because each version has its own strengths. Scottish Ballet's are Peter Darrell's libretto and choreography, Lez Brotherston's designs and, of course, the company's brilliant dancers. 

In Darrell's version, Clara remains a little girl. She does not morph into Sugar Plum.  She gets rid of the vermin who stray into the second act by kissing rather than thumping them.  At the end of the ballet it is she and not Sugar Plum who invites the conductor onto the stage to take a bow.  I also like Scottish Ballet's divertissements.  The Chinese, for example, are not treated as acrobatic clowns despire the musical prompting.  They have a short but sweet dance for two female dancers.  The Arabian dance is a charming solo for one femalle. There is an English dance with a hornpipe that brought to mind  Balanchine's Union Jack and, to a lesser extent, Cranko's Pineapple Poll.

Brotherston's sets and costumes are magnificent. It cannot be easy to create a set for touring. The opening scene looked like a Christmas card.   It gave way to the Stahlbaums' Christmas party in a solid looking living room but the scene that impressed me most was the kingdom of the sweets with its hundreds of Christmas tree baubles.  As for the costumes I particularly liked the female mice.  Without a doubt Brotherston's vermin are the best in the business.  Nobody has better mouse heads.

Sugar Plum was danced by Bethany Kingsley-Garner. I became one of her fans when I saw her in Cinderella in 2015 (see Scottish Ballet's Cinderella 20 Dec 2015). I was impressed by her performance in Dawson's Swan Lake a few months later (see Empire Blance: Dawson's Swan Lake 4 June 2016). She delighted me yet again in The Nutcracker.  She was partnered well by Evan Loudon. Chrstopher Harrison was a splendid Drosselmeyer.  Marge Hendrick was a charming Snow Queen. As I have said before, it is the children who can make or break The Nutcracker and in this production the students definitely helped to make it.  Particularly Ailish Ogilvie who danced Clara and Charles O'Rourke her tiresome little brother.  Finally, it s always good to see Matthew Broadbent.   Tall and athletc he attracts attention. I was a fan when he was at Northern Ballet and even  more so now.

There were a few weaknesses. The orchestra sounded a little thin at times partcularly in the overture but that could have been the theatre's accoustics.  Newcastle's Theatre Royal is an archotectural gem and it is easy to reach by public transport but it is not the most comfortable venue. Scottish Ballet's Christmas show visits all the major venues in Scotland but rarely ventures into England and never south of Newcastle. That is a shame because audiences in the rest of the UK would love it.

Hansel and Gretel in Newcastle - a bit like falling in love

Theatre Royal Newcastle

Author Gita Mistry
(c) 2017 Gita Mistry: all rights reserved

Scottish Ballet, Hansel and Gretel, Theatre Royal Newcastle, 3 Feb 2017

Ballet can be a bit like falling in love. Once in a while, you see a show that stands out.   You leave the theatre floating on a cloud.  You can't quite put your finger on why, especially if you have seen the ballet before, but somehow it is special.  That was how I felt last night after watching Scottish Ballet's Hansel and Gretel at the Theatre Royal in Newcastle.  I had seen Hansel and Gretel before in Glasgow on 21 Dec 2013 and had enjoyed it then (see Scottish Ballet's Hansel and Gretel 23 Dec 2016), but I loved last night's show so much more.

As the show has not yet been to London or, to the best of my knowledge and belief performed abroad by any other company, I shall describe it briefly for my readers. The story follows loosely the fairy tale as retold by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm but with some twists and refinements.  It is set not in medieval Germany but in a small Scottish town near a forest - Dunkeld perhaps or maybe Aberfeldy - in the nineteen fifties or sixties.  The period is set by the costumes.  Little girls in gym slips. The boys in short trousers,  The mums in headscarves and the dads in flat caps. Local toughs in denim jeans and leather jackets. An enormous fridge in a corner of Hansel and Gretel's home - entirely bare except for cans of lager - some basic furniture and a massive telly.

Why did Christopher Hampson set his ballet in post-war Scotland which was well before his time let alone that of most of his audience? Part of the answer may be that Scottish Ballet and indeed Western Theatre Ballet before it has always been topical.  A tradition started by its founder Peter Darrell who staged the marvellous Mods and Rockers to Beatles music in 1963. The story begins with child abductions which of course is the subject of historical child abuse investigations and trials that were taking place in 2013 when Hansel and Gretel first appeared and, unfortunately, are still continuing today.

