The Royal Ballet - The Nutcracker

The Nutcracker
The Royal Ballet
December 16th 2009

There is something quite infectious about The Nutcracker; no matter how many times you’ve seen it before the magic, sparkle and snow will get you every time. Everything glitters and resistance is futile.

The Royal Ballet’s production is full of magic, brought about by Gary Avis’ interpretation of Drosselmeyer. He is a dancer who compels you to watch even when he’s perfectly still, so give him a cloak and the stage and who needs the tricks ?

Photo :  Bill Cooper

Everyone loves the children in Act 1, and the students of the Royal Ballet School, White Lodge, danced with absolute joy, whether they were toy soldiers, mice or Gingerbreads. The Christmas Angels, present in all the important transformational scenes, are danced by the students of the Upper School, seemingly on wheels.

The first three scenes are full of props and tricks, and I thought that Paul Kay as Clara’s partner, at her parent’s party, danced with ease and easily outshone Harlequin, Columbine, Vivandiere and the Soldier. I’ve seen them all look sharper than this.

Once Clara, Iohna Loots, has defeated the Mouse King by bashing him on the head with her shoe, it’s time for a lovely pas de deux with Hans-Peter/The Nutcracker Ricardo Cervera. I’ve seen Cervera in this role many times and he always dances fully with the music, beginning the adagio solo with such ardour that Clara can’t help but melt. I’m not convinced that Loots is a great turner, and Cervera had his hands full keeping her on balance and avoiding flying feet. I do worry that Cervera is forever stuck in this role – with some rehearsal surely it is time for him to be cast as The Prince ?

Photo :  Johan Persson

Melt she does, and the Christmas Angels guide them to the Land of Snow. The corp de ballet are always impressive here, the swirlingly uplifting music, the brilliant white glittering costumes, the interaction with Clara and The Nutcracker, and finally all the snow – filling every inch of air if that’s possible.

There were some cast changes in Act 2 but our celebrated couple journey to the Kingdom of Sweets with the help of Drosselmeyer, arriving in the Sugar Garden of the Palace to meet the Sugar Plum Fairy and her Prince. No doubt about it – the tickets sold out long ago because of the chance to see Alina Cojocaru and Johan Kobborg in these roles. Both started nervously but had the divertissements to master them.

The Russian Dance, with Tristan Dyer and James Hay, was particularly good, Cervera joining in – I like the way that Clara and The Nutcracker dance a soupçon of each divert. Avis is an instrumental figure again here – providing a clue as to the next dance or gesturing for the audience to be quiet. This he did before the Arabian Dance, where Johannes Stepanek was mesmerizing.

The Dance of the Mirlitons is an audience favourite, and Leanne Cope used every single beat of the music to maximum effect. Her facial expressions & her timing were absolutely on the money.

Laura Morera, as the Rose Fairy, brought vivaciousness and brilliance. The choreography suits her personality and she lit up the stage effortlessly.

Cojocaru and Kobborg hit their stride for the Grand pas de deux. Cojocaru is tiny but her arms have a regal grace which is so essential in this role. Kobborg is an exemplary partner, though I did think some of the steps had been changed, perhaps to accommodate Cojocaru’s recovery from injury. Nevertheless theirs is a great partnership, eminently watchable, though Kobborg in particular looked to be gasping for breath at times. Who wouldn’t ? The solos are a test for both – Cojocaru with the Gargouillades and Kobborg with fast turns and high jumps.

By the end, with the whole company on stage, everyone looks to be having a ball, and you’ll find yourself hoping for snow (it’s forecast) with feet itching to waltz out into the Piazza. What better way to twirl yourself into Christmas ?

Diarmaid O'Meara, professional dancer, interviewed

Diarmaid O'Meara - behind the dancer

Diarmaid O'Meara @ The Royal Opera House

Photograph :  Mo Greig

Most of the expert dancers you see on stage have been through rigorous, repetitive training to become an elite athlete – because that’s what professional ballet dancers are. ‘Expertise’ is defined in a study (1) in 1993 as ‘the result of intense practice for a minimum of ten years’. The study went on to describe the specific type of practice an expert needs to acquire this expertise as ‘deliberate practice’, which means getting the best instruction but also several hours of focused practice every day. What is missing from the study is that these ten years of deliberate practice must be completed before puberty, because of the very high level of flexibility needed.

Malcolm Gladwell, in Outliers (2) explains that achievement is talent plus preparation, and that preparation almost always totals 10,000 hours. It’s not enough to practice for an hour a week for 10,000 weeks if you want to be an expert; the conclusion of the 1993 study - the requirement for ‘deliberate practice’ - is fundamental. An experiment in 1995 (3) concluded that it takes 180 practice trials for the human brain to consistently reproduce new, simple movement patterns. There is nothing simple about ballet choreography and you can see how a much longer training period becomes necessary.

That said, it’s not unheard of to start a vocational career in ballet at a later stage. Royal Ballet Principal dancer Johan Kobborg started his career with the Royal Danish Ballet School at the age of 16. Darcey Bussell had a lot of catching up to do in her first years at the Royal Ballet School and found it hard to pick up the steps. It’s been said that the classical Greek Philosopher Socrates learned to dance when he was 70 because he felt that an essential part of himself had been neglected.

But there’s late and then there’s meeting yourself coming backwards. I’m at the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden to talk to Diarmaid O’Meara, who started training at 22. That’s not a typo. He had never considered doing ballet, there were no family links and he didn’t start vocational training until he’d passed a degree in Genetics, started a PhD and had a job as a research assistant (researching arthritis). His heart wasn’t in it, “I just didn’t love it enough, and I need to really love something to do it”. The reality of being in a lab six days a week was not for him, “it was just something that I could never see myself doing as a career.”

