Dance
Scottish Ballet Double Bill (Theatre Royal, Glasgow)
Women in charge
Giannandrea Poesio
Ihave always had a soft spot for Scottish Ballet because of its freshness, its artistic eclecticism and, above all, because of the way its dancers transmit that electrifying `shall we dance?' feeling across the orches- tra pit. These are rare qualities in a world where ballet is mostly synonymous with an emotionless technical display of anorexic contortionists and muscled gymnasts.
The success of Scottish Ballet's new dou- ble bill relies greatly on that chemistry, as well as on an interesting artistic choice. The idea of matching a Romantic ballet such as La Sylphide with a new work by Mark Baldwin (one of Britain's most inter- esting choreographers) might look risky on paper, but works beautifully on stage.
In Ae Fond Kiss, a tribute to Robert Burns, Baldwin has devised a choreograph- ic text where some of his distinctive formu- lae mingle with the canons of classical dance. The choreography is cleverly con- structed around the skills of each dancer, such as the flamboyant Rupert Jowett and the stylish Nicci Theis, but it would be a mistake to say that it is just a vehicle for the performers' abilities. Set to the diver- tissement from Stravinsky's La Baiser de la Fee — a favourite of many choreographers — Ae Fond Kiss stems from an analytical reading of the score and its numerous nuances. Stravinsky's intentional references to Tchaikovsky's music correspond, in fact, to choreographic quotations from the clas- sical repertoire.
Unlike his illustrious predecessors, how- ever, Baldwin has opted for a partly seri- ous, partly humorous choreography that alternates moments of complex construc- tion, conceived in the full respect of the contemporary trends, with humorous, even pleasantly irreverent jazzy solutions. According to the programme note, the idea is to portray a situation where women are in control and men are 'led into all sorts of situations'; to me it appeared also as a cul- tured and comic (thus enjoyable) demystifi- cation of some 'untouchable' ballet icons.
La Sylphide is conventionally regarded as the work that introduced Romantic ele- ments on stage such as the long white tutus — hence the term ballet blanc or 'white ballet' used to describe that particular genre — point shoes, supernatural themes, flying ballerinas and sad stories derived from popular folklore mythology. Although some scholars have demonstrated that a similar subject had been used for a ballet performed at La Scala Theatre in 1828 and that Rossini composed the music for a bal- let with the same title, dance history books report that it was the 1832 version, chore- ographed by Filippo Taglioni for his leg- endary daughter Marie, that inaugurated officially the era of Romantic ballet. Taglioni's choreography, however, did not stand the test of time and the ballet cur- rently performed is the one created four years later in Copenhagen by Auguste Boumonville. As with all Bournonville's ballets, La Sylphide has been carefully pre- served by the Danes.
Bournonville's approach to Romanticism differed greatly from that of his French/Italian colleagues. His proverbial optimistic attitude to life is clearly reflected both in the briskness of his movement vocabulary and in his subtle sense of humour, glimpses of which can be found even in the tragic story of James's hopeless love for the sylph. The idiosyncratic flowery spasms that underline the French Roman- tic ballet tradition are reduced to a mini- mum in his La Sylphide. Bournonville's sylph is far from the clichés of either the beautiful lady without mercy or the angel/ whore figure favoured by the Romantics. She is a sexy, naughty little thing that haunts the dreams and the life of James, a simple farmer torn between the boredom of a respectable family life — symbolised by his fiancée, Effie — and the alluring prospect of a prohibited, unconventional affair — a mortal cannot make love to a supernatural being. The choreographic characterisation of the roles — 'earthly' Scottish dance steps for Effie and Gum, James's rival, quick footwork for the sylph, powerful sequences to underline the hero's uncontainable sexual excitement and mime passages for Madge the witch — is pure genius.
Both casts I have seen responded partic- ularly well to the work's demands. Yet the one led by the Danish dancer Johan Kob- borg as James, Yurie Shinohara as the sylph, and the Danish star Sorella Englund as Madge was the 'magic' one. I am not saying that only Danish artists can deal suc- cessfully with the work: the company went Impeccably through the complexities of the Bournonville style and Shinohara is a beau- tiful Japanese artist. Still, in the matinee performance Maria Teresa del Real, despite a strong technique, did not manage all the stylistic subtleties of the title role, while Campbell McKenzie as James and Robert Hampton as the witch looked slightly lost in the various mime passages. Kobborg and Englund, on the other hand, made each movement credible and clear, thus conferring a great deal of dramatic depth to their roles. It is a pity that this double bill will tour only in Scotland, for it should not be missed by true ballet-goers.
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