Scottish Ballet to revive Dawson's Swan Lake

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One of the most remarkable performances that I have attended was David Dawson's Swan Lake at Liverpool Empire on 3 June 2016.  My review of that show has turned out to be my most popular post attracting nearly 47,000 hits, over 10 times more than my next most popular article.  The reason I love this work so much is that it is innovative and original but still recognizably Swan Lake (see the synopsis). 

I am therefore delighted to announce that Scottish Ballet has announced that this beautiful ballet is to be revived (see Swan Lake The Classic retold for new Generation on Scottish Ballet's website). The work will open at the Festival Theatre in Edinburgh on 9 April 2020 and stay there until 11 April. It will then visit Aberdeen, Inverness and Glasgow finishing at the Theatre Royal on 2 May 2020 (see the Places, Dates and Times page).

The dancers expected to take part in the show include Aisling Brangan, Barnaby Rook Bishop, Claire Souet, Evan Loudon and Thomas Edwards.

This is one of the best productions of Swan Lake that I have ever seen and in Scottish Ballet's brilliant repertoire this work shines brightest.

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.

Hampson's Cinderella

The Forth Road Bridge

Author Euchiasmus

Source Wikipedia

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I had planned to see Scottish Ballet's Cinderella with a good friend from university who lives in Perth but I received an email from her yesterday calling off our outing because of the horrendous congestion on the roads and railways as a result of the temporary closure of the Forth Road Bridge. She and all the other motorists who have been inconvenienced by those emergency maintenance works may be amused by The Scottish Cinderella though I doubt that she would want her granddaughter to watch it just yet. Some of the language would make even the ratings at the Rosyth naval base blush.

Parents and grandparents in Scotland and indeed the rest of the United Kingdom may prefer to let their little ones watch this trailer or better still take them to see the show which opens at the Festival Theatre in Edinburgh tonight. It remains at that venue for the rest of this month and then goes on tour to Glasgow, Aberdeen and Inverness where I hope my friend will be able to catch it.

This is the ballet that Christopher Hampson created for the Royal New Zealand Ballet in 2007 to considerable critical acclaim. Hampson mentioned this ballet when he spoke at the State of the Art Panel Discussion: Narrative Dance in Ballet on 20 June 2015 (see My Thoughts on Saturday Afternoon's Panel Discussion at Northern Ballet 21 June 2015). He described it as a study of grief which is certainly consistent with the synopsis.

This has been a bumper year for Cinderella with productions from Ballet Cymru (Ballet Cymru's Conderella 15 June 2015) and the Dutch National Ballet (Wheeldon's Cinderella 13 July 2015) following on from David Nixon's last year (see Cinderella - even better 30 Nov 2014 and Northern Ballet's Cinderella - a Triumph 27 Dec 2013). I liked all those shows but I think my favourite up to now has been Ballet Cymru's. However, Scottish Ballet (or STB as it was called when I first knew it) was the first ballet company that I got to know and love and you know what they say about first love.

In my review of Northern Ballet's Cinderella in Sheffield I commended Matthew Broadbent who amused us all with his antics as a performing bear. Broadbent has now joined Scottish Ballet and it will be very good to see him again.

Returning to the Forth Road Bridge there used to be a permanent tailback across the Forth Road Bridge when they charged a toll - especially after decimalization when motorists had to fish around their pockets or handbags for a half penny as the half crown had ceased to be legal tender. I remember some medical students picked up a skeleton in Edinburgh and plonked it in the front passenger seat of a left hand drive car. They inserted the toll money in the skeleton's fingers and waited for the cashier to collect it. Feeling the bones she looked up and got the shock of her life. Her temper was not improved on being told by one of the students that the motorist had died waiting for his turn in the queue.

Like meeting an old friend after so many years

Scottish Ballet's The Nutcracker Festival Theatre, Edinburgh 3 Jan 2015


I'd been looking forward to seeing Peter Darrell's version of The Nutcracker all year. It's dangerous to set your heart on something that much because high expectations are rarely satisfied. But from the moment Richard Horner raised his hands it was pure delight. Like meeting an old university friend half a century on.

And in a sense that was just what it was. I was introduced to Scottish Ballet by John Steer in 1969 (see Scottish Ballet 20 Dec 2013). Darrell died in 1987 (Peter Darrell 9 March 2014) and I cannot recall when I last saw one of his ballets. Tonight I was reminded of Darrell's brilliance.  It was one of the reasons I fell in love with Scottish Ballet and why the company continues to occupy a special place in my affections.

Darrell's Nutcracker is of the traditional kind. Clara remains a child unlike the Eagling and Grigorovich versions (see The Nutcracker reference page and my reviews of Cracking! 14 Dec 2013 and Clara grows up- Grigorovitch's Nutcracker transmitted directly from Moscow 21 Dec 2014), She does not morph into the sugar plum. There are no gimmicky balloons, flying boats or expanding Christmas trees. Above all there has been no attempt to shift the location of the ballet from Hoffmann's original location to the banks of the Thames or even The Neva.