When you meet him it’s easy to see why. He’s chatty, intelligent & attentive - our wobbly table was distracting me until he whipped out a notebook to steady the leg - not someone I can see in a white coat and those dodgy blue shoe-covers. He’s very open and will talk to anyone, but dig deeper and he’s wary at first; my guess is that he makes strong and loyal friendships, but only after taking his time to get to know you first. One of his friends, fellow professional dancer Megan Wood, with whom he is currently working, tells me “Diarmaid always puts a smile on my face. When our feet are hurting and we're exhausted, he will always make me chuckle! He is a very genuine and sincere person and his hugs are always the warmth of friendship. I definitely consider Diarmaid a true friend.”

So what alchemy can account for the professionally trained ballet dancer in front of me? In his native Ireland there is no vocational ballet training, and Diarmaid says “any Irish people that have gone anywhere in dance have had to leave and come to London. Or gone abroad to France or Russia”. Of ballet he says “I’d seen it on TV and I was a bit mesmerised by it, but because there wasn’t any dance presence, it was something you didn’t think about.” Diarmaid was “really involved in sports so that took up all my extra energy.” He modestly tells me that he “represented Ireland in decathlon at one stage”. The choreographer George Balanchine said “ I don't want people who want to dance, I want people who have to dance”, and I think this sentiment applies very much to Diarmaid.

Moving to Dublin proved to be the catalyst, and in typically understated fashion, just as in all success stories – think Carlos Acosta in the backstreets of Havana – cut to 10 years later and he’s centre stage at Covent Garden - "a friend of mine was doing a few dance classes and invited me to go along with her. I did some contemporary, some hip-hop and then I wandered into a ballet class one day.” The way he tells it, it’s almost impossible to imagine how transformative that class turned out to be. “It all happened pretty quickly from then. I started taking regular classes in Dublin, and one teacher I had, Stephen Brennan, said ‘if you want to make anything happen, you need to move to London’.” Diarmaid was taking five classes a week by this stage, but only for a few months – nothing like the ten years or more of his contemporaries.

He applied to Central School of Ballet “and luckily, Bruce Sansom was the director at the time, and he was very long-sighted. He thought that they could do something with me.” Given that Diarmaid had earlier told me “I had this idea in my head that it was too late : that ship had sailed, it was never going to happen”, what made him take the plunge and leave his job ? “I hedged my bets - something I love vs. something that merely paid the bills”.

Diarmaid O'Meara @ The Royal Opera House

Photograph :  Mo Greig

Crucially, he has incredibly supportive parents, who, if they were worried, never voiced it. “They tell me now, that at the time when I said ’I want to go to London to Central School of Ballet and I want to be a dancer’, they were a bit like, ‘this is a bit hare-brained’. But at the time they were like, ‘if this is what you want to do, go for it. We’re behind you 100%'. They’re ultra-supportive, which made making a big decision like that so much easier, knowing that they were behind me.” Many studies have shown that parental support is one of the key drivers when it comes to opportunities to succeed.

The training was “really tough. In first year I discovered that I had really bad posture and I was really uncoordinated, and I just had to scrap everything and begin from scratch. I think because I had spent so many years not doing ballet, I really needed to just concentrate on the basics. At the beginning of the 3 years I didn’t really know what I wanted from it. I knew I wanted to perform but I didn’t really know what direction I wanted to go in, because I didn’t know if I was any good, or if I was any good, what area was I good at. But over the 3 years I realised that classical ballet was what I really absolutely loved.” In between training Diarmaid worked (and still does) at Sadlers Wells Theatre in Islington.

“The teacher I had in second year, Paul Lewis, was just phenomenal. I don’t think I would have got a ballet job if it wasn’t for him, because he really just pulled it out of me. He was really, really hard on us, on all of us, and he was really hard on me. But it totally paid off because he knew what he wanted to get out of us, and it was all for us, you know, he wasn’t hard on us just for the sake of being hard on us. He was hard on us because he wanted us to do really well. And I’ve huge respect for him because of that.”

Paul Lewis confirms the hard work but points to Diarmaid’s incredible work ethic and level-headed attitude towards his training, “Diarmaid came to us with having very, very little previous experience and we thought it was a bit of a long shot really, but he was very determined and so we gave him a chance at the school. I enjoyed having him around enormously, watching him overcome the challenges that the course presented. He took it all in his stride. He surpassed all our expectations really, he was incredibly focused. He was coming to this very late so he knew he had to knuckle down and really try and catch up, which he did, and he worked incredibly hard for his three years here. But he’s managed to change himself physically as well, because he’s a strong man anyway, but he looked more like a rugby player than a ballet dancer when he arrived, and he’s managed to completely change his physique.” I ask whether he had to adapt his teaching to accommodate Diarmaid’s late start but he says emphatically not, “the information was the same. It just meant that in terms of trying to change your body already when you are a fully formed man - it’s one thing when they’re younger and physically they’re still growing, they’re changing - Diarmaid was pretty much set. But he still managed, through stretching and just working his body using different muscles, really working very hard at it, he did manage to completely reshape himself. He had co-ordination issues and things which, a lot of it he managed to overcome. He’s still working on it, and I think for any dancer that’s always an on-going thing, you’re always striving to improve and he’s still going to do that but his work ethic was phenomenal."

Approaching Christmas in his first term of third year, recovering from an injury proved, as it does with many dancers, to be a pivotal time. Again, the understated way that he talks about breaking his foot in class, “I landed awkwardly on a patch of slippy floor, and my foot just cracked, and that knocked me out for 8 weeks”, belies how testing an injury can be, particularly in the important graduation year when dancers audition for professional work. “But when I got back from that, I came back way stronger than I’d been before. I literally started again with the basics, while my foot was healing.” A Cuban lady at the school looked after injured students and “she was all about finding connections in your body, all movements were very organic, using your breath. She did lots of visualisations. So I went into class every day with my foot up in a chair and I used to visualise myself doing each exercise. And I imagined how it would feel, what my posture was like, what my arms were doing, all the co-ordinations, and what muscles I would feel doing the exercises. So then when I came back I didn’t feel uncoordinated, everything felt right.”

