Birmingham Royal Ballet at the Lowry's Open Day

Author RobChafer Licence CC BY-SA 3.0 Source Wikimedia Commons

The Lowry

 

According to its website, The Lowry is holding an open day on 6 Aug 2023.  It has not published any details yet though it has posted a video about the event in 2021.   As we have a company class in Leeds on 5 Aug 2023 and I shall be speaking at the Cambridge IP Law Summer School between 7 and 11 Aug 2023 I would have given the event a miss had I not received an email about it from the Birmingham Royal Ballet last week.

That email carried an image of Carabosse doing her worse towering over a smaller image of Désiré and Aurora at their wedding above the banner headline "Join us at The Lowry Open Day on Sunday 6 August".  The email announces that the Birmingham Royal Ballet will attend the open day between 10:00 and 17:00 bringing costumes for The Sleeping Beauty that visitors can try on.  Between 11:00 and 14:00 there will be workshops where attendees can learn some of the choreography.

The Birmingham Royal Ballet returns to Salford to dance Sir Peter Wright's production of The Sleeping Beauty between 7 and 9 March 2024,  Readers can view the trailer here.  Companies around the world dance that production and I have seen performances of that work by the Hungarian and Dutch National Ballets. The best that I have ever seen was in Amsterdam on 17 Dec 2017 with  Maia Makhateli as Aurora, Daniel Camargo as the prince and Igone de Jongh as Carabosse (see The Dutch National Ballet's "The Sleeping Beauty" - I have waited nearly 50 years for this show 20 Dec 2017).  That bit of ballet history will never be repeated but I have very high hopes of BRB's visit to the Lowry in the Spring.

Chelmsford Ballet's Seventieth Anniversary Show

Oberon, Titania and Puck with Fairies Dancing

Author: Willliam Blake
Source Wikipedia, A Midsummer Night's Dream

Chelmsford Ballet Company A Midsummer Night's Dream 20 March 2019 19:30 Chelmsford Civic Theatre

It is very hard for me to review a performance by the Chelmsford Ballet Company objectively because I am an associate member of the company. As I live in Yorkshire I cannot participate in its performances but I have attended all its shows since 2014 and even one of its AGMs.  I am very proud of my connection with the company.   I have come to expect a lot from the Chelmsford Ballet and its dancers have always delivered.   This year's show was no exception.

The evening was in three parts:  it opened with preparations for Hippolyra's wedding to Theseus. It then switched to Coppelia starting with the dolls' scene.  That comprised the whole of the first act.  The second act was a transposition of the play without Pyramus and Thisbe. A computer-generated graphic flashing the years back to 1949 indicated why Coppelia had been substituted for the play within a play.  Coppelia had been the company's first full-length ballet so there was no need for a lion, wall or even a man in the moon which would not have been easy for a choreographer transpose into dance.  There are also some parallels between Hermia and Swanhilda in that Franz makes a pass at the strange new girl reading a book upside down.  Is that is reading too much into the juxtaposition of Athenian wood and Swabian village?

Although I love Coppelia I enjoyed the second act much better than the first.  It told the story beautifully.  It started with the quarrel over the changeling boy and continued with the troubles of the lovers, Puck's blunder, Titania's infatuation with Bottom and the final reconciliation.  I think Annette Potter was right to include Coppelia into the 70th-anniversary production though it might have been better to have Midsummer Night's Dream with an extract of Coppelia as part of a double bill.

There were some memorable performances.   Andrew Potter danced both Dr Coppelius and Oberon.  James Fletcher was a hilarious Botton.  Olivia Riley was a splendid Puck.  Women can often dance that role at least as successfully as men as Isabela Coracy has shown in Arthur Pita's version for Ballet Black. Titania, the fairies, lovers all danced well and all deserve congratulations.

I have already mentioned the computer-generated graphics. Whoever created them for Chelmsford Ballet is a genius. I am surprised he or she has not been snapped up by New Adventures years ago.  I think that artist's best work was the overgrown palace in The Sleeping Beauty.   The other things the company does particularly well are the costumes. They were gorgeous.  Particularly the fairies' tutus and in some cases headgear.

Wednesday's opening night was attended by both of the company's patrons,  Doreen Wells and Christopher Marney.  Readers of this blog will know I have always been one of Marney's fans. Wells, who danced with what was then called the Touring Company, was one of the big names when I began to follow ballet. She was and remains one of my favourite dancers. The city's lord mayor was in the audience resplendent in her chain of office.  It was, altogether, a very good evening.   Well worth the long drive from Holmfirth.

Houston Ballet

Houston Ballet's Centre for Dance

Author Marshall Strabala
Licence Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported

Although I sympathize with everybody in the USA who has been bereaved, injured, displaced, inconvenienced or in any way affected adversely by Hurricane Harvey and the subsequent flooding, I have a particular concern for Houston Ballet, its dancers and other staff. There are two reasons for my concern: the first is that this is an important company with close links to this country through its former artistic director Ben Stevenson; and, secondly, one of my favourite young dancers, Emilie Tassinari, has recently joined the company's corps de ballet. 