Hansel and Gretel are kept away from school until those abductions end.  Not surprisingly, they get bored with each other's company.  They slip away while their parents doze in from of the TV, first into the town and then the woods where eventually they find the witch's cottage.  Everything else follows the Grimms' story. They enter the cottage and find a table heaving with food with dancing chefs who come out from below.  The witch plies the kids with goodies, but then things start to go wrong. She chops off the head of Hänsel's teddy. She forces the children to play a game of hide and seek which ends with Hänsel finding himself in a cage under the table. Her malevolence becomes clear when she tosses the remains of the teddy into a cupboard overflowing with children's toys including two enormous rag dolls danced by Andrew Peasgood and Madeline Squire.

Happily, the story ends well - or fairly well for I can't be the only one who would prefer to see the witch in the dock than in the Aga - but at least the children (including those abducted in the prologue) are saved and reunited with their parents. A pile of bones reminds us not to feel too sorry for the witch who maybe had what was coming to her. Hänsel and Gretel are hoisted on the adults' shoulders and the children and parents parade triumphantly around the witch's kitchen.

The score is essentially Engelbert Humperdinck's as arranged by Richard Honner. The sets are by Gary Harris.  There are two excellent videos in which each member of the creative team explains how they brought the show together (see Scottish Ballet: The Making of Hansel & Gretel (Part One) and (Part Two).  Masestro Honner conducted the orchestra last night.

As I noted three years ago, there are some really juicy roles in this ballet. Hänsel and Gretel, of course, with Gretel taking the initiative but her impetuous brother the glory.  After all, it was he who kicked the old woman into the oven.  Yesterday Hänsel was danced by Constant Vigier (an up and coming choreographer as well as first artist with the company) and Kayla-Maree Tarantolo who trained in Amsterdam.  Gita likes to award "man" or "woman of the match" accolades to dancers as though they were cricketers. Her woman of the match was Tarantolo. I heard Gita giggling as the wide-eyed children gobbled the sweets or the witch hobbled about her kitchen. Now Gita just doesn't usually laugh in ballet but she was having a great time in this one.  "I am really enjoying it" she mouthed to me several times.

 Probably the most demanding role in the ballet is the witch because she mixes so many roles.  As I said in  2013 the teacher morphs into the local vamp, the ballerina in the moon and finally a wicked and twisted, ugly old witch. In The Making of Hansel and Gretel  Hampson says that he created that role for Eve Mutso who is a splendid dancer. Difficult shoes to fill but Grace Horler rose to the challenge and performed that role brilliantly. Indeed, she made it her own. The antithesis of the witch is, of course, the good fairy - in this case the Dew Drop Fairy - and she was danced delightfully by Claire Souet. Hansel and Gretel's mum and dad were danced by two of my favourites, Araminta Wraith and Christopher Harrison. They also have to morph from the everyday into the sublime as the children imagine them in evening dress dancing in high society. There is a sleek and sinister sandman danced by Peasgood last night and, of course, the menacing ravens - Rimbaud PatronHenry Dowden, Thomas Edwards, Eado Turgeman and  Evan Loudon.

Hampson is a great hero of mine as I have repeated many times in this blog. I had heard him speak at Northern Ballet's symposium on narrative dance (see My Thoughts on Saturday Afternoon's Panel Discussion at Northern Ballet 21 June 2015) but until last night I had never actually met him. Gita bumped into him in the theatre lobby and, knowing my admiration for the man, held him in conversation until I appeared. However eloquent my reviews (if indeed they are) and tweets, there is nothing like telling the choreographer in person how much one enjoys his work. Especially after an outstanding performance like last night's.

Hampson's Hänsel and Gretel comes to Newcastle

Hänsel and Gretel and the Witch

Illustration Arthur Rackham

Source Wikipedia

I know not why, but Dawson's Swan Lake comes to Liverpool 29 May 2016 is my most popular article. It has attracted 10,374 page views including 276 today. It is a preview of David Dawson's Swan Lake which Scottish Ballet was about to perform in Liverpool. It also mentioned Christopher Hampson's on stage promotion of Bethany Kingsley-Garner and Constance Devernay to principal ballerinas which has proved enormously popular as their elevation was well deserved, but I still don't have a clue why the internet has taken such an interest in that post. It has had far more attention than the actual review of Dawson's Swan Lake though it was far from an unfriendly one.

So, chums, I am following the same formula substituting "Hampson" for "Dawson", "Hänsel and Gretel" for "Swan Lake" and "Liverpool" for "Newcastle."  