Diarmaid O'Meara & Anna Blackwell in Ascent by Mikaela Polley

Photograph : Bill Cooper.

Diarmaid created several roles in his final year; two roles in Matthew Hart’s Whodunnit and one part in Mikaela Polley’s Ascent, which she describes as “a blend of classical ballet and contemporary dance” and “it starts in one place but by the end it’s very high energy.” Polley initially watched the whole year in a workshop, because her style was classical with a contemporary edge “so I was looking for dancers that could help me creatively create the piece, and who had that something a little bit different, who were willing to take some challenges and some risks.” The next step was to choose around 18 dancers with whom she wanted to work, and she included Diarmaid. “It was a cast of 6, but I had several casts because it’s important that the students have this opportunity to work with choreographers.”

Diarmaid’s broken foot was still healing at this point, but Polley remembers “he was always present, he was always there. He just wasn’t able to physically join in. I knew that I wanted him to do one of the roles and that there were multiple performances and that he would have that opportunity.” In fact he ended up dancing all of the performances in that role, “and taking it to the next level in the performance side of the piece, and he was fantastic. He’s a very clever man, he knew his work, he was prepared, and I think it gave him an opportunity and challenge to show what he was able of. I think the school were amazed because he came to dance so late, that he had this ability that shone through.”

With graduation fast approaching, Diarmaid auditioned when time allowed. He tells me of one audition in Poland which really tested his mettle. “I couldn’t make the actual audition date (because of his performance schedule on tour with Central) so I said ‘can I come up and take company class ?’ Big mistake. There were about 70 dancers in the studio, and the class lasted less than an hour. It was just so fast, everything was in Polish, I could not pick up a single step, and back then, because I was nervous as well, not being able to pick up the steps, nobody helping me and the director watching me - I just looked like I’d walked in off the street and I’d never done a class in my life. That was just horrific. It was horrible.” It’s impossible to over-emphasise the strength of character Diarmaid demonstrates; graduating students have been through years of constant sifting and evaluation from their teachers, but one of the most challenging adaptations to company life is the reality of working for yourself.

Photograph :  Bill Cooper

For the same reason he also missed an audition for Ballet Theatre UK, so he asked the Director and Choreographer of the company, Chris Moore, to watch him in class. Moore says “I was keen to offer Diarmaid a contract after seeing him in class at Central School due to his clean and well finished class work. As I was looking for a partner for Maria (Engel, who dances the Sugar Plum Fairy), it was essential that I found someone who would bring a lot of character and style to the role of 'Nutcracker' as well as the right height and physique.”

Polley confirms this, “he’s an excellent partner. I could see very instantaneously that he was a very good partner and he was able to experiment and was very strong and could do some of the more difficult lifts, so I could specifically pinpoint him into a role which was great.”

Diarmaid O'Meara & Maria Engel in the Arabian Dance from Christopher Moore's The Nutcracker

Photograph :  Mo Greig

Ballet Theatre UK began rehearsals this Autumn and I’ve watched them several times since. I can very clearly remember being impressed by Diarmaid’s ability to portray the characters in various roles even in the rehearsal studio; necessary here because the Company has ten dancers and two alternate casts. When I ask Moore about Diarmaid’s performances, he tells me, “Diarmaid has worked very hard in his characterisations and has great skill in switching from a 'classical prince' to other characters such as the Harlequin doll and the Butler. Diarmaid has also become very good at working on stages of various sizes while still staying true to the choreography and production.” A choreographers dream then.

Diarmaid O'Meara as The Prince & Maria Engel as Sugar Plum Fairy in Christopher Moore's The Nutcracker

Photograph :  Mo Greig

The central pas de deux between the Sugar Plum Fairy and her Prince is famously tricky, “performing the pas de deux was actually really, really scary, because its ultra-classical, ultra-formal and then I’m responsible for Maria, for making her look fantastic, not that she needs any help, and thankfully I had good pas de deux training at school.” Back to Paul Lewis, “he’s a very good partner, being a strong lad is a huge asset. He’s a good looking guy.” How did Maria and Diarmaid form the trust they needed ? “Luckily when we met we just instantly had a rapport, so we were able to talk to each other, which made it very easy to get comfortable with it, so now the pas de deux is actually the most comfortable part of the ballet for me.”

I ask him what he’d like to dance and with whom, given the choice. “I’d love to do Balanchine, something like The Four Temperaments and Theme and Variations, I absolutely love it.” He also mentions Onegin and “if I was dancing something dramatic, it would have to be Laura Morera, she’s just so intense when she’s on stage. She’s just so passionate.”

I’ve watched several of Diarmaid’s performances and it’s true that he makes it look easy, which it isn’t. The company have been travelling all over the UK, and I wonder where he considers home now that he’s been away from Ireland for years, “where my loved ones are, lucky for me, that means many places.” Performing is what he loves, but he’s smart enough to start planning for the future, which may involve teaching “even now, if I see someone doing something wrong technically, I’ll give them a correction, and I like others to do this to me too”, and, as he already has a B.Sc. (Hons.), re-training as a Physiotherapist is a possibility, “I have already researched where and how much it will cost me”.

Diarmaid O'Meara as The Prince & Maria Engel as Sugar Plum Fairy in Christopher Moore's The Nutcracker

Photograph : Mo Greig

Polley wants to know whether I too encountered the force-field that is the charm of the Irish (I did), and adds, “I found him to be very intelligent. He was obviously slightly older than some of the other students but that maturity shone through in his professional approach to working, not only with me but within the company. He was always eager for feedback, and to improve, and I think that’s what will help him into his professional career, just to keep working hard. He’s got a very lovely nature about him, and I think that will stand him in good stead in the future. He’s got a nice presence on stage and he has some very nice attributes to him. He was a very delightful man to work with. I wish him well for the future.”

Lewis says “he’s doing really, really, really well. He needs to keep working as he is, because there is still room for improvement, he’s going to grow, but I’m very, very, very pleased with what Diarmaid has managed to achieve. I’m thrilled that he’s working now; he’s left the school and gone into employment and I’m sure there are going to be other opportunities for him as well after this. I think he’s going to have a very interesting future.”

