Firebird/ In the Night/ Raymonda Act III, Royal Ballet, Covent Garden, December 2012

What a terrific triple bill this is, and on the evening of 29 December it was beautifully danced.

Among cast changes in Raymonda, Zenaida Yanowsky and Ryoichi Hirano replaced Nuñez and Pennefather in the main roles, and Ricardo Cervera replaced Whitehead in the Hungarian dance. Cervera showed a fine cutting edge and dramatic sense, and his partnership with Kristin McNally worked like a charm, the two of them looking like dolls together in perfect time to the music. The dancers in the female variations, the same as before, were even better if that is possible. Hikaru Kobayashi showed beautiful control and musicality, Yuhui Choe’s arabesques en pointe with a bending of the leg were extraordinary, Itziar Mendizabal was lovely in the slow variation, and Helen Crawford’s jumps in the fourth variation were a thrill to watch.

Raymonda Act III, all images ROH/ Tristram Kenton

As a ballet Raymonda has a rather silly story, but the Act III wedding of its eponymous heroine with Jean de Brienne, recently returned from the crusades, is a feast of dancing, and Yanowsky and Hirano were outstanding in these roles. I can’t resist a quick mention of Fumi Kaneko, Emma Maguire and Yasmine Nagdhi who were brilliantly on the music in the pas-de-trois. Raymonda Act III makes a glorious finale, and as the curtain opened Barry Kay’s ravishing set once again elicited spontaneous applause.

Galeazzi and Watson as Firebird and Prince

Firebird, so often the finale itself, is the starter here, with Mara Galeazzi showing beautiful arm movements as the Firebird. Edward Watson gave a well-nuanced performance as Ivan Tsarevich, Alastair Marriott was suitably dramatic as the wicked Kostcheï, and Christina Arestis was a gorgeous princess. The story is the reverse of Swan Lake, the prince abandoning his passion for an exotic female to accept a royal and more appropriate partner, but Stravinsky’s music is, or should be, hugely dramatic, though Barry Wordsworth’s conducting with its elegantly rounded corners lacked energy and bite.

No problem on that score with the second item, In the Night, where Robert Clark gave an excellent performance of Chopin’s nocturnes to accompany some glorious choreography by Jerome Robbins.

In the Night, Campbell and Maguire

Against a starlit background, Alexander Campbell and Emma Maguire made a wonderful first couple, he so full of energy, she showing a gentle gracefulness. And in the third variation, Carlos Acosta and Roberta Marquez made a dramatic entrance on their shaft of light, moving apart and together with great passion. It was a super partnership, but in the second movement Zenaida Yanowsky and Nehemiah Kish did not manage the same success as a week ago. She seemed far less comfortable than with Hirano in Raymonda, and a couple of the lifts went slightly awry. In the Night ends with a delightful waltz, and interactions between the six dancers — it is a superb vehicle for the individual brilliance that this Company has in spades, and they should dance it more often.

In the Night, Yanowsky and Kish

Unfortunately all three later performances are sold out, but click here for details and possible returns.

La Valse/ Invitus Invitam/ Winter Dreams/ Theme and Variations, Royal Ballet, Covent Garden, October 2010

The high point of this lovely mixed bill was Theme and Variations, created by Balanchine in 1947 for Alicia Alonso and Igor Youskevitch. The following year Ms. Alonso founded the Cuban National Ballet, and now at almost 90 years old did us the honour of attending, and appearing on stage at the end flanked by Monica Mason and Carlos Acosta. More on him later when we come to Winter Dreams, but in the meantime, what wonderful dancing from Tamara Rojo and Sergei Polunin in Theme and Variations. Their main pas-de-deux was flawlessly executed, and Polunin’s solo, involving a double tour-en-l’air followed by a pirouette — repeated perfectly time after time in perfect harmony with the music — elicited cheers from the audience. This was a wonderful show of classical dance, and indeed Balanchine intended this ballet: “to evoke that great period in classical dancing when Russian ballet flourished with the aid of Tchaikovsky’s music.” The dancing from the entire cast was excellent, and it’s only a shame that the music — the final movement of the Suite No. 3 for Orchestra (opus 55) — was unevenly conducted by Barry Wordsworth. It was lifeless at the beginning but too loud when the trombones all roared into action, though it settled down later.

