Sarah Kundi - An Appreciation

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Readers of this blog will know that I have a particularly high regard for Sarah Kundi.  Although I must have seen her several times when she was with Northern Ballet she first came to my notice through the YouTube video of Depouillage in which she danced with Jade Hale-Christofi.  It was that film that led me to Ballet Black (see Ballet Black's Appeal 12 March 2013).  When I saw her dance for the first time in  "Dopamine (you make my levels go silly)" and War Letters at the Bernie Grant Arts Centre on Saturday 18 May 2013 I was bowled over (see Why Ballet Black is Special 20 May 2013).

When Ballet Black came to Leeds 6 months later, Sarah Kundi had left the company.  As I said in Ballet Black is Still Special on 7 Nov 2013, I enjoyed Ballet Black's performance in Leeds at least as much as their show in Tottenham but I did miss Sarah Kundi.   I did not have long to wait because I found out that she had joined MurleyDance which performed in Leeds on 1 Dec 2013 (see MurleyDance Triple Bill 2 Dec 2013).

Sarah Kundi did not stay long with MurleyDance and there were reports that she had been offered work with Victor Ulate in Spain (see ByeBye and All the Best 10 June 2014).  Happily, English National Ballet offered her an appointment while she was dancing in Romeo and Juliet in the Round (see Saved for the Nation 17 July 2914).  She remained with that company for the rest of her career picking up the emerging dancer award and triumphing as Lady Capulet (see Congratulations to Sarah Kundi on 20 June 2018) and Hortensia in Christopher Wheeldon's Cinderella (see Cinders in the Round  13 June 2019).

She announced her retirement on Facebook at the end of English National Ballet's latest season in the Royal Albert Hall and I shall miss her greatly.   She was blessed with an expressive countenance that made her a remarkable actor as well as a fine dancer and a physique that gave her an aetherial appearance on stage. Those are qualities that not all principals possess and it is why there were many times that I enquired whether she was in the cast before looking up the leading artists.

Although it is unlikely that we shall ever see her on stage again, Sarah Kundi is not lost to dance.  I was delighted to see the Royal Ballet School's announcement that she has joined its staff. There she will pass on her skills, knowledge and experience to promising students.   I have had the good fortune to meet her at the stage doors of the Palace Theatre in Manchester and the Albert Hall as well as interview her over Zoom for the Stage Door.   I can report that she is as graceful and charming to her fans as she is magnificent on the stage.

I have to thank her for the many years of pleasure that she has given me and no doubt countless other balletgoers and wish her well in her new career as a teacher.

Sarah Kundi and Jade Hale-Christophi dancing in the same Ballet again

To my mind one of the most beautiful clips on the internet is this video of Depouillage danced by Sarah Kundi and Jade Hale-Christophi when they were at Ballet Black. Shortly after this clip was filmed they went their separate ways. Now they are both in English National Ballet and dancing in the same ballet.

Between the 24 July and the 9 Aug 2014 Kundi will dance Aphrodite and Hale-Christophi Paris in The Judgment of Paris, a work to be choreographed by James Streeter. The ballet is an interlude in the opera Adriana Lecouvreur which is to be performed by Opera Holland Park.  Tickets for the performance can be booked through Opera Holland Park's website,

I would not have learned of this performance had it not been for Janet McNulty who posted news of the performance to the BalletcoForum website and drew it to my attention on twitter earlier today. A tweet that was re-tweeted by Kundi herself. I am grateful to both of them.

Bye Bye and All the Best

This Saturday evening I shall be at the Albert Hall to see English National Ballet's Romeo and Juliet in the Round. I would be there anyway to see the company and this production and, of course, the wonderful Alina Cojocaru and Friedemann Vogel. But there is someone else I want to see and that is Sarah Kundi.

Readers of this blog know that I am a Kundi fan. She started her career at Northern Ballet and I have followed her from there to Ballet Black and then on to MurleyDance. A journey that introduced me to new companies, new dancers and new choreographers who are now among my favourites. Kundi is on the move again this time to Victor Ullate in Spain.

That is, of course, great news and I wish her well but it does mean that it will be difficult for her British fans to see her. She brings a particular quality to the dance which is demonstrated so well in Depouillage. I watch this clip a lot whenever I need an emotional boost. However, there is one last chance to see her in England before she sets off for Madrid and that is in the Albert Hall this Saturday. 