Once the tour is over, he’ll be home for Christmas, and then the gruelling process of auditioning begins again (but don’t expect Diarmaid to make a drama out of it – after all, his favourite quote is ‘what’s for you won’t pass you by’), “I don’t know if I’d like to leave London, but if there’s a job outside London, there’s a job outside London.” I can’t imagine that London wants to lose him, so what does the future hold ? “I’ll just keep working and putting myself out there and the rest is for someone else to decide.”

References


1. The Role of Deliberate Practice in the Acquisition of Expert Performance, K. Anders Ericsson, Ralf Th. Krampe, and Clemens Tesch-Römer, 1993
2. Outliers, Malcolm Galdwell, 2008
3. Relative phase alterations during bimanual skill acquisition. Journal of Motor Behavior, Lee,T. D., Swinnen, S. P., & Verschueren, S. (1995).
4. Hot House Kids, produced by Neil George, presented by Deborah Bull, BBC Radio 4

I would like to thank those who have contributed to the making of this interview – Paul Lewis, 2nd year men's teacher, Carol Been & Anya Clifton at Central School of Ballet, Steven Drew & Mikaela Polley at Rambert Dance Company, Christopher Moore at Ballet Theatre UK, Megan Wood, Mo Greig, Neil George at the BBC and Deborah Bull.

Nathalie Harrison interviewed for "Cupcakes & conversation ..."

Cupcakes & conversation with Nathalie Harrison, First Artist, The Royal Ballet

Nathalie Harrison received a very well deserved promotion at the beginning of this season, and you can see her dancing at the Royal Opera House.

Nathalie Harrison

Photo :  Tom Birkett

What motivates you at 8am on a Monday morning ?
Firstly a good cup of tea and during my brisk Bloomsbury walk to work I get into gear and look forward to the day and the week ahead.

Who would you most like to dance with ?
Unfortunately I feel I've just missed out on Jonathan Cope - that was always a dream, however last season I had the honour of dancing with Gary Avis. He is one of the most professional and talented people I've worked with.

How do you prepare your pointe shoes ?
Reluctantly! I seem to always have a pair only half done. I darn the ends, shellac them, sew ribbons and criss-cross elastics then bash them about before they're allowed on my feet. I wear my shoes hard.

What is your daily routine at the moment ?
Well, after the aforementioned compulsory cup of tea, I get to work to sort my shoes for the day. Then after our daily class, it's straight into rehearsals until about 5.30pm. Before the evening show, I'll try and pop out for food and fresh air and to call my loved ones to say hello. After curtain down, when I'm finally home and sitting in my living room, over a glass of wine I look at the decorating that needs doing in my little flat!

You can ask six famous people to dinner - who would you invite ?
Keith Richards, Tony Benn, Richard Dawkins, Stephen Fry, Mae West and Paul Merton. My boyfriend would cook for us. (He's famed for his cooking and hospitality.)

Nathalie Harrison in Alastair Marriott’s Sensorium for The Royal Ballet

Photo :  Andre Uspenski

What would surprise people about you ?
I'm thinking about doing a history degree. Is that surprising? Although I'm told there's no future in history....

Who inspired you to dance ?
My family. Growing up in a household with great music playing and their encouragement to explore all possibilities.

How would someone else describe you ?
Chatty, hard-working, generous and impatient.

What is your best piece of advice ?
I believe that the harder you work at something, the greater the reward. Easy achievements aren't as fulfilling. Most importantly, make the most of every moment. Enjoy it. Live it!

Which role has tested you the most & how ?
Opening night of DGV, dancing the Pas De Deux created for Darcey. One of the best experiences of my life. I was heart-broken to suffer an injured wrist the following week. Dancer unable to dance = unhappy person!

What is the funniest thing that’s ever happened to you ?
I seem to be a magnet for 'funny things' happening to me. There are so many and they're mostly embarrassing so my lips are sealed.

If you designed your own stage costume, what would you create ?
I love Bakst designs, so I would probably steal from him and mix it with a little Westwood.

Nathalie Harrison and Gary Avis in Christopher Wheeldon's DGV for The Royal Ballet

What are you most proud of ?
Without hesitation, my Dad.

Who would play you in the film of your life ?
Chloë Sevigny or Kate Hudson and the sound-track would have to be the Rolling Stones and Tchaikovsky.

What is your favourite quote ?
Elwood: It's 106 miles to Chicago, we got a full tank of gas, half a pack of cigarettes, it's dark, and we're wearing sunglasses.
Jake: Hit it.
(The Blues Brothers)

Do you have a secret skill which no-one knows about ?
I'm not that secretive, and I'm not that skilled. But I'll work on it and keep you posted!

BALLET NEWS UPDATES

COMPETITION WINNER ANNOUNCED

Congratulations to ‘Two sugars please’, who wins our exclusive competition in association with English National Ballet.

Please get in touch with your details and I'll arrange the rest.



CHRISTMAS BALLET TV

This summer The Royal Ballet embarked on a ground-breaking tour to Cuba with Guest Principal Carlos Acosta in his home country. You may recall that the press coverage, in the UK at least, wasn't massive, and you may want to know more about the tour. 

The Company were followed by The Ballet Boyz, who made a documentary to be shown on More4 on Christmas Day at 9pm.

BIRMINGHAM ROYAL BALLET ANNOUNCES A NEW PRODUCTION OF CINDERELLA FOR WINTER 2010

Birmingham Royal Ballet is delighted to announce a brand new production of Cinderella to be performed at Birmingham Hippodrome during the company’s winter season in 2010.

Cinderella will be choreographed by Birmingham Royal Ballet’s Director David Bintley with designs by John Macfarlane, lighting by David Finn and music by Sergei Prokofiev.