The first item — Ashton’s choreography for Ravel’s La Valse — was beautifully performed by the company. The music was completed in 1920, encouraged by a commission from Diaghilev, who then rejected it as “untheatrical” and not a ballet but “a portrait of ballet”. Since then it has been choreographed many times, most notably by Balanchine in 1951, and Ashton in 1958. Ravel envisaged La Valse as set at the imperial court of Vienna in 1855, and saw it as “a choreographic poem … a sort of apotheosis of the Viennese waltz … the mad whirl of some fantastic and fateful carousel.” The waltz themes in the music are subject to unexpected modulations and instrumentation, but the conducting did not quite bring out the macabre quality of Ravel’s creation, though the dancing was, as I said, excellent.

Winter Dreams with Acosta and Nuñez, photos by Johan Persson

 

Winter Dreams, to music of Tchaikovsky arranged by Philip Gammon, was beautifully performed by Gammon himself at the piano, along with a small band at the rear of the stage, playing traditional Russian music, and including traditional Russian instruments. This ballet by Kenneth MacMillan is a distillation of Chekhov’s Three Sisters, but its genesis was a pas-de-deux for a gala celebrating the ninetieth birthday of Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother in 1990. After he’d created it MacMillan said, “When I saw it, I realised that this was the farewell between Masha and Vershinin from Three Sisters, and I had to go on and make Winter Dreams”, which he did in 1991. The central pas-de-deux was superbly performed by Marianela Nuñez and Carlos Acosta as Masha and Vershinin, and Masha’s husband was wonderfully portrayed by Jonathan Cope. The other two sisters were beautifully danced by Mara Galeazzi as Olga, and Laura Morera as Irina, and the whole cast performed with elegance and emotion. The ballet is not a rendition of Chekhov’s play, but recreates its melancholy and atmosphere of quiet despair.

Invitus Invitam with Benjamin and Watson

The new item on this mixed bill was Invitus Invitam by Kim Brandstrup, a ballet inspired by the relationship between the Roman emperor Titus, and Berenice, queen in the Roman province of Judaea. Racine created a play Berenice on the story of their ill-fated love. When Titus’s father Vespasian died it seemed he would be free to marry Berenice, but public opinion was against marriage with a foreign queen, and Titus chose duty to Rome over his love for Berenice. The ballet involves three meetings between them. In the first she senses something is amiss, in the second she knows it but resists it, and in the third they meet for the last time before parting forever. The title comes from a single sentence in Suetonius where he says that Titus, who passionately loved Berenice and intended to marry her, let her go invitus invitam (against his will, against her will). Berenice and Titus were danced with subtlety and restrained emotion by Leanne Benjamin and Edward Watson, and this was a fine sequel to the unworldly quality of La Valse. The setting by Richard Hudson, with clever lighting by Lucy Carter, involved lines, circles and spirals appearing on a vast blackboard, with rulings like a piece of graph paper, showing mathematical constructions of angles. This created an atmosphere of calculation and inevitability, and later morphed into brick walls from the Royal Opera House’s Rigoletto set. On the other hand the presence of two people with notes, who seemed to be preparing the scene, suggested that things might always have gone differently, but that is life. It always seems more inevitable in hindsight. Music was by Thomas Adès after Francois Couperin.

That the Royal Ballet could put on these four works in one evening, and do them all to perfection, is a testament to the strength of this company. A single ticket buys an eclectic evening’s entertainment, and further performances will take place on October 18, 22, 28 and 30 — for more details click here.

Royal Ballet Triple: Chroma, Tryst, Symphony in C, Covent Garden, May 2010

This triple bill was beautifully danced, and the first and last items are very strong ballets. What a shame there were so many empty seats, but those who are eligible should be aware of the student standby tickets, where excellent seats on the main floor could have been purchased for £10.

