Scottish Ballet: Mixed Bill at the Theatre Royal, Glasgow
As the curtain goes up on Façade, Scottish Ballet’s tribute to Sir Frederick Ashton, the kilted trio of the Scotch Rhapsody are met with a cheer from the audience at Glasgow’s Theatre Royal. This is the Scottish premiere of Ashton’s playful dig at popular dances of the 1920s and 30s set to William Walton’s music, which first emerged seventy-four years ago and staged now for Scottish Ballet’s Spring Season by Alexander Grant and Margaret Barbieri. Artistic director Ashley Page was keen to mark Ashton’s centenary year and thought Façade would suit his dancers, particularly after their success dancing the quirky Act 2 divertissements from his own Nutcracker, created on the Company. The dancers don’t disappoint, and Ashton’s fun and sophistication are handled with ease and versatility – loud laughter confirming that Ashton’s wit is alive and well today.
Scottish Ballet’s mixed bill, presented as ‘a fabulous celebration of eighty years of dance’, begins with George Balanchine’s The Four Temperaments (1946) set to Paul Hindemith’s score. Page’s sexy dynamic company has been moulding itself now for two-and-a-half years and Page believes the Company has come a long way. A year ago, Patricia Neary described staging Balanchine’s masterpiece – a challenge for any company – on Scottish Ballet as one of the best experiences she’d ever had. The dancers performed beyond the expectations of even their artistic director and again, on the first night of this year’s Spring Season, gave a more than accomplished performance of this epic neo-classical work. Neary is demanding, a perfectionist, and protective of Mr B’s legacy, so it is a real confirmation of her belief in Page’s company that she will return to stage Balanchine’s Apollo, Rubies, and the
In the middle of the programme, sandwiched between these two legendary masterworks, are three Page shorts. Page’s adaptation of his 32 Cryptograms (1996) – originally designed to show off young Royal Ballet talent – is a signature piece for his dancers, also thirty-two in number. To music by American composer Robert Moran, it perfectly fits and displays their youth, strength, speed and precision. 32 Cryptograms is a cool electric blue dance of pure energy. It’s an ensemble piece where many create the whole. Walking In The Heat (1990) is a refined duet, playfully Latin, set against a red bar of light. Soon Ja Lee and Oliver Rydout are stylish and exact in their partnering. With The Pump Room (2005), Page brings the dancers to deeper and more sensual confrontation. This new work for the Company is inspired by and set to At The Heart Of It All, Aphex Twin created music performed by Nine Inch Nails. It’s loud and pulsating, drawing you in as repetitive and heart-thumping rhythm drive two couples in hot and seductive contact, jumps, entangling and releasing across blood-red floor, through transitions – a blue field, slabs of ochre, a shaft of light – to a spot lit face-to-face finish. Page confirms his reputation as modern ballet rebel. The Pump Room is a dance of two couples, a focus on specific dancers: ex-Rambert star Paul Liburd with Sophie Martin on pointe, Jarkko Lehmus and Diana Loosemore – in pumps. While 32 Cryptograms is their signature, The Pump Room is Scottish Ballet’s new trademark – sexy, confronting, strongly dualistic – which will surely impact on Page’s next work for the Company: a full-length Cinderella for Christmas.
With all this and the endorsement of such dance luminaries as Neary and Hans van Manen (who referred to Scottish Ballet as ‘a wonderful company’), the future is bright. Scottish Ballet is all set to storm the international dance scene. If you’re not already heading their way, you must suffer from travel sickness – don’t miss out!
Michael Scott, Dance Expression Magazine June 2005
Above: Scottish Group from Façade. Photograph by Bill Cooper.
Centre: Claire Robertson and Cristo Vivancos in Façade. Photograph by Bill Cooper.
Below: Diana Loosmore and Oliver Rydont in Façade. Photograph by Bill Cooper.
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