The full-length, narrative ballet reunites the design team behind the company’s ever-popular and Christmas family favourite, The Nutcracker. John Macfarlane’s extravagant and magical designs are currently enthralling audiences of all ages at Birmingham Hippodrome in The Nutcracker until Sunday 13 December. The production will not be performed at the Hippodrome again until 2011.

David Bintley, Director for Birmingham Royal Ballet said:

‘I am very excited to work on a new production of Cinderella. Not only I am delighted to work with John Macfarlane, David Finn and the company’s new music director Koen Kessels but 2010 also marks Birmingham Royal Ballet’s 20th anniversary year in Birmingham. The announcement of a new production shows the company continues to go from strength to strength in this great city.’

Our ascending Stars... Jeremy Curnier

'Our ascending stars'…. follows the progress of professional dancers who have graduated this year.  Regular readers will know that all of the dancers featured here were interviewed just as they made the transition from vocational school to professional ballet company.  Here we see how they've been getting on....

Ascending stars

Drawing by noomiedoodlesfashion

The quite fabulous noomiedoodlesfashion very generously gave up some time to work on my brief, which was to use her fashion expertise to conjure up traditionally dressed dancers but with a fashionable twist.

Jeremy Curnier, Northern Ballet Theatre

What is it like now that you are working as a professional ballet dancer ?

To actually reach the status of being a professional dancer and no longer a student is a great satisfaction in itself. It is only the difference of one day from being a student to being a professional in a company, yet you must take on the responsibility that you are now part of a team of people who have the demanding task of staging various productions throughout the year. You know it is your job to work and perform to the best of your ability and to do your part to ensure that the audience, whether for a production that night or in a months time, will leave the theatre with great appreciation for what they have just watched. That is why, when the curtain goes up at the end of the show and you hear the enjoyment of the crowd it is an awesome feeling to know that you are a professional dancer.

What roles have you performed so far and what did you enjoy ?

So far we have performed three productions in various venues around England. My first role with the company was in Dracula where I danced as a guest in the Engagement scene. It was the first step I took to gain more on-stage experience as a dancer. Our next production was Wuthering Heights in which I was a guest at Catherine & Edgar’s wedding. I also had the great opportunity to play the role of young Heathcliff, which has probably been my most demanding role so far whilst here at Northern Ballet. This was great fun to perform as throughout the ballet Heathcliff has flashbacks to his past in which his younger self seems so innocent and happy! I danced with Antoinette Brooks-Daw and this was a great chance to work on some of my partnering skills. Most recently we have been all over the place with A Christmas Carol which has been a light and merry ballet compared to the tragedy of Wuthering Heights! It involves lots of costume changes from priests to phantoms and many others!

What have you learnt that’s been unexpected ?

The thing that I have learnt since leaving The Royal Ballet School is how much experience shows in a dancer. As we mature and progress as dancers we may lose some aspects of our youth, but what we lose in those areas we gain in experience. After speaking to some of the more experienced dancers in the company it is interesting to learn how they cope with the continual heavy load. I started work with Northern Ballet at the end of July and since then I have had far fewer days off and holiday breaks than I had at school. I did not expect to find my body, at times, to feel as exhausted as it has. I am only twenty and I’m one of the youngest in the company. I therefore had to learn quickly about how to take care of my body even more than I did before, and to really know when to push myself physically and safely in order for me to perform to the best of my ability over many shows, not just one. Experience shows in many aspects of a dancer and this is one of many I have to learn about!

What roles are coming up for you in the New Year ?

The New Year brings many new productions, one of which is Peter Pan. We are almost done learning this as we have a couple of weeks of this ballet before Christmas. This is an awesome show as it involves flying! I have (or have had) flying lessons for this show as I have been cast for Michael and also Peter in different casts. I have been very fortunate in my casting so far. I will never forget to value it. Other shows coming up that we have yet to learn and rehearse are Romeo and Juliet and Dangerous Liaisons.

Venus Villa interviewed for "Cupcakes & conversation with..."

Cupcakes & conversation with Venus Villa, First Artist, English National Ballet

Venus Villa has been nominated for The Emerging Dancer Award, which is an annual competition for English National Ballet to recognise and nurture the phenomenal talent of their up-and-coming dancers. The Award encourages excellence and potential within the Company, with the winner being awarded a £5,000 cash prize.

During the Summer English National Ballet’s artistic, musical, administrative staff and Principal dancers have been voting for their Emerging Dancer and the top six nominated dancers are Esteban Berlanga, Anais Chalendard, Crystal Costa, Ksenia Ovsyanick, Junor de Oliveira Souza and Venus Villa.

There will be an Awards Evening on the 25 February 2010 to announce the winner of both The Emerging Dancer Award and The People’s Choice Award.

What motivates you at 8am on a Monday morning ?
Well, most of the time on Mondays I’m motivated after sleeping for more than 12 hours on a Sunday. Certainly some Mondays I am not motivated, but as I start class, I find my motivation.

Who would you most like to dance with ?
I don't have a specific name: there are many good dancers all around the world, all of them with something special to offer. Personally I love to dance with someone who is a good dancer of course but especially a good interpreter.

How do you prepare your pointe shoes ?
I sew them in a very specific way that I like, then I cut them on the third part. I need 1 or 2 hours to prepare them. I spend all that time because I like them to be perfect and beautiful.

What is your daily routine at the moment ?
A routine day for me is: wake up at 7 am, always have breakfast before I leave home. At 8am I do training at the gym until 9am. Then I start ballet class and my daily rehearsals until 5 or 6.30pm. Sometimes after that I spend one hour more working on solos for my next gala. Finishing at 7.30pm. After all of that I come back home where I spend most of the time watching movies, calling my family and resting for the next day.

You can ask six famous people to dinner - who would you invite ?
William Shakespeare, Leonardo da Vinci, Charlie Chaplin, George Balanchine, Roberto Benigni and Dante Alighieri.

What would surprise people about you ?
The strength of my will.

Who inspired you to dance ?
I have many dancers who have inspired me, but the first dancer was Paloma Herrera. When I was 9 years old I saw her dancing with Angel Corella in the Don Quixote pas de deux. I remember how much I loved that DVD! I watched it millions of times.