Chroma, photo by Johan Persson

Chroma is a modern dance work choreographed by Wayne McGregor for four women and six men. It’s strikingly asexual, in the sense that boys and girls frequently make the same movements and are clothed in identical grey costumes. The opening was very well danced by Mara Galeazzi and Edward Watson, I loved the pas-de-deux performed by Steven McRae and Yuhui Choe, and there are plenty more such male-female duos, but male-male ones too. For example in one scene there are five seemingly identical couples on stage, but only four female dancers. There is also a pas-de-trois for three boys, and later three simultaneous male-female-male pas-de-trois. The ballet lasts just under 25 minutes, and the leaps, twists and multiple partnering works well. The music was composed partly by Joby Talbot, partly by Jack White III, all arranged by Joby Talbot and orchestrated by Christopher Austin. The six male dancers were: Ricardo Cervera, Steven McRae, Ludovic Ondiviela, Eric Underwood, Jonathan Watkins and Edward Watson, with the four females being: Yuhui Choe, Mara Galeazzi, Sarah Lamb and Laura Morera. The dancing was first rate, and Daniel Capps conducted the music with lyrical energy. My only question is why it’s called Chroma, meaning ‘colour’ in ancient Greek, but as the lady next to me said, ‘achroma’ would be more suitable in view of the grey costumes and white background. I’m told the background gives a different effect from the main floor, but from the Amphi it’s just flat and white.

Melissa Hamilton and Eric Underwood in Tryst, photo by Bill Cooper

The title of the next work, Tryst, is easy to explain. The choreographer, Christopher Wheeldon was driving across Scotland while the radio played a composition of that name by James MacMillan. It’s rhythmic intensity, coupled with a lovely adagio passage, struck him as being well-suited to ballet, so in April and May 2002 he created this work. The designs by Jean-Marc Puissant are beautifully asymmetric with splashes of colour, and the lighting by Natasha Katz shows interesting variations. I very much liked the central slow section, which started with Melissa Hamilton dancing a solo on stage while a silhouetted male figure walked slowly across the front. As the light changed it turned out to be Eric Underwood, and they danced a lovely pas-de-deux. The ballet is a mixture of classical and modern dance, so its second place on the programme is entirely appropriate, but it seemed a slight let-down after Chroma. The music, conducted by the composer, I found interestingly atonal. Apparently it began life as a folk melody for a poem of four verses called The Tryst by Scottish poet William Soutar.

Symphony in C with Pennefather and Nuñez, photo by Bill Cooper

Finally Symphony in C was a delight, as usual. George Balanchine created it in 1947 for the Paris Opera Ballet, to Bizet’s music of the same name, and recreated it in New York the following year. The original had different colours for the four movements, but in the recreated version the girls are all in white tutus with the men in black. This is a magnificent ballet requiring eight principals, sixteen soloists and a substantial corps de ballet, so it can show off a classical company to great advantage, and the dancing here was superb. The four principal couples, one for each movement were: Sarah Lamb with Steven McRae, Marianela Nuñez with Rupert Pennefather, Yuhui Choe with Sergei Polunin, and Laura Morera with Edward Watson. It seems almost invidious to single out anyone, but Sergei Polunin’s leaps were extraordinarily strong and graceful, and Edward Watson danced with terrific attack. This is a beautifully constructed ballet by Mr. B, and after we have seen all four sets of dancers, they return one after another, and then combine in a finale. Bizet’s music was well conducted by Dominic Grier.

My final remark is that putting on this triple bill is quite a feat. Three different conductors, dozens of dancers, many with difficult roles — the Royal Ballet surpasses itself, and the auditorium should really be full to bursting.

MacMillan Triple: Concerto, The Judas Tree, Elite Syncopations, a second view, Royal Ballet, March 2010

These three Kenneth MacMillan ballets represent strikingly different aspects of his choreography. As a starter we had the classical lines of Concerto, to Shostakovich’s second piano concerto; then the dramatic intensity of The Judas Tree, to specially commissioned music by Brian Elias; and finally the riotous fun of Elite Syncopations, to a jazz band playing rag-time music, mainly by Scott Joplin. This was my second visit, in order to see the alternative cast, so I’ll comment mainly on the dancers, other details being given on my previous posting.

Marianela Nuñez in Elite Syncopations, photo by Johan Persson

Elite Syncopations was just as good as last time, and Marianela Nuñez was outstanding in the second female solo, so musical, and with enormous precision and attack. Her partner in the waltz was Thiago Soares, showing excellent stage presence and looking entirely fresh despite starring in the previous ballet! Laura Morera danced the first female solo, having already performed well with Nathalie Harrison and Yuhui Choe in Scott Joplin’s Cascades. Choe was utterly charming in this, and in her later partnership with Liam Scarlett. Ludovic Ondiviela danced well in the final male solo, but the biggest applause was for Nathalie Harrison and Michael Stojko as the tall lady and short man in the Alaskan Rag. Their comic timing was excellent, and he with his glasses and bearing reminding me of that great comedian, Eric Morcambe, albeit in a shorter version.

