Birmingham Royal Ballet’s latest bill, “[Un]leashed,” treats us to two premieres and a reprised 2012 ballet, all from female choreographers. It’s an attractive offering, somewhat unfocused but capably danced and dressed with some handsome moments.
Link copied to clipboard
Performance
Birmingham Royal Ballet's “[Un]leashed”
Place
Sadler’s Wells, London, UK, June 25 & 26, 2019
Words
Sara Veale
Yvette Knight in “Lyric Pieces” by Jessica Lang. Photograph by Bill Cooper
subscribe to the latest in dance
“Uncommonly intelligent, substantial coverage.”
Your weekly source for world-class dance reviews, interviews, articles, and more.
The highlight of the evening is Jessica Lang’s “Lyric Pieces,” a comely octet arranged across a suite of Edvard Grieg’s piano solos. Black paper pleats garnish a simply lit stage, folding accordion-style to form fans, footstools, even a large abstract sculpture. It’s a nifty choice for a prop—unfussy and elegantly conceived. One striking visage sees the pleats stretched and draped over two dancers’ curved backs—stately elephant trunks that trail along the floor. In another they’re rolled into tight cylinders, an anchor for willowy extensions and deep-seated pliés.
The ensemble chases the music as it skips from velvety to bracing, weaving skitters and bounces into its brisk notes. Dashes of folk dance are sprinkled throughout, from skips and ballottés to whirling square-dance spins. Some of the best performances come in a female quartet, a rippling waltz that sends its ballerinas cascading to the floor like southern belles fainting in the heat. Later, Tzu-Chao Chou churns out swizzling pirouettes against an aquamarine sky, and Brandon Lawrence and Céline Gittens sparkle in a moonlit tangle of soft, twirling lifts.
Céline Gittens and Brandon Lawrence in “Sense of Time” by Didy Veldman. Photograph by Bill Cooper
Rushing to this show after an overlong day at work, sweat-soaked from the Tube, duly primed me for Didy Veldman’s “Sense of Time,” an introspective piece about the hustle and bustle of modern-day life. How do we choose to spend our time? How much of that is within our control? The new ballet is set to a bespoke score by Gabriel Prokofiev, its tsk-ing cymbals alive with the go-get-’em gusto of mid-century New York. The stage is busy, alight with roving formations and a quickening drumbeat.
Veldman layers different tempos and dynamics across the work, some harmonious, some erratic. A lone man presses against a tide of pedestrians, the confrontation played out in slow-motion; voices whisper atop the score, hinting at an overflowing mind; dancers pluck suitcases from a hulking pile, darting around in a show of busyness, or possibly transience. Amid the hubbub are stolen moments in time, including another tight duet between Lawrence and Gittens—this time a little wild, a little desperate, the former plying luxurious extensions out of the latter.
Other scenes wander, though: for example, Lawrence gathering up as many suitcases as possible, like someone determined to get their groceries from the car in a single trip. These meanders don’t offer much in the way of clarity or flair, and pale against the music, with its peppery brass and urgent honks.
Brooke Ray as Duck and Laura Day as Peter in Ruth Brill's “Peter and the Wolf.” Photograph by Andrew Ross
It’s Prokofiev’s renowned grandfather, Sergei, behind the score in BRB first artist Ruth Brill’s new take on “Peter and the Wolf.” In his 1936 “symphonic fairy tale,” each character is assigned an instrument—Peter strings, the Wolf horns and so on—and the action plays out among its intersecting notes, a narrator describing it over top (in this case, the poet Hollie McNish). With its plucky protagonist and hip-to-the-kids setting—think sneakers, scaffolds and basketball hoops—Brill’s treatment has the easy, predictable cadence of an after-school special. Nike swooshes and sunglasses don’t offer much edge.
Nor does the choreography take advantage of the narration, which should free it from the need for miming. Instead the dancing is surprisingly literal, pretty enough but lacking the imagination that would distinguish this revival. On the plus side are vibrant turns from Samara Downs and Tzu-Chao Chou—a delightful cat and bird duo—and a shrewd slice of stageplay when Mathias Dingman’s wolf gobbles up Brooke Ray’s duck. Unfortunately, that’s about the only bite we see.
Sara Veale
Sara Veale is a London-based writer and editor. She's written about dance for the Observer, the Spectator, DanceTabs, Auditorium Magazine, Exeunt and more. Her first book, Untamed: The Radical Women of Modern Dance, will be published in 2024.
While Kendrick Lamar performed “Humble,” during his Super Bowl halftime set and was surrounded by dancers clad in red, white and blue—and in the process assumed the formation of the American flag (choreographed by Charm La’Donna)—so, too, did Faye Driscoll use performers who created slews of shapes/sculptures in her astonishing work, “Weathering,” seen at REDCAT on February 8, the last of three sold-out performances.
Let’s start with the obvious, or maybe to some this notion will be highly disputable, even offensive. OK, then, let’s start with what kept repeating in my head as I walked out of UC Berkeley’s Zellerbach Hall, synapses abuzz with the wonders of Twyla Tharp Dance’s 60th anniversary “Diamond Jubilee” program: My God, Twyla Tharp really is the most brilliantly inventive choreographer now alive on the planet.
In Maldonne, French filmmakers Leila KA and Josselin Carré pose eleven women side by side on a barren stage. They’re dressed in floral patterns that hearken to the 1950s. The camera zooms in to frame their faces—each woman is in a state of distress.
Today I have the immense privilege of speaking with Riley Lapham. Riley started dancing early in her home town of Wollongong, and by age 14, she had joined the Australian Ballet School. But from here, Riley's journey takes twists and turns. In her graduation year, Riley missed her final performance due to injury. But in a Center Stage-like moment, the then artistic director David McAllister offered her a contract with the company. In this brave and vulnerable conversation, Riley and I talk about what it's like to join a company while injured, and what it was like to deal with...
comments