But there are some interesting features. In the prologue Drosselmeyer transformed an urchin into a handsome youth. Clara's troublesome little brother Fritz was given a toy rat for Christmas with which he tormented the women folk foretelling the battle between rodents and toy soldiers. The mice are children - girls as well as boys. The struggle was short and sweet and the nutcracker despatched the rat king without any help from Clara. One of the divertissements is a hornpipe reminiscent of Pineapple Poll danced to music that I cannot recall hearing before. Best of all were two great monkeys who parked themselves either side of Clara. They amused the crowd with antics that would not be encouraged in the drawing rooms of Morningside or Bearsden.

My seat was in the centre of the first row with a full view of the orchestra pit. I had never been so close to an orchestra before. I could see every movement of every player which was almost as fascinating as the ballet. I watched them in the "la la" vocals snow flake scene to see whether they had a choir as Festival once did. I thought I saw the woodwind players mouth the tune but I think Horner must have used a previous recording.

As advertised Erik Cavallari danced the nutcracker, Bethany Kingsley-Garner the sugar plum, Owen Thorne Drosselmeyer, Amy Pollock Clara and Remi Anderson as King Rat but Eve Mutso was the snow queen. All danced well but in many ways the biggest stars were the children from Scottish Ballet Associates and the Dance School of Scotland who showed considerable stage presence as well as good technique. Amy Pollok was a great Clara. The other big star was the designer Lez Brotherston who created a gorgeous kingdom of the sweets out of Christmas tree baubles and barricades for the mice out of outsize apple cores, boiled sweets and assorted cheeses.

The day I danced in public David Nixon stood next to me on the landing overlooking the foyer of Northern Ballet. The audience, which consisted largely of proud parents, siblings and friends of the dancers so was less than impartial, erupted in generous applause and emptied out of the Stanley and Audrey Burton Theatre chirping and chattering. "It's the best sound in the world" said Nixon. "They really enjoyed it". It was the same last night. The auditorium, which was packed to the gunwales, exploded with clapping and we stepped into Nicholson Street on a high. I've reviewed six productions of The Nutcracker since I started this blog and have enjoyed them all but this is the one I like best.

Bruce Again

Less than 24 hours after seeing Rambert's Rooster in Manchester, I saw Christopher Bruce's face in another programme. This time it was for Ten Poems which was part of the double bill The Crucible with Ten Poems which Scottish Ballet danced at the Festival Theatre in Edinburgh.

Shortly before the show, I tweeted:

Two Christopher Bruce works in consecutive days. I wonder whether I shall enjoy @scottishballet's 10 Poems as much as @Rambertdance Rooster.
— Jane Lambert (@nipclaw) October 4, 2014

I did.

I found "Do not go gentle into that good night" particularly moving. @scottishballet did Wales proud with its tribute to its great poet.
— Jane Lambert (@nipclaw) October 4, 2014

The two works had quite a lot in common. Rooster was choreographed to familiar songs.  Ten Poems to equally familiar poems. There was similar precision and control in the choreography in both works. Marian Bruce who designed the sets and costumes of Rooster also designed the costumes and sets for Ten Poems. But there were differences. There is much less light and joy in Thomas's verse than in the music of The Rolling Stones. Do not go gentle into that good night danced by Andrew Peasgood and Chris Harrison had me close to tears. On the other hand, having seen men push women around in Rooster I derived some satisfaction at masculine comeuppance in Lament. There weren't too many laughs in Ten Poems unlike Rooster but the plucking gesture in the general neighbourhood "of the old ram rod, dying of women" by one of those women generated one of them. Indeed a guffaw of (mainly) female laughter.

The other work in the double bill was Helen Pickett's The Crucible.  This followed closely Arthur Miller's play which I first saw performed by the National Theatre at The Old Vic at about the same time as I was introduced to Dylan Thomas's poetry. It is about the Salem witch trials which resulted in the execution of some 20 people in 1692 for the crime of witchcraft. Each of those condemned was convicted on the evidence of a scheming teenager who manipulated her friends and through them the whole colony of Massachusetts into a hysterical frenzy. Miller wrote The Crucible as a study of mass hysteria and the irrationality of group think as Senator McCarthy was ending the careers of some of America's leading figures in the arts with groundless or exaggerated allegations of Communist sympathy.

There were very strong performances by Sophie Martin as Abigail Wlliams, Chris Harrison as John Procter and Eve Mutso as his wife, Elizabeth Procter.  Indeed, the whole cast were great. Tense and dramatic it was in many ways more powerful than the play. Charles Heightchew's designs and George Thomson's lighting were striking, particularly the last scene with a silhouette of the gallows and a prisoner ascending to his doom.

The double bill is moving on to Aberdeen having started in Glasgow and having also visited Inverness as well as Edinburgh but sadly it will not be seen outside Scotland, at least not for the moment. That is a pity because we don't see enough of Scottish Ballet south of the border. It does a season at the Wells, of course, and makes it down to Newcastle occasionally but not to Bristol where it was born or Leeds where its first cousin if not sister company through Laverne Meyer now resides. Its family resemblance to Northern Ballet is remarkable. We in Leeds and I am sure the folk in Bristol and indeed the rest of the nation would welcome it with open arms if it could be persuaded to pay us all a visit.

