ballet
Bolshoi Babylon, BBC FourMonday, 29 February 2016
Here’s a paradox. Just as the words “new Cold War” were beginning to form on the lips of political commentators in the West, two British film-makers, former TV newsmen no less, were being granted uncensored access to the Bolshoi Theatre – just 500... Read more... |
Fleming, BBCSO, Oramo, BarbicanSaturday, 06 February 2016
Renée Fleming recently announced her imminent retirement from the opera stage. But she has no plans to stop performing, and will instead devote her time to recitals and concerts. Yesterday’s excellent performance with the BBC Symphony Orchestra... Read more... |
Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra, Dudamel, RFHFriday, 15 January 2016
So much black and red ink has been spilled about the infamous 1913 premiere of The Rite of Spring that it’s easy to underestimate how radical the orchestration, at least, of its predecessor Petrushka must have sounded. It still usually comes up as... Read more... |
Elizabeth, Royal BalletSunday, 10 January 2016
Please, sir, I want some more. Will Tuckett and Alasdair Middleton's Elizabeth is soul food for the hungry dance fan; an ingenious blend of words, music and dance that beguiles and entertains in equal measure. The shame is that it will be seen by so... Read more... |
Nutcracker, English National Ballet, London ColiseumFriday, 18 December 2015
Christmas legends are not born; they are made. In the case of the Nutcracker, its Christmas indispensability in Britain and America stems not from the original 1892 St Petersburg production, but from 1950s reinterpretations by emigré Russians (... Read more... |
RLPO, Petrenko, Philharmonic Hall, LiverpoolFriday, 04 December 2015
Why play a very substantial act of ballet music in concert? In the case of Aurora’s wedding entertainment from Tchaikovsky’s The Sleeping Beauty, there are at least three good reasons. It embraces the most inventive and unorthodox of divertissements... Read more... |
Yolanda Sonnabend: designer of MacMillan's 'neurotic' balletsMonday, 16 November 2015
Ever since Diaghilev’s day the relationship of dance movement to its visual design has been a lively, sometimes combative affair. Sometimes people leave whistling the set, saying shame about the dance; other times they hate the set, love the dance.... Read more... |
The King Dances, Birmingham Royal Ballet, Sadler’s WellsSaturday, 17 October 2015
For an art form with a marked penchant for looking over its shoulder, it’s surprising how rarely ballet has exploited its own origins story – not least given the fabled opulence and style of its leading character. The Sleeping Beauty makes a nod to... Read more... |
Robbins/MacMillan Triple Bill, Royal BalletSaturday, 30 May 2015
Last night at the Royal Ballet was, emphatically, laser-free. The combination of Afternoon of a Faun (1953) and In the Night (1970) by the great American choreographer Jerome Robbins, with a repeat of Kenneth MacMillan's 1965 Song of the Earth,... Read more... |
A Streetcar Named Desire, Scottish Ballet, Sadler's WellsWednesday, 01 April 2015
Your mum told you (or at least, I hope someone did) that it wasn't about being pretty, it was about having personality. True wisdom though this is, you probably also noticed that there are some jobs where it appears to be necessary to conform to a... Read more... |
Bronfman, LPO, Jurowski, RFHSunday, 22 March 2015
Over the past two Saturdays, Vladimir Jurowski and a London Philharmonic on top form have given us a mini-festival of great scores for Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes. The hallucinogenic vision of ancient Greece in Ravel’s Daphnis et Chloé last week was... Read more... |
The Nutcracker, English National Ballet, London ColiseumMonday, 15 December 2014
Unusually, English National Ballet’s Nutcracker finds itself in an empty field this year. Three Decembers ago, the second time out for Wayne Eagling’s production, it had to contend with Matthew Bourne’s version and the Royal Ballet’s, not... Read more... |