Sarah Lamb & Ryoichi Hirano in Concerto, photo by Johan Persson

The hyper-colourful costumes for the performers and the jazz band in this ballet are delightfully absurd, and it made a fine end to an evening that started with MacMillan’s 1966 ballet Concerto, where Laura Morera and Brian Maloney did a fine job as the principal couple in the first movement, and Sarah Lamb with Ryoichi Hirano did a lovely pas-de-deux in the slow second movement. All four were joined by Laura McCulloch for the last movement, and the whole company danced with precision and excellent spacing on stage.

This 25 minute ballet makes a fine start to the evening, which then plunges into the intense darkness of The Judas Tree, where Thiago Soares gave a menacing portrayal of the Foreman (the Judas character). He was ably supported by Sergei Polunin as the Simon Peter character who stands by as Johannes Stepanek (the Jesus character) is murdered after being kissed on the cheek by the Foreman. Mara Galeazzi was the girl (the Magdalen character) who is gang raped by the workmen, and then killed by the Foreman after she accuses him of being responsible. It’s a horribly dark story, but the dramatically physical choreography keeps the momentum going at full tilt, and is a fine example of how well MacMillan could use the abstract choreography of dance to give a representation of sex and violence. Despite the subtext from an apocryphal gospel, the whole ballet can simply be viewed as a nasty story on a building site on the Isle of Dogs, with the main tower of Canary Wharf looming up in the background.

As part of a triple bill, The Judas Tree goes in the middle, and although some commentators have criticised the choice of Elite Syncopations to follow it, I find the playful absurdity a welcome relief. For me this triple bill is well judged, and whichever cast one gets, it’s an evening of ballet well worth seeing.

Triple Bill: Concerto, The Judas Tree, Elite Syncopations, Royal Ballet, March 2010

These three ballets by Kenneth MacMillan are from different stages in his career, and form a nicely eclectic triple bill.

Steven McRae in Concerto, photo by Johan Persson

Concerto was created in 1966 for the Deutsche Oper Ballet in Berlin, one year after his full-length Romeo and Juliet. The music is Shostakovich’s second piano concerto, a lively, witty work, played here by Jonathan Higgins under the baton of Dominic Grier. It starts with a bassoon and two oboes, closely followed by the piano as the dancers step out into the first movement, where the principal couple was Yuhui Choe and Steven McRae. Both danced beautifully and I thought she was particularly graceful. In the adagio of the second movement, Marianela Nuñez and Rupert Pennefather gave a wonderfully smooth performance. They reappear in the third movement, as do Yuhui Choe and Steven McRae, along with Helen Crawford. There are three levels of dancers in this ballet, the principals in orange leotards, the second level in red and the third in yellow. Watching them all from the front of the Amphi one could see very clearly the precision of their placing on stage, and the whole effect, like the music, was ebulliently energetic.

Carlos Acosta in the Judas Tree, photo by Johan Persson

Edward Watson and Leanne Benjamin in the Judas Tree, photo by Johan Persson

This fine start to the evening was followed by MacMillan’s last and perhaps darkest and most brutal work, The Judas Tree, to music of Brian Elias, written relatively freely without a set scenario. I find it a powerful dance work, on the themes of betrayal and guilt, showing MacMillan to be a master craftsman when it comes to using abstract movement to tell a nasty story. The action involves a foreman and thirteen workmen on a building site in a run-down part of town. Leanne Benjamin, as a provocative and skimpily dressed young woman, seems to have a mutually abusive relationship with Carlos Acosta as the foreman. He ignores her and she flirts with one of his friends, portrayed by Edward Watson, the two of them forming a bond together. The action is very physical and aggressive, with fights among the men and an assault on the woman, who finds some protection from Edward Watson and another friend, portrayed by Bennet Gartside. In the end she is gang raped by the other eleven workmen, and when she blames the foreman, he murders her, then beats up and murders the friend represented by Edward Watson. In a final act of guilt the foreman climbs up the scaffolding and hangs himself. There’s a Biblical, or at least gnostic Christian, background to all this, and when the girl reappears at the end as a wraith-like figure it signifies the indestructibility of the purified soul, but . . . it can simply be taken as a story to be interpreted as one wishes. MacMillan’s choreography is done with his usual finesse, and Acosta, Watson and Gartside all performed it very well in their interactions with one another. Watson in particular portrayed his character very sympathetically, and Leanne Benjamin was superb in her physically demanding role, maintaining integrity and stage presence throughout. Both these two had danced their roles before, unlike the others, but there was also a direct link from the original production in 1992 to the present cast as Irek Mukhamedov, who created the role of the foreman, helped in coaching this revival.

