Vivaldi’s Masterpiece Re-imagined in Dance A Life in Four Seasons is an exuberant riff on the phases of our lives, danced by a company that encompasses a range of ages and training, and all the better for that. Presented in the feel-good, sylvan setting of the Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre on a mercifully dry […]
So Are We: León and Lightfoot at Covent Garden
The Royal Ballet Excels in a New Choreographic Language The dancers of The Royal Ballet are truly special. We knew that, of course, but to see the way in which they mastered the totally alien choreographic language of León and Lightfoot was heart-warming. The double bill So Are We marks the first time work by […]
This is Rambert
On its Centenary, Rambert Looks to the Future You can celebrate a landmark birthday – a centenary, in the case of Rambert, the UK’s foremost contemporary dance company, in one of two ways. You can look back at the key moments of a long and illustrious life to outline “how we got here”. Or you […]
Ballet Nights New Futures
A Showcase for the UK’s Major Dance Schools For its latest edition, Ballet Nights went off piste: instead of assembling a cast of seasoned professionals and up-and-coming dancers and choreographers, as it’s done over the past 11 editions, director Jamiel Devernay-Laurence brought together the top seven ballet schools in the UK for an unprecedented joint […]
Sir Peter Wright at 100
A Celebration of “a True Man of the Theatre” Dancer, teacher, artistic director, choreographer – Sir Peter Wright is a towering, inspirational figure in British ballet, “a true man of the theatre”, in the words of Royal Ballet director Kevin O’Hare. As he turns 100-years-old this year (25 November), Birmingham Royal Ballet (BRB) is holding […]
La Fille Mal Gardée Returns to Covent Garden
Cuban Patricio Revé’s Ashton Debut No choreographer is as quintessentially English as Sir Frederick Ashton (1904-1988); and few of his many ballets are as English as La Fille Mal Gardée (generally translated as The Wayward Daughter). Though inspired by an 18th-century French original, Ashton’s 1960 version, framed by Osbert Lancaster’s naturalistic designs, and set to […]
Gentleman Jack The Ballet
Northern Ballet Celebrates the First Modern Lesbian Gentleman Jack is possibly the first ever ballet centred on a lesbian heroine: Anne Lister, the indomitable 19th-century Yorkshire landowner, known as Gentleman Jack, who lived and loved as she liked, with no concessions to societal mores and restrictions. Since the discovery and decryption of her detailed diaries, […]
Tulsa Ballet: Made in America
A UK Debut for Oklahoma’s Premier Ballet Company Tulsa Ballet, Oklahoma’s largest performing arts organisation, brought a large dose of American showmanship to the Linbury with Made in America, a triple bill of very distinctive works that illustrate the company’s talent, technique and versatility. American dancers possess unique attack and a very special way of […]
Still Pointless: BalletBoyz at 25
BalletBoyz’s Much Anticipated Return to the Stage If BalletBoyz worried that a relatively long absence from the stage might have diminished their appeal, they needn’t have worried: their many supporters were out in force for the première of Pointless: BalletBoyz at 25, the show that marks the company’s 25th anniversary at Sadler’s Wells, where founder […]
Il Cimento dell’Armonia e dell’Inventione
Vivaldi’s Four Seasons Through de Keersmaeker’s Eyes Anne Teresa de Keersmaker’s work often feels like a test of endurance for audiences. The uncompromising Belgian choreographer has stripped dance of what she considers unnecessary flummery to arrive at an abstract and geometric style of movement, deliberately unacademic and seemingly artless. De Keersmaeker’s company, Rosas, founded in […]