How would someone else describe you ?
Well, my friends say that I am a very happy person, generous, and very entertaining. I hope that is true !

What is your best piece of advice ?
Be happy, respect others and love everything you do.

Which role has tested you the most & how ?
I believe that the one that tested me most has been the Don Quixote pas de deux. I have danced it at lot of galas: Kitri is something that I have in my personality, and I will never get tired of it. My dream is to dance the whole ballet.

What is the funniest thing that’s ever happened to you ?
I have a lot of funny stories, especially from English National Ballet where we perform a lot. But the one I really remember was during Sleeping Beauty. I was dancing a fairy and my friends and I had a
fit of laughter watching Yat Sen Chang interpreting Carabosse for the first time. He was so funny and I could not control my laughing. It was horrible!!!

If you designed your own stage costume, what would you create ?
Definitely something very soft, but with a very strong colour like red!!! And with a lot of sparkling decorations...

What are you most proud of ?
Definitely my family (all of them).

Who would play you in the film of your life ?
Thais Pedroso.

What is your favourite quote ?
Love everything you do and everything you have.... that is the most important thing for me.

Do you have a secret skill which no-one knows about ?
I am very good at playing baseball.

Daria Klimentová - legwarmers sale

English National Ballet Senior Principal Dancer, Daria Klimentová is selling some of her legwarmers. 

They would make a really unique Christmas present if you want to surprise friends and family.

If you would like to purchase any of them, please leave me a comment with the details and I will make the arrangements for you, provided they have not been sold already.

Please hurry though - they are selling out very quickly !

No 2 - £25 + postage

No 3 - £25 + postage - NOW SOLD

No 4 - £25 + postage

No 5 - £25 + postage

No 7 - £25 + postage

No 8 - £15 + postage

No 12 - £15 + postage - NOW SOLD

No 13 - £15 + postage

No 14 - £15 + postage

No 15 - £15 + postage

BALLET NEWS UPDATES

THE NUTCRACKER

Please don’t forget that the exclusive competition I’ve been running in association with English National Ballet to win a pair of tickets to The Nutcracker this Christmas, as well as a pair of pointe shoes signed by Senior Principal Dancer Elena Glurdjidze, closes on Sunday 6th December 2009 at midnight GMT.

Photo: Annabel Moeller

I’ve just received Glurdjidze’s shoes, and here they are :

There is time to enter !

MARIA ENGEL

Following my interview with Maria last week, many of you have asked to see Maria's fabulous skyscraper heels.  Here they are :

Photo :  Mo Greig

DARCEY BUSSELL

Tonight @ 20:00 BBC4 are showing Darcey Bussell’s ten best ballet moments. Bussell, who retired from The Royal Ballet in 2007 introduces and demonstrates some of her favourite ballet moments with dancers Roberto Bolle and Jonathan Cope. Featuring some of her own performances and archive highlights, with music ranging from Scott Joplin to Tchaikovsky. The ballets include Giselle, The Nutcracker and a classic performance by Margot Fonteyn in Swan Lake.

The programme is repeated on 28th November @ 02:30 and lasts for 60 minutes.

MIYAKO YOSHIDA

The Royal Ballet's Miyako Yoshida has announced her retirement.  Yoshida's performance in The Nutracker with Steven McRae on 26th November will be available on DVD at a later date and her last performance at the Royal Opera House will be in Cinderella on 23rd April 2010.  Her last performance will be in Tokyo, in Romeo & Juliet in June 2010 when The Royal Ballet are on tour in her home country.

Esteban Berlanga interviewed for "Cupcakes & conversation..."

Cupcakes & conversation with Esteban Berlanga, Soloist, English National Ballet

Berlanga has been nominated in the OUTSTANDING MALE PERFORMANCE (CLASSICAL) category of the National Dance Awards.  The other nominees in this category are :  Tobias Batley / Northern Ballet Theatre, Esteban Berlanga / English National Ballet, Sergei Polunin /The Royal Ballet.

Berlanga has also been nominated in the Emerging Dancer Award, which is an annual competition for English National Ballet to recognise and nurture the phenomenal talent of their up-and-coming dancers. The Award encourages excellence and potential within the Company, with the winner being awarded a £5,000 cash prize.

During the Summer English National Ballet’s artistic, musical, administrative staff and Principal dancers have been voting for their Emerging Dancer and the top six nominated dancers are Esteban Berlanga, Anais Chalendard, Crystal Costa, Ksenia Ovsyanick, Junor de Oliveira Souza and Venus Villa.

Throughout the Autumn Tour of Giselle and the Christmas Season you are invited to vote for your favourite of the six nominees, giving you the chance to win some fabulous prizes. The dancer with the most public votes will win The People’s Choice Award. You can vote now for your favourite dancer.

There will be an Awards Evening on the 25 February 2010 to announce the winner of both The Emerging Dancer Award and The People’s Choice Award.

What motivates you at 8am on a Monday morning ?
I don’t think I have any motivation at that time!!!! But I wake up every day with energy to spend working a lot during the day in my ballet class and also in the rehearsals, to get better and better every day, to improve every second at work, and also in my normal life.

Who would you most like to dance with ?
Any amazing dancer.

What is your daily routine at the moment ?
Well, right now I wake up at 8 in the morning, I take a shower and then have breakfast. I take the tube, put my ipod on until I get to High Street Kensington or Gloucester Road, then I take the bus to work. At 10:30am I have a ballet class every day for an hour and fifteen minutes. After that a 15 min break and then I go to the rehearsal (depending on the timetable I can be rehearsing all day without break or have some little breaks at some point, but otherwise I finish my work day at 6:30). Then normally I take the tube again back home...when I get home I put my computer on and the first thing I do is check my Facebook and emails, and then I cook and prepare everything that I need for the next day.....

