★★★★✰ Three short but densely packed ballets infused with a strong Russian flavour were at the heart of the Royal Ballet’s last bill of the season.
Reviews
Reviews of Dance and Ballet Performances
★★✰✰✰ For all Marston’s qualifications, I found her Jane Eyre to be a dreary affair, theatrically dutiful and choreographically thin.
★★★★✰ Ballet companies across the globe are in a new age of commissioning ...but none can match the pioneering zeal of this, the oldest American ballet company.
★★★★✰ Yes, the narrative has its inherent challenges, but the choreography, performances and design all riveted with drama, intensity and humour.
★★★✰✰ Without help, which was certainly not forthcoming in the programme, most of the action was a mystery in relation to Kuti and the Kalakuta Republik.
★★★★✰ Thirty years after its creation, In the Upper Room is still the ultimate Twyla Tharp piece, an expression of American dynamism and New York style.
★★★★✰ A gleaming triptych of imaginative and remarkably demanding choreography. The production is textured in every aspect, plumbing deep wells of emotion and revelling in a multiplicity of tones, tempers and movement styles.
★★★★✰ For Balanchine, Shakespeare’s characters are two-dimensional types, exemplary but wholly unreal. They are shadows in a shadow-play, representing this or that quality...
★★✰✰✰ Cas Public’s 9, now at the Linbury Theatre is a curious mix, big ideas but flawed execution.
★★★★✰ "Ultimately both versions of "Soldiers" have the same impact of sending you home aware of the sacrifice involved and proud of what the military does."
★★★★✰ There is something verging on the mystical about Tao Ye’s rigorously minimalist dance creations. The Beijing-based choreographer’s Numerical Series has stripped back dance to an almost forensic study...
★★★✰✰ Tanowitz is ideally placed to translate poetry into dance. Her vocabulary is effortlessly fluid with clear Cunningham/Graham/Brown influences and yet her own voice is strongly established.
★★★★✰ It’s impossible not to be impressed by the range of these works, from introspective and conversational (Symposium) to brilliantly classical (The Seasons) to dramatic (Dnieper).
★★★✰✰ Rite of Spring: Through the perspective of a South Asian gaze, the brutality and finality of the original ballet’s pagan sacrifice is tempered by a rich spirituality and the optimistic suggestion of an after-life. It’s still scary but less barbaric.
★★★★★ To my eye, this Harlequinade may be the most well-rounded of Ratmansky's historically-minded stagings of Petipa.
★★★★✰ By swelling the numbers of her small touring company, Yolande Yorke-Edgell was able to mount a revival of Kenneth MacMillan's Playground and a 10-strong ensemble for Robert Cohan's Communion. The programme also included new works by Sophia Stoller and Yorke-Edgell herself.
★★★★✰ I caught the show on closing night and saw a terrific company debut filled with collaboration, rigor and a connection to the visual art community.
★★★✰✰ Bintley feels strongly about tradition (much more so than most other directors) and the commissions are his way of saying what's important and passing that baton on.
★★★✰✰ The bill is a bold statement of intent – but a little underwhelming in reality.
★★★★✰ I can’t recall ever leaving a theater after seeing a Trey McIntyre work, and not feeling better about things.