dance
Song of Songs, Pam Tanowitz/David Lang, Barbican Theatre review - sublime music and intricate dance bring life to a 2,000-year-old love poemMonday, 16 October 2023
On the whole the Bible is not big on sex and sensuality, with the exception of one very short book in the Old Testament. The Song of Solomon – aka Song of Songs – is a hymn to carnal pleasure, one whose vivid descriptions of perfect flesh and brimming wine flagons have divided religious scholars for centuries. Read more... |
Don Quixote, Royal Ballet review - crazy Russian-Spanish romcom, brilliant dancingFriday, 06 October 2023
It was Carlos Acosta’s new production of Don Quixote that launched the Royal Ballet season in the autumn of 2013, and as it does so again 10 years on, its sunny dynamism is just what the doctor ordered. Read more... |
Ballet Nights, Lanterns Studio Theatre review - dance gets its own cabaret seasonWednesday, 04 October 2023
The variety show format is hardly new to concert programming. In the early 1900s it was the norm. Go to hear a Beethoven piano sonata or the latest piece by Claude Debussy and you could expect it to be followed by a novelty item on the fiddle, a vocal rendition of “Sally in our Alley” or a ventriloquist. By comparison Ballet Nights – an enterprise headed by impresario-compere Jamiel Devernay-Laurence – is playing safe by focusing on dance. Read more... |
Black Sabbath: The Ballet, Birmingham Royal Ballet, Birmingham Hippodrome review - two very different art forms mergeFriday, 29 September 2023
These days Black Sabbath aren’t short of admirers in the arts and even further afield. Artists as disparate as veteran soul man, Charles Bradley and Scandi popsters the Cardigans have covered their songs – and then there’s Jazz Sabbath, who do exactly as their name suggests. Read more... |
Ailey 2, Marlowe Theatre, Canterbury review - young, black and fabulousWednesday, 27 September 2023
Dance lovers with no access to a major city could feel genuinely hard done by were it not for Dance Consortium. This sainted organisation works to bring a company from overseas each autumn to a dozen or so large-scale theatres across the UK and Ireland – theatres whose dance offering might otherwise rarely extend beyond the latest Strictly spin-off. Read more... |
Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre, Sadler's Wells review - exhilarating display of a full deck of dance stylesSaturday, 09 September 2023
A big welcome awaited the Alvin Ailey dancers at the Wells, on their first international tour since lockdown. The company has scheduled four different mixed bills over 10 days, each with its signature piece, Revelations, as the finale. This is a great idea as the company returned after their final bow on press night to reprise part of the piece and coax the audience onto their feet. No problem. Read more... |
Matthew Bourne's Romeo + Juliet, Sadler's Wells review - exhilarating dancing, inventive movesMonday, 07 August 2023
Matthew Bourne regularly revamps the first version of a new piece so that by the second go-round it really zings. For the return of his 2019 Romeo + Juliet, though, very little has changed, yet it feels refreshed. Read more... |
Jewels, The Australian Ballet, Royal Opera House review - a sparkling parade of great dancingFriday, 04 August 2023
Every time you see Jewels, George Balanchine’s masterpiece from 1967, something new emerges from its treasure trove. What the Australian Ballet pleasurably bring to the fore is its playful, and play-acting, side. Read more... |
Carlos at 50, Royal Opera House review - lovingly designed gala from a still impressive starThursday, 27 July 2023
On the day Mick Jagger turned 80, that spring chicken Carlos Acosta, 50 this year, returned to the stage of the Royal Opera House, which he had left in 2015 after 17 years. Carlos at 50 was a wonderfully sunny, warm embrace of a return: the audience greeted his first appearance ecstatically, and his wide grin reflected how happy he was to be there too. Read more... |
theartsdesk at the Ravenna Festival - invisible cities and possible dreamsMonday, 17 July 2023
Came for the music, returned for the theatre. I oversimplify: Riccardo Muti’s Roads of Friendship events, meetings of his Luigi Cherubini Youth Orchestra with players from other places – since 1997, they have included Sarajevo, Lebanon, Kenya, Iran and this year Jordan – will always be the big cornerstones of the Ravenna Festival. Read more... |
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