Ballet Cymru's "Sleeping Beauty Moment"

The Millennium Centre

(c) 2016 Jane Lambert: all rights reserved

Ballet Cymru Little Red Riding Hood and Three Little Pigs Millennium Centre, 4 Dec 2016

Yesterday I was fortunate enough to attend an event which may be as significant for Ballet Cymru as the first performance of The Sleeping Beauty by the Sadler's Wells Ballet in the Royal Opera House on 20 Feb 1946 was for the Royal Ballet. That performance of The Sleeping Beauty made the Royal Ballet. There is every chance that yesterday's performance of Little Red Riding Hood and the Three Little Pigs before a packed house at the Wales Millennium Centre with the entire BBC National Orchestra of Wales will do the same for Ballet Cymru. The performance celebrated two significant anniversaries: the centenary of Roald Dahl's birth in Llandaff  and the 30th anniversary of the formation of Ballet Cymru (see Our History on Ballet Cymru's website).

The show took place in the Donald Gordon Theatre which is a massive auditorium as my photograph shows. According to Wikipedia it has 1,897 seats which makes that auditorium significantly larger than The Lowry with 1,730, the Leeds Grand Theatre with 1,550. and the Bradford Alhambra with 1,440 and only slightly smaller than the Royal Opera House and the Coliseum. There was barely an empty seat in the house.  With a population of only 346,000, Cardiff is not a massive city. To attract nearly 1,900 people tat 16:00 in the run-up to Christmas speaks volumes for the regard that members of the public have for Ballet Cymru.

I had seen the show at the Riverfront Theatre in Newport on 21 May 2016 and reviewed it in Ballet Cymru's Summer Tour 22 May 2016. David Murley saw it in the Lilian Baylis Studio at Sadler's Wells last week and reviewed it in Little Red Riding Hood comes to London on 2 Dec 2016. On each of those occasions the dancers performed to recorded music. Dancing to a massive symphony orchestra presented logistical questions such as where to put the musicians. They were too numerous for an orchestra pit and part of the attraction was to experience the orchestra playing a new work.

Donald Gordon Theatre

(c) 2016 Jane Elizabeth Lambert: all rights reserved

The answer was to put the orchestra on stage as in Elite Syncopations. Just before the show started the musicians and dancers assembled behind the screen in the photo to the left. As the house lights dimmed, silhouettes of the musicians and dancers could be made out. The curtain rose and the lights focused on Mark Griffiths who began the story by introducing the wolf and other forest creatures. I had feared that a work that had been designed for small or medium theatres would be swamped by the sheer expanse of the auditorium but the orchestra scaled up the production naturally and seamlessly.

The role of Little Red Riding Hood had been danced by Lydia Arnoux. I don't know whether Darius James and Amy Doughty had created it for her but she was well suited to it. When I read in David Murley's review that Anna Pujol had danced Little Red Riding Hood in London I was intrigued because Pujol is taller and dances differently. Pujol certainly impressed David Murley:

"Spanish company Artist Anna Pujol portrayed a likeable, empowered, no-nonsense and even glamorous Little Red Riding Hood. Pujol has sass and class. There were moments speckled throughout the piece when she was a budding Cyd Charisse."

I was impressed too. She made the role her own. There are a lot of chaînés and other  pyrotechnics in James and Doughty's choreography which Pujol executed exquisitely.

All the dancers performed well and it would be unfair to single any out for special praise but I loved Robbie Moorcroft's depiction of the "bad grandma", Dylan Waddell's mean wolf and half pantomime cow and Miguel Fernantes's other half. It was as always good to see Krystal Lowe on stage again as a guest artist.

I met the dancers briefly at a small party after the show. They told me about the thrill they experienced at dancing to a full house in a massive theatre. They also loved dancing to live musicians. They want more of both. They are ambitious. They want to see their company grow. They are looking forward to Farnham Maltings on Thursday but they are ready for bigger things now.

Other Reviews

Mike Smith  Little Red Riding Hood and The Three Little Pigs, Ballet Cymru, BBC National Orchestra of Wales, Wales Millennium Centre 5 Dec 2016 Art Scene in Wales

Ballet Cymru's Summer Tour

Darius James with Gwenllian Davies and Miguel Fernandes

Photo Gita Mistry
(c) 2016 Gita Mistry, all rights reserved

Ballet Cynru, Roald Dahl's Little Red Riding Hood and The Three Little Pigs, Riverfront Theatre, Newport 21 May 2016

Last night I attended the opening of Ballet Cymru's summer tour at the company's home theatre in Newport. The works which they are taking on tour are revivals of Roald Dahl's  Little Red Riding Hood & The Three Little Pigs to celebrate the centenary of the writer's birth and Romeo a Juliet to commemorate the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare's death.  Both ballets were created by Darius James and Amy Doughty whose work I admire very much indeed. Their Cinderella was outstanding. It was so good that it was my ballet of the year and their Tir was my number two (see Highlights of 2015 29 Dec 2915).

The work which the company performed last night was Lwhich I previewed in Hard not to have Favourites ...... Ballet Cymru's Little Red Riding Hood rides again 28 April 2016). These are dance dramas based on two of Roald Dahl's Revolting Rhymes which are connected by the appearance of Little Red Riding Hood as wolf slayer in both works. Little Red Riding Hood and the Wolf are act 1 and The Three Little Pigs are act 2. The ballet is very short which makes it suitable for young children of whom there were quite a few in the audience last night but those stories have an ironic twist epitomized by the line "Ah, Piglet, you must never trust Young ladies from the upper crust" which appeals to adults.

The central figure in the show (or as Gita would say "person of the match") was Little Red Riding Hood danced last night by Lydia Arnoux who displayed her usual virtuosity with charm and humour but she was supported strongly by Mark Griffiths who told the story and also by Andrea Battagia who danced the wolf and Robbie Moorcroft who danced the dissolute alcoholic grandma in act 1. Yesterday was an opportunity to see Ballet Cymru's latest recruits two of whom appear with Darius James in the photo above. Gwenllian Davies, who is actually Welsh, danced the virtuous grandmother yesterday. Her companion, Miguel Fernandes, was part of a cow in act 1 and a pig in act 2. Dylan Waddell was the other half of the cow. Anna Pujol was a pig in both acts. They all performed well as did the whole cast.

The recruitment of four new dancers with excellent credentials attests to the increasing strength and self confidence of the company. It is still relatively small in numbers but not in ambition for it will perform Little Red Riding Hood and the Three Little Pigs to the accompaniment of the BBC National Orchestra of Wales in the massive Millennium Centre in Cardiff on 4 Dec 2016. That will be a great day and a coming of age for a great little company. Wherever you are in the country, nay Europe or indeed the world, it will be worth a trip to Cardiff for it will be a day to remember.