Van Dantzig's "Swan Lake"

Anna Ol and Artur Shesterikov

Author Michel Schnater
© 2018 Dutch National Ballet, all rights reserved
Reproduced courtesy of the company

Anna Ol and Artur Shesterikov White Swan Pas de Deux, Swan Lake Dutch National Ballet Gala, 8 Sept 2018, 19:30  Stopera

This year the gala for the opening night of the 2018-2019 ballet season was dedicated to Rudi van Dantzig. One of the works for which he is most admired is his production of Swan Lake which will be performed in March.  I have seen extracts before but not yet the whole ballet but the little bits that I have seen persuade me that this is special.  With van Dantzig's choreography, costumes by Toer van Schayk, how could it be otherwise?

On the opening night gala we saw two pas de deux from the ballet.  The first from the white act stars Artur Shesterikov and Anna Ol as Siegtied and  Odette.  The second was the seduction scene from the black act with Daniel Camargo and Maia Makhateli as Siegfried and Odile. I shall discuss that second extract tomorrow.

Jakop Ahlbom's Swan Lake

Teaser Swan Lake from Jakop Ahlbom on Vimeo.


First we had Mat Ek's Swan Lake, then Sir Matthew Bourne's, next David Nixon's, then Alexander Ekman and now Jakop Ahfbom's which will be danced at the Meervaart Theatre in Amsterdam between 21 and 30 June 2016 before going on tour to Eindhoven and Roosendaal in September.  According to Jakop Ahlbom's website, this is a joint production with the International Choreographic Arts Centre in Amsterdam ("ICK") and the Meervaart Theatre.  The Meervaart, incidentally, is the theatre in which the Dutch National Ballet Junior Company danced Ballet Bubbles on 14 Feb 2016.

The synopsis of the ballet is set out here:

"Swan Lake is een moderne vertaling van Het Zwanenmeer, een vrije interpretatie van het oorspronkelijke sprookje. Centraal in zijn bewerking staat de destructieve kracht van liefde. Hoe gaan wij om met de liefde, in alle puurheid maar ook in de dubbelhartigheid ervan. Jakop is geïnteresseerd in het dilemma van de mens die we willen zijn, en de mens die we soms moeten en zullen zijn. Hoe blijven we dicht bij onszelf in ons verlangen naar de ander, in ons verlangen naar volmaaktheid. Swan Lake is een associatieve vertelling, waarin de personages zich gewaar worden van hun obscure kanten, liefde niet alles overwint en een mens zijn diepste wezen niet kan verloochenen."

Now I have never studied Dutch (though I have German which I believe helps) so my translation may well be rubbish but I think that means that Swan Lake is a modern version of Swan Lake, a free interpretation of the traditional folk tale. The rest I can't make head or tale out of at all and the Google machine translation seems to be gobbledegook.

I have had a little bit more luck in the Lees Meer (Read More) section:

"Het oorspronkelijke Zwanenmeer vertelt het verhaal van de witte zwaan Odette, die is betoverd door de tovenaar Von Rothbart. Zij is ‘s nachts vrouw, maar overdag moet ze als zwaan door het leven. Tijdens een jachtpartij staat prins Siegfried op het punt de witte zwaan neer te schieten, als zij plots in een mooie vrouw verandert. Ze worden verliefd en hij belooft haar te trouwen. Dan zal de vloek verbroken worden. Ze spreken af dat zij die avond naar het bal op het kasteel zal komen. Daar verschijnt echter Von Rothbart met zijn dochter Odile. Zij is het zwarte evenbeeld van Odette. Siegfried denkt dat het zijn geliefde is, danst met haar en belooft haar zijn trouw. Als Odette bij het kasteel arriveert, ziet Siegfried zijn vergissing in. Haar kans op verlossing lijkt verloren."

This seems to tell the story of Von Rothbart's spell over Odette, Siegfried's falling in love with her and Rothbart's passing off Odile as Odette quite faithfully.

One big difference between this Swan Lake and everybody else's is that the choreographer is using an adaptation  of Tchaikovsky by Alamo Race Track rather than the original score. The cast will include Helena Volkov, Tycho Hupperets, Gwen Langenberg,  Ivan Cidrian Ugrin and Silke Hundertmark.

Sadly I won't be able to make it as I shall be in Italy for the Casa for Alessia gala but should be happy to publish a review from any of my dear readers.

Maya Plisetskaya

Maya Plisetskaya 31 Oct 2011

Copyright: www.kremlin.ru
 Creative Commons Licence 

A lot of good things happened on 2 May 2015 for me personally in that I saw an outstanding performance by Ballet Central in Leeds (see Dazzled 3 May 2015) and for the public in general in that the Duchess of Cambridge gave birth to a daughter. But for me it was all overshadowed by the sad news from Moscow that the prima ballerina assoluta Maya Plisetskaya had died in Germany.

Though I never met her I felt the loss deeply.  When I first took an interest in ballet in the 1960s there were two great names: Dame Margot Fonteyn in this country and Maya Plisetskaya in the Soviet Union. Of the two I found Plisetskaya by far the more interesting,

Here is a film about Plisetskaya and her art made at about that time I first heard of her.  It shows her at her peak dancing in some of her most famous roles: Odile, Juliet, the Dying Swan and above all Phrygia.  It also has some shots of her as a young student,

  

I admired her as an artist but also as a human being. She had an old fashioned loyalty to her country (which siome would say was misplaced as she lost her father in one of Stalin's purges) but she was not afraid of asserting herself from time to time.

In 1958 Plisetskaya married the composer Rodion Shchedrin who composed the score to The Little Humpbacked Horse and arranged several other works for her. Their marriage continued until the day she died.

She was a ravishingly beautiful woman even in her eighties as the photograph shows. Like Fonteyn she continued to perform long after the age most dancers have retired.

Nobody can live for ever. She had a very good innings. But that does not stop me from feeling very, very sad at her passing.