The final item of the evening, Elite Syncopations, MacMillan created in 1974 immediately after his full-length ballet Manon. Where Manon deals with seduction, rape, robbery and violent death, albeit in the context of a great eighteenth-century romantic novel, this is a light-hearted, almost flippant work. The dance is performed to rag-time music, mainly by Scott Joplin, played by a jazz band at the rear of the stage. They and the performers are dressed in extremely colourful and elaborately stylized costumes by Ian Spurling, and the whole effect is delightful fun. Everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves, and the dancing was glorious. Mara Galeazzi was the first female soloist, and Sarah Lamb the second. Both were excellent, and Lamb danced very well with Valeri Hristov in the waltz. Laura McCulloch and Paul Kay were hilarious in their deliberately absurd Alaskan rag, and the dancing could hardly have been better, until suddenly Steven McRae came on for his solo and was electrifying, with excellent precision and attack, and superb musicality.

If you need a reason to go to the ballet, the final item alone is worth the price of the ticket, but there are only six performances of this triple bill, with the last one on 15^th April.

Review — The Tsarina’s Slippers, Royal Opera, November 2009

This little-known Tchaikovsky opera is based on a tale by Gogol called Christmas Eve, a time of the year when witches were abroad, and demonic forces had to be tamed. In this story it’s achieved through youthful energy and a sense of fun, as Vakula the smith cunningly uses and circumvents these dangerous magical forces. They enable him to acquire the Tsarina’s slippers, a heroic task that his beloved Oxana challenges him to achieve if he wants to marry her. The basic story — boy gets girl — appears here in a phantasmagorical setting where the young man’s mother is a witch whose admirers include the schoolmaster, the mayor, and the devil himself.

This sparkling production by Francesca Zambello has lovely set designs by Mikhail Mokrov, and very colourful costumes by Tatiana Noginova, with lighting design by Rick Fisher. It includes serious ballet work, some electrifying Cossack dances and acrobatics, plus court dances for the opera chorus, all choreographed by Alastair Marriott. The second half, comprising Acts III and IV, is wonderful fun; the Cossack dancers were absolutely terrific, and Gary Avis and Mara Galeazzi of the Royal Ballet did some lovely pas-de-deux work.

Musically it all worked very well under the baton of Alexander Polianichko, who drew strong contributions from the wind section, and a very Russian sound from the orchestra. As to the singers, Larissa Diadkova was predictably excellent as Solokha the witch, with Maxim Mikhailov vocally and physically lively as the devil. The bass role for the elderly Cossack, Chub was wonderfully sung and acted by Vladimir Matorin, and Vakula was very strongly performed by Vsevolod Grivnov, making a superb debut at Covent Garden. Chub’s daughter Oxana was sung by Olga Guryakova, also making her debut at Covent Garden, but her powerful voice was regrettably screechy at times. This was altogether a fine cast, and Sergei Leiferkus sang glowingly in the relatively small role of ‘his highness’, who provides Vakula with the Tsarina’s slippers.

It’s a new production that should appeal to anyone with an appreciation for Tchaikovsky, Russian opera, or indeed magical realism in the great Slavic tradition. The only problem is that it was sold out before the first night!

