Dance
Peas and cues
Julie Kavanagh Les Sylphides Pas de Legumes 5 Tangos La Boutique Fantasque A tribute to Nora Roche (Sadler's Wells Royal Ballet) As soon as the curtain went up on Les Sylphides, a woman sitting next to me took out a foil parcel from her handbag and started to work her way through two rounds of sandwiches, ending up by noisily moulding a foil canoe and tilting the last crumbs into her mouth. Mute rage at this may well have tainted my appreciation of the performance, but tranquil recollections still reveal sore deficiencies. Instead of the `complete and harmonious artistic unity' that Fokine wanted Les Sylphides to be, the Sadler's Wells Royal Ballet separate the dance from the music. Even Galina Sam- soya, recognised as a lyrical dancer, was an- ticipating many phrases, and because the music so clearly spells out each movement, the effect was as disconcerting as a film's soundtrack out of sync. The dancers should appear to be emanations of the music, but we were made only too aware of their humanity: instead of being pliant and hushed, Christine Aitken's slow assembles resounded like a door being slammed. One dancer — Leanne Benjamin, in the front row of the corps — was conspicuous for her understanding of the rhythm, creating a sustained tension rather than a step-by-step definition of the dance, seeming to lie back on the music, almost lethargically, as Makarova does: What the SWRB evidently need now is the kind of supervision Markova recently gave the Festival Ballet to rectify stylistic deficiencies and infuse new life in the work.
Any impressions of staleness, however, were soon dispersed by the ballet that followed, Pas de Legumes, Ashton's joyous tribute to the old vegetable market at Co- vent Garden (note the pun in the title). Unlike MacMillan, who relies on apocalyp- tic themes for inspiration, Ashton's genius is to make something out of nothing, to dramatise the undramatic. In Pas de Legumes, Ashton's vegetables are brought to life with the kind of audacious invention the 'Martian poets' bestow on their culinary subjects. But whereas Christopher Reid will transfigure everyday things — his peas in Peasoup are 'workaday hierophants' — Ashton's are just plain peas. Ashton's choreography for the vegetables is comical- ly graphic: the chaine turns, for example, that plump out the crinoline of Choux Rouge, or the curly flourish of the arms in Fifth that mimics the heads of Celeris. As so often, Ashton takes his cue from the music, and his choice of Rossini pieces to characterise the vegetables is exactly right. The humour comes as much from the score as from Ashton's inspired choreography. And indeed from the costumes, which are brilliantly designed by Rostislav Dobou- jinksy.
The only imperfection in this delightful ballet is the conventional Petipa-style pas de deux for le Prince et la Princesse de Legumes. The incongruity is a result of transferring the ballet from its original con- text. It was created for a film, Stories from a Flying Trunk, in 1979, but the SWRB have had to incorporate a slightly edited version into their repertoire. Because it would not work on stage, the ballet loses the mock-heroic episode in which a potato, the lowliest of vegetables, realises his dream to be a sophisticated potato crisp and dance with a beautiful princess. The metamor- phosis is carried out in the film by well- edited cuts during the dancer's coupe jetes in a circle. But this lack of causation on stage does not matter much: ballet readily accommodates the surprise appearance of fairytale princes and princesses. Hans van Manen's 5 Tangos which came next, provided a good, steely contrast to the frivolity, and affirmed the company's recently improved strength and range. La Boutique Fantasque gave us more edible themes by Rossini (e.g. four hors d'oeuvres: `Radishes', 'Anchovies', 'Gherkins' and `Butter') but did not have the impact of the Ashton piece. With its comic types and schoolboy jokes, the humour of Boutique Fantasque seemed cruder, dated and less spontaneous.
Extracts from Pus de Legumes were chos- en to replace Michael Corder's ballet Rhyme Nor Reason (cancelled because of intured dancers) at a gala arranged to pay tribute to Nora Roche, the Cecchetti teacher and examiner who died last summer. Nora Roche taught me for five years at White Lodge, the Royal Ballet's junior school. I Particularly remember her democratic treat- ment of us, the way she took just as much trouble with those who would never be Royal Ballet Company material as with potential stars. She was responsible for let- ting us try our hand at choreography, foun- ding a competition which Ashton judged. It
was therefore fitting that two ex-White Lodgers now in the Royal Ballet, Ashley Page and Jonathan Burrows (Michael Car- der would have made three) should demonstrate their potential as choreo- graphers in this tribute to her.
Page's work, Seven Sketches with music by Beethoven, won the first Frederick Ashton Choreographic Award last year. This is a competition started by an anonymous donor in the hope of discover- ing and nurturing much needed choreographic talent. The reason Ashton gave at the time for awarding the prize to Page was that he had shown a professional sense of structure and a facility for manipulating his dancers. I suspect Ashton was also responding to elements in the ballet that bear his stamp — the danceable music, the ballroom waltz motif and the whimsical mannerisms. MacMillan could be spotted too in the dancers' convoluted interwinding and the dramatic lifts. Page assimilates these influences well but needs time to develop a recognisable style of his own. The trio of fine dancers, Phillip Broomhead, Gail Taphouse and lovely Alessandra Ferri contributed greatly to the work's success.
Jonathan Burrows is probably the more progressive talent of the two, taking his direction from choreographers like Richard Alstone and Siobhan. Davies. For this gala, though, he showed a blithe, classical solo, impeccably danced by Nicola Roberts, which was in keeping with such a Cecchetti- orientated occasion. (The maestro was a notorious traditionalist who deeply resented any departures from classical technique. Cecchetti told Cyril Beaumont that when Diaghilev asked him what he thought of Nij insky' s Le Sacre du Printemps, he replied: 'I think the whole thing has been done by four idiots. First: M. Stravinsky, who wrote the music. Se- cond: M. Roehrich, who designed the scenery and costumes. Third: M. Nijinsky, who composed the dances. Fourth: M. Diaghilev, who wasted his money on it.') 'Early to bed, early to rise, then you may grow up to be a Breakfast TV presenter.' The first half of the gala was in the form of a ballet class. Demonstrating Cecchetti syllabus work were dancers ranging from pre-White Lodge tots to young Royal Ballet stars. I found myself experiencing a sense of deja-vu — watching exercises that were ex- actly the ones I was drilled in decades ago. Even the music was the same. Presumably this stasis honours the maestro's antipathy to change. Whatever the reason, it was fascinating to watch the various dancers im- pose their style on the enchainements: Bryony Brind gave us a wonderfully silken demonstration of epaulement, the slight twisting of the torso that is a vital feature of classical style; David Yow combined perfect placing with the splits doing coupe jetes round the stage; Phillip Broomhead per- formed a faultless adage — apparently hav- ing practised all week on a physiotherapist's balancing board to help him master the rake on the Sadler's Wells stage. The 'class' ended with a wonderfully controlled pas de deux by Lesley Collier and Stephen Beagley.
Beagley went on to dance Harlequin to Collier's sprightly Columbine in an extract from Le Carnaval. He replaced David Pedon, injured after a fall on stage, with only a day's notice and deserves to be con- gratulated for managing a new part with such aplomb.
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