volcanohunter Posted February 4, 2015 Share Posted February 4, 2015 Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui has been named artistic director of the Royal Ballet of Flanders. Inevitably this will raise questions about whether the company will continue to be a classical one. http://www.dancing-times.co.uk/news/item/1719-cherkaoui_to_direct_royal_ballet_flanders Link to comment
sandik Posted February 4, 2015 Share Posted February 4, 2015 Golly. I've been so impressed with his choreography. Aside from the questions that people might have about the direction of the repertory for RBF, I hope he doesn't fold up his own ensemble -- it's the best chance most of us have of seeing his work in person. Link to comment
miliosr Posted February 7, 2015 Share Posted February 7, 2015 I hold out little hope that the RBoF will remain classical. Look what happened to the Ballet de Marseille under Frederic Flamand. Link to comment
miliosr Posted February 17, 2015 Share Posted February 17, 2015 http://www.flanderstoday.eu/art/all-eyes-dance-world-sidi-larbi-cherkaoui Some choice quotes from the article: "Not everyone will survive, but other dancers will in turn be attracted to the new prospects." miliosr: Of course not because the classically-minded dancers will leave for lack of anything to dance. ". . . there are more and more international voices calling for classical ballet as a historic form, to undergo a revolution." miliosr: And those voices almost always come from the contemporary side of the fence. "[Classically trained dance teacher Tamas Moricz is a long-time student and associate of [William] Forsythe, and so will be in a position to bring his works, . . . , back to Flanders." miliosr: Another Forsythe-dominated company? "Cherkaoui has already demonstrated that classical ballet can accommodate social themes as slavery and colonialism." miliosr: Sounds dire already. I think its revealing that the Lyons and Marseille companies are cited in the article when they are aggressively contemporary. If this article is any indication, another classical ballet company is about to sink beneath the waves . . . Link to comment
Lynette H Posted February 18, 2015 Share Posted February 18, 2015 I'm not sure that I really think of the Royal Ballet of Flanders as a "classical company". That's probably down to seeing them in Jan Fabre's version of Swan Lake at the Edinburgh Festival. It featured a live owl tethered to Rothbart's head, an unexplained dwarf twitching though the action and another figure with what looked like a TV aerial on his head wandering about at random. There were more of these characters, but I don't really want to remember much more. Granted, this was back in 2002. RBF did do a very fine version of Forsythe's Artifact in London in 2012. Link to comment
tomorrow Posted February 18, 2015 Share Posted February 18, 2015 According to the Twitter feed of British critic Graham Watts there were even campaigns to prevent Cherkaoui from being appointed, so how long will he last. Is he going to ditch the dancers who disagree with him? I guess it depends which road he's going to take the company down. Neoclassical, or ballet does contemporary dance? I like what Crystal Pite, Mark Morris and currently, Hofesh Shecter are doing, finding a 'hybrid' (or neoclassical) style when working with ballet companies, but that isn't something Cherkaoui's shown any interest in doing. The thing which frustrates me most about all this talk about creating ballets 'of the now' is how cringeworthy it all is. How many theatre heads are saying in interviews, right, next season we need to commission a play on LGBT people (well, white gay men, you rarely see the rest of the spectrum well-represented), or modern slavery or we're going to lose our audience because they'll see us as irrelevant and dated? It comes across as really fake and condescending to me. European opera's as guilty of this with regards to new productions and new operas. With the exception of English National Opera, you do not see any large opera companies forced to take on musicals (or for fans of ballet's warhorses, a repoirtoire mostly made up of new works). You don't see Alexei Ratmansky, Jean-Guillaume Bart or Justin Peck at NDT, Rambert or, for a private sector example, Cedar Lake, and as far as I know, you don't see them at the Venice Biennale or any comparable festival. Ballet companies and neoclassical choreographers, however, have to move over... Link to comment
kbarber Posted February 18, 2015 Share Posted February 18, 2015 I'm not sure that I really think of the Royal Ballet of Flanders as a "classical company". That's probably down to seeing them in Jan Fabre's version of Swan Lake at the Edinburgh Festival. It featured a live owl tethered to Rothbart's head, an unexplained dwarf twitching though the action and another figure with what looked like a TV aerial on his head wandering about at random. There were more of these characters, but I don't really want to remember much more. Granted, this was back in 2002. RBF did do a very fine version of Forsythe's Artifact in London in 2012. Under Kathryn Bennetts, RBF really did have the more typical mixed repertoire of a "national" ballet company, e.g. 20th c classics like Onegin, Marcia Haydee's Sleeping Beauty, a Don Q, as well as more contemporary evenings, including Forsythe. Link to comment
miliosr Posted April 27, 2015 Share Posted April 27, 2015 The 2015-2016 season is out (although incomplete in some sections.) It looks like they split the difference between classical and contemporary: 09/18-09/27 Choreolab #11 "All genres, styles and concepts are welcome!" 10/22-11/10 Hans van Manen Solo Hans van Manen Four Schumann Pieces Sidi Labi Cherkaoui Faun Sidi Labi Cherkaoui world premiere 01/24-02/14 Demis Volpi The Nutcracker 03/23-04/17 Marcia Haydee Sleeping Beauty 05/28-06/25 (Ravel program) Jeroen Verbruggen Sidi Labi Cherkaoui unnamed choreographer to use Ravel's Bolero Link to comment
sandik Posted April 28, 2015 Share Posted April 28, 2015 Wow -- that really is varied! Link to comment
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