Triple Bill — Agon, Sphinx, and Limen, Royal Ballet, November 2009

Melissa Hamilton and Carlos Acosta in Agon, photo by Bill Cooper

Agon is a Greek word meaning ‘contest’, and this 1957 Balanchine ballet is for twelve dancers who perform in twos, threes, etc. without any story. The music by Stravinsky is interestingly varied, some parts strongly represented by wind instruments, and others very quiet. The main pas-de-deux towards the end was brilliantly performed by Carlos Acosta and Melissa Hamilton, who continues to impress as a rising star in the company. In the two pas-de-trois we had Johan Kobborg with Yuhui Choe and Hikaru Kobayashi, and Mara Galeazzi with Valeri Hristov and Brian Maloney. The dancers all performed beautifully, and Daniel Capps did an excellent job conducting the orchestra.

Sphinx is a ballet by Glen Tetley to music of Martinů, originally choreographed for American Ballet Theatre in 1977. It’s based on Jean Cocteau’s La machine infernale, a reworking of the Oedipus myth, exploring the conflict between free will and fate. There are three dancers, the Sphinx, Oedipus and Anubis, the jackal-headed god who shepherds the dead into the Egyptian underworld. The choreography for the two men is intensely physical and both Edward Watson as Anubis, and Rupert Pennefather as Oedipus, danced like gods, while Marianela Nuñez was an attractively seductive sphinx. This was the first performance of the work by the Royal Ballet, and it used the original designs by the late Rouben Ter-Arutunian, with costumes by Willa Kim and lighting by John B. Read. The costumes were very effective, making the men look as if they were dancing naked, but with painted bodies.

Limen is a new ballet by Wayne McGregor. The title refers to the threshold of some physiological or psychological response, and we were presented at the beginning with dancers behind a transparent bluish screen. On the screen were projected single digit numbers of various sizes — like those on an LED display — that moved and changed value. The costumes by Moritz Junge were colourful tops with shorts, well set off by Lucy Carter’s lighting, which at one point showed thick bright coloured stripes from one side of the stage to the other. The choreography combined strong physicality alternating with moments of calm, but towards the end I found the production distracted me from watching the dancers. A screen with a matrix of small blue lights at the back of the stage moved very slowly forward, and as it did so some lights went out, while others came on. I’ve seen mysterious on-off lighting on stage before, but the trouble is that I’m always trying to work out the pattern and this distracts me from the dancing or singing that is the main point of the work. Obviously the lights were meant to recall the screen at the start, because as they came closer I could see that each light was a small single digit number. Presumably one has now gone over the threshold to a new level of reality.

The choreography fitted very well with the lovely music by Finnish composer Kaija Saariaho, conducted by Barry Wordsworth, who was also the conductor of the previous ballet Sphinx. Since this ballet was brand new, it was danced by a very strong cast of fifteen, including Edward Watson, Steven McRae and Eric Underwood among the men, and Leanne Benjamin and Marianela Nuñez among the women. It works well, but Wayne McGregor seems to have too strong a predilection for screens that distract from his choreography.

Mayerling, Royal Ballet, 29th October 2009

Tamara Rojo as Mary Vetsera, Royal Ballet photo by Bill Cooper

This was the October 29^th performance with Carlos Acosta as Crown Prince Rudolf. A brief discussion of the story appears in my review of an earlier performance with Johan Kobborg as Rudolf. Certainly Kobborg was very good, but Acosta was arguably better, portraying Rudolf’s angst with emotional restraint and superb physicality. Tamara Rojo as his mistress Mary Vetsera was prettily seductive, and their pas-de-deux at the end of Act II writhed with passionate intensity. Rudolf’s wife was very well danced by Iohna Loots, and Countess Marie Larisch was well performed by Mara Galeazzi. Last time, Laura Morera took that role, but on this occasion she was Mitzi Caspar, the courtesan, and danced beautifully. This ballet has a large cast of soloists, and I won’t list them all, but I did particularly like Ricardo Cervera as Bratfisch.

Liszt’s music, arranged and orchestrated by John Lanchbery, came over very well under the baton of Martin Yates. The designs by Nicholas Georgiadis are still fresh and entirely in keeping with the story, and the whole cast worked well together in reviving this Kenneth MacMillan ballet. As the programme noted, it was on this same day 17 years ago that he died back-stage at the Royal Opera House — his creative talent is sadly missed.