"No chance," growls Chip the Dog on Crosby sands with mistress in tow. "Newcastle isn't Liverpewel."
Well, we shall see. Newcastle is a great city with a great theatre and a great love of dance (see Dance in Newcastle 4 Nov 2016.

Certainly, the Novocastrians have packed out the Theatre Royal well in advance for every performance. I am aways happy to learn that a company has filled a theatre and particularly so when that company is Scottish Ballet who are the first company that I got to know and love and who will always enjoy a special place in my affection. Not just for old times sake because I knew them in their Bristol days when they danced Mods and Rockers to the Beatles but for what they have become with some of our nation's finest dancers under the direction of an outstanding choreographer.

For Hampson is outstanding. I defy anyone to sit dry-eyed through Storyville. or not to be uplifted by his Four; or enraptured by his Perpetuum Mobile. His Cinderella which I saw in Edinburgh was magnificent. His  Hänsel and Gretel which I saw in Glasgow in Dec 2013 was a delight. All my favourites were in that show.  The production has received excellent reviews from the Scottish critics as it made its way from Edinburgh to Glasgow, Aberdeen and Inverness. The company is off to Northern Ireland after it briefly visits us.

As I said above, Scottish Ballet's season in Newcastle has been a sellout; but in case there is a return they are at the Theatre Royal on Gray Street from Wednesday to Saturday.

Scottish Ballet's Cinderella

@jelterps @scottishballet Enjoy the performance!

— Christopher Hampson (@HampsonChris) December 19, 2015

You bet I will. Merry Christmas to all at @scottishballet especially to Matthew Broadbent who is greatly missed. https://t.co/VCvjNVJYH0

— Terpsichore (@jelterps) December 19, 2015

Scottish Ballet, Cinderella,  Festival Theatre, Edinburgh 19 Dec 2015

While just about every other company in the United Kingdom is staging The Nutcracker this Christmas (see All those Nutcrackers 11 Dec 2015) Scottish Ballet presents Cinderella not as "a rags-to-riches story that offers a girl a way out of the ordinary" but as a study of grief and loneliness. But it is not only Cinderella who is lonely, as the choreographer, Christopnher Hampson, explains in his interview with Alan Morrison in the programme notes. So, too, is the prince and they each find a way out of their loneliness by finding each other.

Such a prince has to be very sensitive and Hampson chose Christopher Harrison to dance that role. Having previously seen Harrison as Romeo and Stanley in A Streetcar named Desire (Scottish Ballet's Timeless Romeo and Juliet 18 May 2014 and Scottish Ballet's Streetcar 2 April 2015) which are strong male roles. It was something of a revelation that he does sensitive but he can and he did it very well. His bride, Bethany Kingsley-Garner whom I had previously seen as Gretel and the the Sugar Plum (see Scottish Ballet's Hansel and Gretel 23 Dec 2013 and Like meeting an old friend after so many years 4 Jan 2015), was a more obvious fit. She was a delightful Cinderella -not too good to be true - she appreciated the attention from the dressmakers when they came to prepare her stepsisters and stepmother for the ball.

The other stars in Hampson's Cinderella are those step sisters and for those roles he chose the company's female principals, Eve Mutso and Sophie Martin. These are magnificent dancers.  I saw them both in Marc Brew's Exalt earlier this year (see No Mean City - Accessible Dance and Ballet 26 April 2015). Mutso has been nominated for the National  Dance Awards for her performance as Blanche in Streetcar. It must be difficult for such graceful creatures to clown on stage but how we laughed as they struggled through their dance lesson and dress and show fittings, their gauche encounters with the prince and his courtiers and their attempts to make the slipper fit.

Hampson structured the ballet very cleverly, Each Act was preceded with a prologue with the house lights up. The mourners at the funeral of Cinderella's mother started the ballet. Two flunkies dusted a chandelier before Act II. Matthew Broadbent, one of Leeds's favourites when he was at Northern Ballet, laboured at his last as the bossy royal shoemaker. For me it was such a delight to see him again. The transposition of the grasshopper (Jamiel Lawrence) for the scornful dancing master and moths and spiders for the shoe and dressmakers is another example of Hampson's ingenuity. They mirrored the real world with fantasy.

There was some novel choreography. The grasshopper's dives which startled Cinderella first time and then amused her at the next delighted me. So too were the back to back lifts in the final pas de deux between Cinderella and her prince which were surprisingly graceful. There was Martin's can-can as she tried to interest the prince and Mutso's duet with the courtier struggling to retain his dignity with this she monster.