What are you looking forward to dancing this year ?
Well I’ve already done my first show as Albrecht (from Giselle) in Manchester with Senior Principal Daria Klimentova. Also I'm looking foward to dancing a solo from one of my teachers in Spain (Ricardo Franco) for the Emerging Dancer Award.

You can ask six famous people to dinner - who would you invite ?
Angelina Jolie, Pedro Almodovar, Penelope Cruz, Nureyev, Woody Allen, Victoria Beckham.

What would surprise people about you ?
People are surprised when I say that I am from a little village (Motilleja) in Albacete (Spain).

Who inspired you to dance ?
I was inspired by my mum, and little things that I see in other people.

How would someone else describe you ?
Well I don’t really know...but I think they can see that I am a happy person, joking all the time, but also that I really focus on my work.

What is your best piece of advice ?
Hakuna Matata! (Hakuna matata is a Swahili phrase that is literally translated as "There are no worries". It is sometimes translated as "no worries", although is more commonly used similarly to the English phrase "no problem".)

Which role has tested you the most & how ?
I think it was Des Grieux in Manon because I think is a really hard work. It is a three act ballet and you have to be strong enough to deal with the dancing, pas de deux and also what’s really important is the acting throughout the ballet.

What is the funniest thing that’s ever happened to you ?
Once I went to Hong Kong with the Company, and my group of friends and I were looking for a restaurant to have dinner. We were dancing Alice in Wonderland at that time, and one of my friends (Juan Rodriguez) dances the lead role, the White Rabbit, so we were chatting about that role and then I was trying to imitate him, and I fell onto the floor in the middle of the biggest street in Hong Kong and everyone was looking at me.... it was so funny and embarrassing, but we had a lot of laughs .....

If you designed your own stage costume, what would you create ?
I would do something like shorts in a naked colour. I love to see the dancers bodies on the stage.

What are you most proud of ?
I’m proud of myself, everything I have done, my dancing. Now I can speak English (a little bit) and I’m proud of my family because they help me a lot, always.

Who would play you in the film of your life ?
Someone with a lot of energy, someone who knows very well what he wants & what he dreams of, someone funny, happy, friendly, someone who likes to work hard every day to get the best in work and life.

What is your favourite quote?
"mas vale caer en gracia que ser gracioso."
"It is better to fall into grace than to be funny"

What’s on your iPod ?
I have so much music - many Spanish songs, so much Flamenco music, salsa, classical music, everything....also some photos and videos which I need to learn for work.

What makes you a good dance partner ?
Well I think that whatever I do, I try to do it well. I give everything to my dance partner. I am a calm person and a lot of people like that because they feel comfortable next to me, and I think I transmit a lot with my face, so anyone dancing with me can see it in my eyes.

Do you have a secret skill which no one knows about ?
Not really. Well I can make people smile when they are having a bad day....and that makes me feel good as well.......

Describe yourself in just three words.
Hardworking, passionate, modest.

Cupcakes at Tiffany’s with professional dancer Maria Engel

When I meet Maria Engel, co-incidentally on the opening day of the Christmas ice rink at Somerset House, she is wearing newly acquired and utterly fabulous skyscraper heels. Beaming her usual mega-watt smile at me, she drops into the conversation that she is a good skater. I fear that there may be a clause in her contract forbidding such precarious activity and thank my lucky stars that a giant Tiffany blue box provides immediate distraction.

Mirror, Mirror on the wall....  Maria Engel inside the Tiffany Blue Box
Photos throughout :  Mo Greig

Maria started ballet classes in her native Germany at Ballet und Tanzstudio Beatrix Klein aged three and a half, because her Mum spotted her flexibility and passion for spinning in their living room. Initially going once a week after school, by the age of 12 her teachers, (Beatrix Klein, Christine Steiniger, Elaine Underwood, Galina Georgieva-Weber & Jadwiga Antony) recognising her potential, suggested gradually increasing the number of classes until she was dancing daily, only having Sundays off.

Maria Engel at Somerset House

Auditions, the bane of any dancers life, followed for companies in Germany and abroad, including Elmhurst, a vocational school associated with the excellent Birmingham Royal Ballet. Maria says of her first visit “when I went with my mum to Elmhurst, it was so friendly and my mum felt really comfortable with the school, which seemed really like home, and I felt really comfortable.” Maria was accepted, and the sixth form students train intensively for three years towards the National Diploma in Professional Dance, which is recognised as the vocational equivalent of an honours degree. By the time they graduate, students are expected to have mastered a range of techniques and to have developed the maturity needed to take responsibility for their own future in dance.

Maria praises her teachers for guiding her towards these goals. “The thing is, at the beginning I didn’t really speak that much English, and then I came here and I didn’t go home for the first month. That was the first time I’ve ever been far away from home.” It took only a few weeks to settle in and get used to fast-spoken English, a testament to the pastoral care at the school.

Ofsted (The Office of Standards in Education) inspected this course in January 2008 and the report listed the school's key strengths as 'very good and outstanding teaching; highly effective strategic management; high technical standards; high standards of performance in productions; thorough pastoral and academic support; effective staff appraisal.' Students, just like Maria, speak most highly of the support they receive and ‘the friendly atmosphere’ of the school, which aims to produce ‘thinking dancers’.

Maria Engel at the Royal Opera House

During her final year Maria performed Elite Syncopations – “it’s a great show to do”, and toured with Birmingham Royal Ballet in The Firebird. “You get the credit of your hard work back as soon as you step on stage.” The audition process began again, this time for professional work, and I asked Maria whether she had considered going home to work in a ballet company there, but she replied “I really like to speak English. You know, it’s so strange, going home, for the first two days, I can’t speak, because you use different muscles, and when I’m on the phone to my Mum I start talking English to her. It’s really strange, because I think a lot in English, I think more in English than I do in German.”

Maria’s approach to auditioning is to look through the profile pictures of the dancers in the Company, and with her own profile picture in her head, tries to work out whether her face might fit, “because sometimes the Company goes for a certain look which you can then see in their programmes.”