On Saturday I shall be cheering and clapping the company, its principals, its artistic director, its choreographer, the company but also Sarah Kundi whose career I shall continue to follow with interest.

And they have the cheek to call Balletomanes obsessive.

Apparently something to do with Dr. Who    Source Wikipedia

This Saturday I shall see the Stuttgart Ballet dance Taming of the Shrew at Sadlers Well's.  The next day I am catching an easyJet flight from Luton to see the Dutch National Ballet's Junior Company dance at the Staddschowburg in Amsterdam.  Then next Sunday I shall be in the audience of the Stanley and Audrey Burton Theatre for MurleyDance.

"Aren't you being a teeny weeny bit obsessive?" asked one friend who is a Dr Who fan.  Another friend who is a Chelsea supporter told me to get a life.  "Like watching 22 grown men chasing an inflated pig's bladder around a freezing stadium?" I replied.  If you ever want a study in obsession find yourself a football fan. When I was at St Andrews I learned of somebody's dad who demonstrated his allegiance to Rangers by planting forget-me-nots in his lawn as that was the only part of his dwelling that he could not paint blue. And as for Dr Who I remember being dragged around industrial estates in South Wales after a strenuous hearing in the Trade Marks Registry by a former clerk on the hunt for David Tennant. "Now there's obsession for you" as the locals would probably say.

Now balletomania isn't like that.  It can save lives and civilize as I mentioned in my article on "The New Mariinksy" of 4 May 2013. Tamara Karsavina's brother probably owed his life and certainly his liberty to the fact that his interrogator loved ballet.  And I don't think that loving ballet is an obsession for it is nothing more than the pursuit and admiration of beauty. A dancer like Sarah Kundi actuates an electrochemical switch in the brain that induces a feeling of contentment and well being.  Look at her "Dépouillage" in "Ballet Black's Appeal" of 12 March 2013 or her "Dépouillement" after the terrible events in Woolwich.  See what I mean.  That's why I can hardly wait for MurleyDance (a company that I would have longed to see anyway for the reasons I set out in "Something to brighten up your Friday" on 8 Nov 2013).

As for the trip to Holland I think we shall see a lot of Michaela de Prince in the opera houses of the world but at seat prices greatly in  excess of a return flight on a budget airline.  Often a dancer is at his or her best when he or she is young and I shall have seen this remarkable young artist while she is still young (see "Michaela dePrince" of 4 April 2013).

As for "Taming of the Shrew" see my post of 21 Sept as why John Cranko's masterpiece is one ballet everybody should see before they die.

If you are still unconvinced go, find yourself a dalek to play with.

Why Ballet Black Is special

In "Ballet Black's Appeal" 12 March 2013, I wrote:

"I have yet to see Ballet Black on the stage but I fell in love with the company just by watching this film of Depouillage by Jade Hale-Christofi and Sarah Kundi on YouTube:"

I could not say so at the time but that clip of Depouillage reminded me of another pas de deux.  In 1969 I attended a special gala to mark Sir Fred Ashton's retirement as principal choreographer to the Royal Ballet.  One of the works presented at that gala was the pas de deux was from Marguerite & Armand.   It was danced by the late Rudolf Nureyev and Margot Fonteyn.   

I saw Fonteyn a number of times and even dined with her in a manner of speaking when she visited my Inn one Grand Night. She was exquisite and I have never seen her like again. Nor had I ever expected to.  But I was reminded of Fonteyn by Sarah Kundi when I first saw Depouillage on YouTube.  Am I flattering Kundi extravagantly? I don't think so. Take a look at this YouTube clip of Marguerite and Armand and then another look at Depouillage. See what I mean?  

When I actually saw Kundi on stage for the first time in a Quadruple Bill at the Bernie Grant Arts Centre on Saturday 18 May the resemblance to the prima ballerina assoluta was quite uncanny.   She danced in two of the four short ballets: "Dopamine (you make my levels go silly)" with Jazmon Voss and as one of the girl friends left back home in Christopher Marney's "War Letters".

Dopamine was a pas de deux choreographed by Ludovik Ondiviela to the music of Fabio d'Andrea. It demonstrated the virtuosity of both Kundi and Voss.  Next was "The One Played Twice" by Javier de Frutos - a charming suite of dances to a barbershop harmony. The dancers were Sayaka Ichikawa, Damien Johnson, Cira Robinson and Jacob Wye.  I loved Javier de Frutos's green and purple costumes. Finally there was Egal danced by Kanika Carr and Jose Alves choreographed by Robert Biner to a strong percussive score.  