The sets and costumes for this performance were stunning. They were designed by Tracy Grant Lord who had originally created them for the Royal New Zealand Ballet's production of Hampson's Cinderella in 2007. The were among the best that we have seen since the days of Diaghilev. The designs are almost an integral part of the libretto. For instance, the rose tree that Cinderella plants by her mother's grave with its leaves that become a face and are almost a continuing presence of her mother.

There is so much to like about this production. Even the programmes are to be treasured for their fine paper, rich colours, striking designs and high quality printing. The Festival Theatre is a delightful venue with a restaurant that serves some of the best meals and snacks that I have ever savoured in Edinburgh. Despite the Forth Bridge closures the Edinburgh season is pretty close to fully booked but the show will shortly tour Glasgow, Aberdeen and Inverness though, sadly, not the rest of the country.  It was well worth a trek from Yorkshire. Knowing what I now know, I would travel from the Lizard or cross seas or even oceans to see it again.

I began this year with a review of Darrell's Nutcracker and it is fitting that the last ballet that I will see this year is Hampson's Cinderella. Scottish Ballet connects me with my days at St Andrews which were the happiest of my life. I try not to have favourite companies. I love English National Ballet, the Dutch National Ballet, Rambert, the Royal and Birmingham Royal Ballets, Ballet Black, Ballet Cymru, Northern Ballet, Phoenix and many others with a passion. But Scottish Ballet was my first love and you know what they say about the first love being the love that is never to be forgotten.

Scottish Ballet's Streetcar

Scottish Ballet has always occupied a special place in my affections for the reasons I explained in Scottish Ballet 20 Dec 2013, Peter Darrell 9 March 2014, Elaine McDonald in her own words 11 March 2014 and Scottish Ballet and Ballet West 3 Oct 2014. Yesterday I found fresh reason to love that company last night when I saw A Streetcar named Desire at Sadler's Wells.  This was a collaboration between theatre director, Nancy Meckler and choreographer, Annabelle Lopez Ochoa. The result is quite extraordinary: high drama as well as great ballet. I don't think I've ever seen anything quite like it.

The ballet is based on the play by Tennessee Williams. I say based because there are bits of the ballet that do not appear in the play such as Blanche Dubois's marriage and her late husband's suicide but these are necessary in order to set the ballet in context.  In the play there are four main roles: Blanche Dubois, once the heiress of the great Southern mansion Belle Rêve, her sister Stella who has thrown in her lot with the uncouth Stanley Kowalsk and his mate Mitch who courts Blanche for a while. Commencing the ballet with the marriage enables Meckler and Lopez Ochoa to create a firth: Blanche's late husband Alan who shoots himself in despair after Blanche discovers his apparent affection for another man.

Blanche is not nice to know.  Her rejection of Alan leads leads directly to his suicide. She is arrogant and disdainful of the hospitality that her sister and brother show her initially by taking her off the street. Stanley may be a brute but we can well understand why he doesn't like his sister in law. Playing dance music while he and his friends try to relax over a game of cards. She gets Mitch to change the the light fittings without so much as a by your leave. Finally she tries to turn Stella against her husband.  She takes to the bottle. She has a succession of unhappy relationships. Eventually she tries to seduce the delivery boy. But for all her faults we can't help feeling sorry for her as her dignity  like her clothes in the rape scene- is stripped away in layers. In the penultimate scene she is left naked quivering on the floor. A very powerful image.

Two fine young dancers have created that role - Eve Mutso and Luciana Ravizzi.  Last night I sa Ravizzi, She comes from Buenos Aires - a city which, like the Southern states in the 1940s has known better days. It is the city of the tango - the mournful music of the Italian immigrants so far from home. That city has more than its fair share of tragic heroines. Most particularly María Eva Duarte de Perón whom we know as "Evita". I was conscious of those connotations as I watched Ravizzi dance last night.

Whereas I had some sympathy for Blanche I had much less for her sister Stella. One of the few wise and brave things that Blanche did was to try to save her sister from Stanley. To no avail for she threw herself into his arms no matter what the abuse. In the end she connived at Blanche's committal to the psychiatric hospital  That role was danced by Sophie Laplane who portrayed that poor conflicted soul exactly.

Christopher Harrison danced the loutish Stanley. He was menacing in every movement. He walked in a slow, threatening swaggering gait. His gestures were staccato even when playing cards,  His manhandling of Blanche in the rape scene was harrowing. A first class performance in every respect. Remi Andreoni danced the gentle Mitch with sensitivity. Andrew Peasgood was the ghostly blood stained spectre of Blanche's husband.

