★★★★★ Thank you, Royal Ballet, for giving so much pleasure in trying times.
Tag - Akane Takada
★★★★✰ Kevin O'Hare, director of the Royal Ballet, came on stage to welcome the return of a paying audience for what turned out to be the opening and closing live performance of the season...
The entire Royal Ballet were back on stage and performing for a live audience last Friday in a gala style show which was/is also streamed. Jann Parry was mightily impressed with the dancing and repertoire (★★★★★) if not so much with the live audience experience in a Covid aware Opera House (★★★✰✰)
★★★✰✰ Wayne McGregor’s first full-length creation for the Royal Ballet, Woolf Works, inspired by Virginia Woolf, remains one of his best works to date.
★★★✰✰ If The Unknown Soldier is dispiritingly low-key, Wayne McGregor's Infra remains assertively bold...
★★★★✰ In the past, the Royal Ballet's version, last performed five years ago, has sometimes seemed insubstantial. Not so this time, with a luxury cast in full dramatic mode: Vadim Muntagirov, Marianela Nuñez, Natalia Osipova and Gary Avis...
★★★★★ Liam Scarlett has devised a visual and emotional treat for audiences, fully justifying Kevin O'Hare's faith in him as a director and choreographer.
Gallery by Dave Morgan...
★★★★✰ All credit to Viviana Durante (supported by Royal Ballet, Ballet Black and Scottish Ballet dancers) for contributing to the 25th anniversary of Kenneth MacMillan's death with recreations of his early work.
★★★★✰ Elite Syncopations: Dancers from all five major British ballet companies took part, some doubling up roles in identical outfits so that identifying dancers was confusing. The stand-out solo in both the casts I saw was to the Calliope Rag, Monica Mason’s original role...
With Akane Takada in the lead role. Gallery by Dave Morgan...
★★★★✰ The Royal Ballet’s away-day to Hull, this year’s UK Capital of Culture, was dramatic in its scale: 17 pieces presented over three hours...
We talk to Emma Maguire about the Gala that honours the life of her mum, Ann Maguire, and this year takes place at the Leeds Grand Theatre on 3 September. The proceeds go to support the Ann Maguire Arts Education Fund - inspiring young people through the arts...
★★★★✰ In Marguerite and Armand the 3 casts reviewed are Zenaida Yanowsky and Roberto Bolle, Alessandra Ferri and Federico Bonelli, Natalia Osipova and Valdimir Shklyarov.
An all Frederick Ashton bill. Gallery by Dave Morgan...
★★★★✰ Symphonic Dances is Scarlett’s farewell portrait of Yanowsky. Like her, the ballet is big and bold, beautiful and elusive.
The Royal Ballet perform a mixed bill of four works - William Forsythe's 'The Vertiginous Thrill of Exactitude', George Balanchine's 'Taranatella', Christopher Wheeldon's 'Strapless' and Liam Scarlett's world premiere of 'Symphonic Dances'...
★★★★✰ The grand pas de deux was the triumphant highlight of the fairytale festivities. Hay expressed the prince’s pride and pleasure in his variations; Takada was demure and regal in hers...
Four Royal Ballet dancers promoted to Principal from the start of the 2016/17 Season - Alexander Campbell, Francesca Hayward, Ryoichi Hirano and Akane Takada
Woolf Works is a chimera, an illusory creation made up of disparate elements...