Though I had trekked down to London specifically to see Kundi I was bowled over by the other dancers. Each and every one of them is a star.

War Letters, which took up the whole of the second act, brought all the dancers together.  It opened with the voice of Kwame Kwei Amah reading the words of a soldier's letter to his sweetheart rejoicing at their love. The mood changed with a poignant pas de deux between a wounded, gassed or shell shocked soldier in pyjamas and his lover who arrived with smiles and left with a broken. Next came a dance to the music of Glenn Miller. Four soldiers met four girls on the dance floor. Three of the girls were asked to dance but the fourth was ignored. She tried to attract the boys' attention but to no avail. The second reading came from Thandie Newton comparing throwing off a lover to the loss of a heavy coat - but then regretting the loss of warmth. This analogy was taken up by the choreographer as the boys tried to lend her their overcoats. The scene ended with the girl shrouded with the soldiers' coats.  Finally, there was the voice of the wartime radio presenter John Snagge announcing "Victory in Europe". The last scene is of the artists together which I reproduced in my previous post. Home came the boys nursing their injuries. This was not the first ballet on the horror of war but I still found it a very moving work.

According to the company's website Cassa Pancho started Ballet Black to provide opportunities for aspiring Black and Asian dancers. That may still be its mission even though dancers of all races are now establishing themselves in other companies but it is certainly not the main reason for watching the company.  See Ballet Black because it is very, very good.

We in the North will have an opportunity to watch Ballet Black in November when it comes to the Stanley and Audrey Burton Theatre in Leeds between 6 and 7 Nov 2013.  Do go and watch them. They really are unmissable.

See also
"'Dépouillement' - another beautiful Pas de Deux by Kundi and Christofi" 22 May 2013

Ballet Black's Appeal

Writing in the Independent ("Dance review: Trouping the colour - Why Ballet Black puts on such a jolly good show" 9 March 2013) Jenny Gilbert opined:

"There should be no need for a company called Ballet Black, just as there should be no need for all-female political party shortlists. But there is, and for two reasons: to offer a platform for classically trained dancers of colour, particularly women, conspicuously absent from Britain's big ballet companies; and to provide role models for a rising generation of talented kids. But in the 12 years of Ballet Black's existence, it has found itself a third raison d'être. It's hard to think of another small company that even comes close to its turnover of new work."

I can think of a fourth reason and that is that there are some works that black dancers can do better than anyone else. I realized that when I first saw Dance Theatre of Harlem in London many years ago.

I have yet to see Ballet Black on the stage but I fell in love with the company just by watching this film of  Depouillage by Jade Hale-Christifi and Sarah Kundi on YouTube: Ballet Black, an associate company of the Royal Opera House, has just finished a successful season at the Linbury with a quadruple bill by Robert Binet, Ludovic Ondiviela, Javier de Frutos and Christopher Marney. The company is now taking the show on tour to Bracknell, Cambridge, Exeter and the Bernie Grant Centre in Tottenham. It has a school in Shepherd's Bush where the children are lucky enough to be taught by Cassa Pancho, the founder and artistic director of the company.

It is sad that the appearance of Tyrone Singleton and Celine Gittens in Swan Lake made news not just for their virtuosity which is self-evident but for their ethnicity (see "Birmingham Royal Ballet to make history" ITV website 4 Oct 2012) but that will change as the kids from Harlem, Shepherd's Bush and indeed Nairobi  come on stream.

Ballet Black is hoping to raise £60,000 for its 2012/13 season to help it  continue to support

• its brilliant and inspiring dancers, 
• its new choreographic work, and 
• its junior school and associate programmes, where it will develop the dancers of tomorrow.   

Apparently it costs £350,000 a year to run Ballet Black and any donation of WHATEVER size can make a difference to the future of the company, whether it's £1 or £1000. The company emphasizes that any support we the great British public can offer will be greatly welcomed.

Contributions can be made through Ballet Black's Just Giving web page.  Please dig deep.

Related Posts
"'Dépouillement' - another beautiful Pas de Deux by Kundi and Christofi" 22 May 2013

"What Makes Ballet Black Special" 20 May 2013