There were two other elements that made the show: Peter Salem's magnificent score and Niki Turner's designs. The loss of Belle Rêve was symbolized by the porticoed mansion collapsing into a pile of rubble, Brilliant theatre! One of several images from the performance that I doubt that I shall forget in a hurry

Scottish Ballet spent only three days with us. It was lovely to see them but I wish it were longer. I would love to have seen Mutso's interpretation of the role of Blanche. In her interview with Christopher Hampson in Uncut which I mentioned in Object of Desire 7 March 2015 and also in Mark Monahan's programme note Becoming Blanche, she describes the research she carried out to understand the role. She read the play, saw it on stage and studied the film. I would imagine her performance would be quite different.

The company is now taking the production to the United States and it will be interesting to see what the Americans make of this transposition of a classic of their literature. I think they will be as impressed as I have been and I certainly hope so.

Scottish Ballet's Timeless Romeo and Juliet

Ever since it was in Bristol  Scottish Ballet has been exciting and innovative. I suppose that is one of the reasons why I have always admired it.  It was works such as Mods and Rockers '63 and Houseparty that first attracted my attention. It continued to innovate and take risks after the company's move to Glasgow with a a steady stream of new works by Peter Darrell, Ashley Page and now Christopher Hampson all of which are reflected in the company's repertoire. Krzysztof Pastor's Romeo and Juliet continues that tradition of adventure and innovation.  

I saw that ballet at Sadler's Wells on 17 May 2014. This is the first time it has been seen in London but it has  been in Scottish Ballet's repertoire since 2008.   It is in fact on its third tour of Scotland or fourth if you count the Up Close tour when parts of the ballet were danced in some of the smaller venues in Scotland during October 2010.  After London it will be in Edinburgh between the 21 and 24 May. As Northern Ballet's recent success at The Linbury shows, there is good ballet outside London though that seems to come as a surprise to London audiences.

The story of Romeo and Juliet is well known and has been the translated into ballet by several choreographers. The version with which British audiences are most familiar is probably Kenneth Macmillan's for the Royal Ballet.  Ballet Cymru also has a great version for the small auditoriums that it visits which I reviewed in "They're not from Chigwell - they're from a small Welsh Town called Newport" 14 May 2013. Next month we shall see English National Ballet's Romeo and Juliet in the Round and then the Mariinsky's with Xander Parish dancing Romeo.  

Shakespeare's play and the other versions of the ballet focuses on the young lovers who are kept apart by family antipathy and rivalry. Pastor's version focuses on the enmity not just in mediaeval Verona but in Italy throughout the ages.   It achieves that effect by setting different scenes of the ballet in different periods of modern Italian history: 

• between the wars when Fascists struggled with Communists; 
• the immediate post war period when Italy was transformed into a consumer society; and 
• the recent past when the post-war consumer boom ended precipitously.

There are people in the position of Romeo and Juliet in every age and I read the references to Romeo and Juliet in the ballet as the representatives  of such persons in each of those periods.

In every other respect the ballet followed the play. There were strong performances by Christopher Harrison as Romeo, Claire Robertson as Juliet, Daniel Davidson as Mercutio, Owen Thorne as Tybault and Rimbaud Patron as Friar Lawrence. Principal conductor Richard Honner stuck to the Prokofiev score though perhaps with a few tweaks. For instance the percussion seemed to continue a little longer than in other versions after Romeo had killed Tybault.  As in Macmillan's version the centre piece of Pastor's ballet were the pas de deux that traced the lovers' relationship: the initial meeting, the balcony scene, in the bedroom and finally the tomb. I noticed how a lift that seemed like an assisted grand jeté expressed diffidence and even struggle in the first pas de deux and joy in the second.

Among the aspects of the ballet that I most liked were Tatyana van Walsum's designs which can be studied on the Romeo and Juliet page of her website. For each of the three periods she set the scene with flickering newsreel clips and the protagonists' uniforms.

For my further reflections on this ballet and the views of others who saw it This ballet is not everybody's cup of tea though it is certainly mine. The initial reactions on BalletcoForum were not exactly encouraging but I have known Scottish Ballet for many years and I was not going to be deterred. I am glad I persevered. After watching Romeo and Juliet at the Wells on Saturday I signed up as a Friend though I have been such for many years.

Further Reading
20 Dec 2013   Scottish Ballet
9 March 2014 Peter Darrell
11 March 2014  Elaine McDonald in her own Words