Tribute to Diaghilev, Royal Opera House, June 2009

This was a delightful mixture of divertissements, very ably conducted by Valery Ovsianikov with the orchestra of the English National Ballet. The most striking items were Igor Zelensky and Ulyana Lopatkina dancing a pas-de-deux from Scheherazade, Marianela Nuñez and Thiago Soares dancing the black swan pas-de-deux from Swan Lake, Zelensky as Apollo, and Ulyana Lopatkina as The Dying Swan. Here is the list of what was done — in my view they should have cut Daphnis and Chloë, and Tamar, both performed to recorded music and to choreography unconnected with Diaghilev.

Scheherazade by Igor Zelensky and Ulyana Lopatkina of the Kirov, choreography by Fokine, décor and costumes by Leon Bakst. Simply superb.

Daphnis and Chloë by Natsha Oughtred and Federico Bonelli of the Royal Ballet, choreography by Ashton, décor and costumes by John Craxton. Nicely done.

Petrushka by Dmitri Gruzdyev of the English National Ballet, choreography by Fokine, décor and costumes by Alexandre Benois. Disappointing—unmusical and lacking pathos.

La Chatte by Alexandra Ansanelli of the Royal Ballet, choreography by Ashton in homage to Fanny Elssler, décor and costumes by William Chappell. Very nicely done.

Giselle pas-de-deux from Act II by Mathilde Froustey and Mathias Heymann of the Paris Opera Ballet, choreography by Fokine, décor and costumes by Benois. Well done.

Tamar by Irma Nioradze and Ilya Kuznetsov of the Kirov, choreography by Smoriginas, décor and costumes by Bakst. They should either have done the original Fokine choreography or omitted this, particularly since it was to recorded music.

Le Spectre de la Rose by Yevgenia Obraztsova of the Kirov and Dmitri Gudanov of the Bolshoi, choreography by Fokine, décor and costumes by Bakst. Beautifully performed.

Apollo by Maria Kowroski of the NYCity Ballet and Igor Zelensky of the Kirov, choreography by Balanchine, décor and costumes by Andre Bauchant. Nicely done.

Les Sylphides by Tamara Rojo and David Makhateli, choreography by Fokine, décor and costumes by Benois. Well performed.

Le Tricorne by Dmitri Gudanov of the Bolshoi, choreography by Massine, décor and costumes by Picasso. Strongly performed.

The Firebird by Irma Nioradze and Ilya Kuznetsov of the Kirov, choreography by Fokine, décor and costumes by Gontcharova. Well performed.

Les Biches by Mara Galeazzi and Bennet Gartside of the Royal Ballet, choreography by Nijinska. Well done.

Swan Lake pas-de-deux from Act III by Marianela Nuñez and Thiago Soares of the Royal Ballet, choreography by Petipa. A superb performance, particularly from Nuñez.

Le Carnaval by Yevgenia Obraztsova and Andrei Batalov of the Kirov, choreography by Fokine. Very nicely done.

The Dying Swan by Ulyana Lopatkina, choreography by Fokine. Beautifully performed.

Les Sylphides, Sensorium, The Firebird, Royal Ballet, 21 May 2009, return visit

This was a return visit to see a performance with a different cast. Here is the link to the earlier review of the first night.

This time Les Sylphides featured David Makhateli and Tamara Rojo as the principal couple, backed up by Yuhui Choe in the waltz, Helen Crawford in the Mazurka, and the same leading sylphs as before. All were very good, as was the corps, but I thought Rojo and Choe were outstanding. The conducting by Barry Wordsworth was very slow at the beginning, though it picked up tempo later, but the trouble is that his work lacks incision and edge — it is just mellifluous and laboured, or in a single word, dull.

In the other cast for Alastair Marriott’s new ballet Sensorium, to music by Debussy, we had Mara Galeazzi with Bennet Gartside, and Melissa Hamilton with Gary Avis as the main couples. The lighting worked well this time, and the designs by Adam Wiltshire were excellent as before, with white leotards for the principal ladies and light peacock blue for the others. The cast seemed very much in tune with the ballet, and Melissa Hamilton was simply wonderful. It’s astonishing that she’s a mere 21 years old.

The Firebird was once again a blaze of colour, and the corps were terrific. This time we had Leanne Benjamin as a very fine firebird, with Edward Watson as the Tsarevich, Genesia Rosato as the Tsarevna, and Christopher Saunders as the immortal Kostcheï. All did well, and Saunders was very strong in this part, which seems to suit him better than some of the other roles I’ve seen him do.