The pictures and press reports from Houston are horrendous.  According to the Houston Press, Houston's theatre district had taken a serious hit from the hurricane (see Natalie de la Garza Houston's Theater District Takes Serious Hit From Harvey 29 Aug 2017 Houston Press). One of the photos to Ms de la Garza's report shows flood waters lapping the walls of the company's studios. I see from the company's website that the company suffered a power outage and water damage and that its offices will be closed until after Labour Day which is a public holiday that falls on the first Monday of September and that it has had to cancel its opening performances of Poetry in Motion that was scheduled to start the new ballet season (see Hurricane Update, a message from Jim Nelson and Staunton Welch).

Although we have been spared weather as intemperate as Hurricane Harvey, we in Yorkshire know the damage that water can do to a ballet company's costumes and properties. On 26 Dec 2015, the River Aire burst its banks and flooded the warehouse where our regional ballet company, Northern Ballet, stored many of its sets and costumes (see Northern Ballet's press release Flood Update 21 Jan 2016). Northern Ballet is a company to which I am particularly close as it was formed in Manchester, my home town, and is now based in Leeds which is my nearest big city. I have followed its productions for many years and support both the company and the academy (of which I am an adult ballet student) financially. Many of the productions were salvaged but some were lost, including Peter Pan which I enjoyed very much (see Not too sure about Fairies but I certainly believe in Rachael Gillespie 21 Dec 2014).

Happily, Messrs Nelson and Welch have reported that the dancers, artists, and staff are safe, although many have been displaced and otherwise affected by this terrible storm.  I was in touch with Emilie through Facebook on Sunday morning. She replied that her district was unaffected and that she was safe and well. She responded very quickly indicating that she still had electricity and access to the internet.  I wondered whether that was still the case but I am very glad to report that she marked herself safe on Facebook 21 minutes ago.

Northern Ballet recovered from the flood and is now as strong as ever. This year it will have created three new ballets including Kenneth Tindall's excellent Casanova (see Casanova - "it has been a long time since I enjoyed a show by Northern Ballet as much as I enjoyed Casanova last night" 12 March 2017). I am sure Houston Ballet will do the same.  They will probably need a little bit of extra help from ballet fans around the world.  If you want to lend them a hand they have a donations page though it is not open yet. I am sure it will be very soon.

Dance and Diplomacy: Britain's IP Attaché to China will visit Northern Ballet

Standard YouTube Licence


Ever since Northern Ballet moved from West Park to Quarry Hill I have been looking for an opportunity to introduce the company to my connections in intellectual property (see Ballet and Intellectual Property - my Excuse for reviewing "Beauty and the Beast" IP Yorkshire 31 Dec 2011).

The opportunity arose when Mr Tom Duke, our IP attaché in Beijing, asked me to recommend a venue for a talk that he plans to give in Leeds on 19 Sept to business owners and their professional advisers entitled Succeeding in China - Mitigating the IP Risk. I could think of no better place than Northern Ballet' boardroom in its premises at Quarry Hill.

I suggested that venue for several reasons.

First, the building is magnificent, one of the finest new structures in the city. The view of Leeds from the boardroom is breathtaking.

Secondly, Northern Ballet creates a lot of intellectual assets such as choreography, costumes, musical scores, performances, properties and set designs which are protected by copyrights, rights in performances and unregistered design rights and the Northern Ballet brand is a valuable trade mark for all kinds of merchandise. The company performs regularly in China where it uses all those intellectual assets. It, therefore, exemplifies the topic of Mr Duke's talk.

The third reason for my suggestion is that letting fees and catering services are a source of revenue for the company. It helps to fund dazzling new productions.

Finally, I hope that some of the business owners, lawyers, patent and trade mark attorneys and other professionals may be tempted to return for a show at the Stanley and Audrey Burton Theatre or even a class at the Academy which I am sure they would enjoy enormously.

If any of my readers would like to attend the talk on 19 Sept it is free. Give me a ring on 020 7404 5252 or send me a message through my contact form.  The event starts at 09:30 with registration and networking.  Mr Duke will deliver his speech at 10:00. I will also speak briefly about the things you should do here before you leave for China. There will be opportunities for one-to-one discussions with all sorts of business and professional advisors. The event will end at midday so that Mr Duke can grab some lunch before his next appointment in Barnsley.

I have also written about the event in NIPC News and IP Yorkshire if anybody is interested.

23 July 2017	Jane Lambert	IP Rights in China	NIPC News
21 July 2017	Jane Lambert	Meet our IP Attaché to China	IP Yorks

Ballet Cymru's Big Give Appeal

Ballet Cymru

(c) 2015 Gita Mistry: all rights reserved

I have already asked you to dig deep for English National Ballet's Dance for Parkinson in ENB's Big Give to Dance for Parkinson's 25 Nov 2016 and Birmingham Royal Ballet to stage La Bayadere in A Birmingham Bayadere 26 Nov 2016 . I urge you to support those causes once again. I also ask you to add Balletboyz Parkinson's can dance. But there is one other appeal I should like you to consider.  It is smaller than the others but no less deserving.

Ballet Cymru, some of the sweetest people I know in dance, hope to raise £1,000 in the Big Give for a new roof with solar panels. They need it because their existing roof is beginning to leak in several places putting props and costumes at risk. Responsibly they also want to reduce their carbon footprint.  They have already arranged £1,000 match funding and another £1,000 from the public is not too much to ask - is it?

We are very lucky in this country to have strong regional companies in Birmingham, Glasgow, Leeds and Newport as well as world class companies like the Royal Ballet and ENB and we must cherish them all.