Ballet West's "The Nutcracker"

Pitlochry

Val Vannet

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For those who do not know Pitlochry, it is a small town in Perthshire just outside the Cairngorms National Park. Overlooked by Ben y Vrackie, on the banks of the River Tummel and not far from the Queen's View with its magnificent panorama of Loch Tummel and Schiehallion  Pitlochry is surrounded by spectacular scenery.  The town has many attractions but the one that distinguishes it from everywhere else in the Highlands is the Pitlochry Festival Theatre. Between May and October every year it holds a summer theatre festival under the strapline "Stay 6 Days, See 6 Plays."  I have been coming to the summer festival on and off for the last 40 years and I can recommend it strongly.  You will find the programme for this year's season right here.

The theatre stages the occasional show in the Winter and I was intrigued to receive a mailing for a performance of "The Nutcracker by Ballet West". Now I had heard of a company by the name of Ballet West in the United States which is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year but if that company ever came to the United Kingdom I would have expected it to tour major cities rather than towns in the Highlands of just over 2,500 souls.  It occurred to me that there might be a  company from the West Country which is where Scottish Ballet originated,  I googled "ballet, west, uk" and was surprised but delighted to find a company and school in Taynuilt.  Delighted because where could be more idyllic to study dance than by the banks of a real lake (or more properly loch) which might even host the occasional swan?

Now "Nutcracker" is a ballet I know very well.  Every Christmas I used to see the London Festival Ballet's production at the Festival Hall.   I have seen several other companies' productions, including one by the Cairo Opera Ballet in their new opera house.  More recently I saw David Nixon's production for Northern Ballet in Leeds and the Royal Ballet's which was streamed to cinemas just before Christmas.   I had travelled a long way on Saturday to see Ballet West's production and I am glad to say that I was not in the least disappointed.

This is a very young company and also a manifestly Scottish one.  I loved the reel at the Christmas party in the first Act.   Other touches that I appreciated were a clog dance reminiscent of Simone's in Fille and automatons as in Coppelia in the first act and some extra divertissements such as the Sailor's solo and Mother Ginger and her children in the second.   It is also refreshing to find a ballet with naughty little girls as well as naughty little boys making a nuisance of themselves.  Usually it is just young Fritz or Hans who gets ticked off for damaging the nutcracker,   Another bit of humour was the servants snatching a furtive dram after their employers had had their party.

Altogether I loved the choreography which I now know to have been created by the late Alexander Bennett.   All I know about him is as what appears on the company's website:

"Born in Edinburgh, Mr Bennett achieved international acclaim in the Ballet Rambert and the Royal Ballet. Throughout his years as a principal dancer in both companies he partnered such distinguished ballerinas as Dame Margot Fonteyn & Lynn Seymour, and worked with many of the great choreographers including Peter Darrell, Sir Peter Wright and Sir Robert Helpmann. This production was the last full-length work completed by Mr Bennett."

I shall find out more.

A ballet is made by the virtuosity of its principals who in this production were:

• Sara-Maria Smith who danced Sugar Plum - a particularly demanding role with its pointe work and fouettés in the pas de deux; 
• her partner Jonathan Barton, and 
• Isaac Bowrey who danced Drosselmeyer. 

They all danced well. The website says that Smith and Barton are graduates of Ballet West's school but says nothing about Bowrey whom I liked best of all.

Finally I loved the sets. This is a complicated ballet with a Christmas party, snow scene and a ball room and lost of different costumes from mice and toy soldiers to Chinese, Russians and flowers. Not easy for a great theatre like Covent Garden as we learned from the cinema production. Harder still for the different often tiny stages upon which this company has to perform. Whoever designed the backdrops and costumes did a very good job. The backdrops were much more solid looking than most though Bowrey had to free some fabric which snagged on an expanding Christmas tree.   Particularly impressive were the costumes for the mice whose heads resembled shock troops' helmets and particularly charming were the rainbow skirts for Mother Ginger's daughters.

Was there anything I did not like? Not much. I would have appreciated a programme instead of just a cast sheet. I only found out the name of the choreographer by calling the company and I still do not know the name of the set designer. Some of the divertissements were under-rehearsed and there were a few slight mishaps which hardly anybody noticed and nobody minded. It has to be remembered that Ballet West is a school as well as a company which reaches out to the public. It appears that everyone is allowed a go. There was no orchestra but then this ballet was performed in a theatre designed for drama and the theatre's speakers were pretty good.

The company has one more show to perform on its current tour of Scotland at The Howden Park Centre near Livingston in West Lothian on 1 March. If you live in the area I urge you to see them because you are in for a treat. Surprisingly they have no immediate plans to tour the rest of the United Kingdom though they have advertised a tour of China. I do hope they come to London because I think audiences there will take them to their hearts.