At least there are some memorable performances to recall from 2021: at the beginning of the year none of us had any idea when we might sit in a theatre and watch live dance again...
Tag - Wayne McGregor
★★★★✰ Celebration Gala is not a red-carpet event with super stars on the stage but instead, a well curated showcase of The Australian Ballet’s principal artists, senior artists and soloists dancing in 10 different pas de deux.
★★★★✰ The annual ballet gala organised by Olga Balakleets and Ensemble Productions was deferred to the end of this year because of coronavirus restrictions. Fortunately, invited dancers from European countries were able to travel before the latest measures were imposed...
The Frederick Ashton Foundation marked its tenth anniversary with an evening of rarely performed Ashton pieces and a specially commissioned film, Frederick Ashton: Links in the Chain, by Lynn Wake.
★★★★✰ Both are exceptional dance-actors, though Ferri must take the limelight as the lost, legendary ballerina of Béjart’s imagination.
★★★✰✰ The latest Royal Ballet premiere is a full evening ballet from Wayne McGregor, using a cracking custom score from Thomas Adès...
Gallery by Foteini Christofilopoulou...
★★★★✰ The full bill features: The Sleeping Beauty Act III, Anemoi (new Valentino Zucchetti), Divertissements: Morgen (Wayne McGregor), Winter Dreams pdd, After the Rain pdd, Woman with water (Mats Ek and new to RB), Voices of Spring pdd.
The full bill features: The Sleeping Beauty Act III, Anemoi (new Valentino Zucchetti), Divertissements: Morgen (Wayne McGregor), Winter Dreams pdd, After the Rain pdd, Woman with water (Mats Ek and new to RB), Voices of Spring pdd. Gallery by Foteini Christofilopoulou...
★★★★✰ I had missed SFB’s London season at Sadler’s Wells in 2019, so was pleased to catch up with ballets brought together for this digital triple bill.
★★★★✰ 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 (★★★✰✰)
★★★★✰ As tentative steps continue to get the dance world back on its feet, the Lawrence Batley Theatre in Huddersfield has asked three companies to embrace the possibilities of lockdown with a trio of filmed works.
★★★✰✰ 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.
★★★✰✰ The first concert was not much of a consolation for all that we have lost. So far, the Royal Ballet appears a token add-on to the opera's contributions...
★★★✰✰ The idea of setting a story about a refugee family to the songs of Sting was inevitably an enforced marriage of his diverse lyrics with a narrative for which they were never intended.
★★✰✰✰ There was certainly some spectacle and some good dancing, and not just from the big stars. However, the most heavily promoted piece and world premiere was an excruciating fifteen minutes of disappointment...
★★★★✰ Dorrance Dance boast crisp technique and a sharp-witted approach that catapults tap way beyond its show-biz associations.
★★★✰✰ Program A consisted of a string of solos and duets representing a slice of the company’s choreographic trajectory, from Frederick Ashton through Kenneth MacMillan to Liam Scarlett, Wayne McGregor, and Charlotte Edmonds.
★★★★✰ It’s been a treat to see so much new work made specifically for a company. The dancers are free, unburdened by the weight of history and expectation, with no comparisons to be made to famous past performers or interpretations. It’s all theirs.