Ballet Theatre UK, Britain’s newest classical ballet company, was auditioning at this time, and Maria travelled to London and was asked to perform a solo. She chose Kitri from Don Quixote, which company Director & Choreographer Chris Moore describes as “completely the other end of the spectrum from Sugar Plum, but I could just see that she was someone that I could work with and that she would create the image that I was hoping to go for with it.”

Maria Engel inside the Tiffany Blue Box

Chris cast ten dancers for his new production of The Nutcracker, with two alternating casts to cover all the roles. From the start of the audition Chris knew that he wanted to cast Maria, “well, to be honest, to be perfectly honest, she was the first one that we decided to offer a contract to, and we sussed that out pretty much within the barre work and the class really. Just because she presented such a finish with her work and she seemed to dance with quite a lot of maturity and a lot of style, which is quite unique in someone that’s obviously just left college and is on their first contract. She really shone out because of that style and her athletic dynamic that I was really looking for without it being someone non-expressive and just legs and technique. It was quite clear that she could act a little bit through her dance which was exactly what I wanted. There are so many things; style really was the biggest thing, she looked so right for it and has such energy in her dancing.”

In fact, such was the standard of Maria’s dancing that Chris had quite a task on his hands to find a suitable partner for her. “I did find then after we decided to cast her, it was difficult to find a guy that would be suitable for her, to find a guy that was of a good enough standard. So then luckily we found Diarmaid.”

Just two weeks before the end of her training at Elmhurst, Maria received the news that she had been offered a contract. After screaming with a mixture of relief and excitement, she phoned home. “I was so happy, I was crying down the phone to my Dad.”

Maria, the youngest girl in the Company, was cast as the Sugar Plum Fairy.

Maria Engel in rehearsals

I spent some time with the dancers at final rehearsals, where they were already portraying excellent characterization. I could see how impressive all of the dancers would be once they were in the theatre, as Maria highlights “well, once you are in the theatre, and you have the lights, the props, and you wear the costume, it’s completely different. It makes it about fifty per cent more than you are doing already. It just brings out the character; I’m actually wearing that red dress, something to be proud of, I actually get the necklace.“

What about the fiendishly tricky Gargouillades ? “It’s the way of approaching things and thinking. For example, I had coaching with my ballet teachers at Elmhurst who said, ‘think of the second leg coming in’, but for me it was really hard, and then they told me ‘bring your foot to the knee’ and that would make it work for me. So it’s just about approaching things in a way that you understand. The solo is hard because the Sugar Plum variation is pure classical ballet; it’s so pure that you can see any mistakes.”

Maria Engel as the Sugar Plum Fairy and Diarmaid O'Meara as The Prince

Maria’s Prince, Diarmaid O’Meara, says of dancing with her “Maria has real elegance when she dances, not only physically but a sense of poise and maturity. We very quickly gained each others trust which makes dancing with her a joy, and her openness allows us to improve with each performance. I hope that we'll have many opportunities to dance together after this tour. “

Maria Engel as the Sugar Plum Fairy and Diarmaid O'Meara as The Prince

In the famous Sugar Plum pas de deux, Maria has to trust Diarmaid “because if you are turning on pointe, on one leg, it’s the boy who saves you or puts you on your leg. And I love Diarmaid to bits. He’s so funny. I do trust Diarmaid and I know that he will be there. It gets better every time. Every performance is different but the more we do it, I think I get more secure.”

I reviewed one of their performances recently and watched Maria dance with elegant, long clean lines, and a warm, expressive face. Secure in the choreography and in her partner, Maria fouttés effortlessly upstage and launches into the fish dives with ferocious abandon. But there is more, which is what Chris also saw in the auditions. Maria has a rare luminosity, she dances like a single dust mote dancing in a beam of light cast by the brilliance of her technique but also by her innate intelligence as a dancer.

Maria Engel as the Sugar Plum Fairy and Diarmaid O'Meara as The Prince

The particular challenges of being on tour – new theatre each time, maybe a raked stage, the travelling - meant that at their first dress rehearsal the stage was a tight fit for the choreography, so adjustments were rapidly made and the cast adapted easily. “You have to be really secure on the choreography though, to then get the placement right.”

Equally testing is knowing that friends and family are in the audience. In Tamworth last week Maria had three of her teachers from Elmhurst watching - Errol Pickford, Elizabeth Rae and Donald Tolj, and she says “I know they’ve seen me dance so many times but they’ve never seen me in the show, and I was so nervous and no-one can understand. So nervous !”

Conquering the nerves is part and parcel of a dancer’s life, and of course, Maria danced brilliantly. As we were walking between photo shoot locations, she told me that she felt it was her best show so far. Anyone who knows how modest and unassuming dancers are, will know that for Maria to admit to being happy with her performance under such scrutiny means a lot.

Audience feedback has been excellent and Chris says “I’ve been really, really surprised at the amount of comments. People have been emailing and I just thought that’s really nice of someone to email to say how much they enjoyed it.” The theatres too have been positive and “we’ve had quite a lot of them already want to confirm for next year.”

Whose choreography would Maria like to dance, given the chance ? “MacMillan. Manon is one of my favourite ballets actually”. And if she could choose her partner ? “I’m torn between Carlos Acosta and Roberto Bolle. Or maybe Robert Parker.” She’d be wearing a tutu, and it would be red, “I’m a bit obsessed with the colour red.”

I asked Chris how he’d describe Maria’s dancing now, at the half-way point of the tour. “I’d say she has definitely grown in her performance, just with the experience of doing the shows and touring, but the lovely thing about Maria which has come out as we’ve been travelling is that she’s such a positive person to have on tour. She keeps the morale up and is always happy. When you are sat in the bus and you’re going around for long drives, it’s nice really.”

What does Maria wish for herself in the future ? “To get into a medium sized company, which gives me challenges.”

As Maria was directed by the photographer, a crowd gathered around me and asked who she was. I replied, “That’s Maria Engel and she’s going to be a famous ballet dancer.”