Promotions and new dancers 2018-2019

[RUKen]

https://www.ballet.org.uk/blog-detail/promotions-new-dancers-joining-company-2018-19-season/

This was posted on the ABT forum because Jeffrey Cirio is becoming a principal at ENB (he is leaving ABT).

Edited June 21, 2018 by RUKen
I had originally stated that it was unclear if he is leaving ABT; he has now confirmed his departure.

[Ashton Fan]

I have to say that while  I regret Summerscale's  departure from ENB I completely understand her decision. Her husband moved to Munich at the beginning of the current season and their first season there has provided both of them  with the opportunity  to perform a far wider range of repertory than they could have hoped to dance in four or more seasons at ENB. I can't help wondering whether Cirio's move to ENB is going to provide him with the opportunities he expects. He will certainly get plenty of opportunities to dance but whether or not there are opportunities to be involved in the creation of works which are  "relevant" to modern audiences is quite another thing. Whatever Rojo may say about wanting to make ballet "relevant "to modern audiences the fact remains that ENB is very dependent on its nineteenth century repertory and more specifically its annual  London performances of Nutcracker to maintain its solvency. Unless things have altered radically since Eagling's time as director the company's regional tours produce massive weekly losses which have to be compensated for by its London appearances.

 Although I believe that Khan's "Giselle" did good business on its regional tour, historically the company loses money when it travels the regions even when it performs works well known to the average regional balletgoer. This is why I find Cirio's move to ENB a bit odd. The company's repertory is constrained by the need to make money.  Rojo may have ambitions to transform the company into a creative force to be reckoned with  she may wish to make  it less financially dependent on the performance of a handful of ballets which attract audiences but she can only do this if the new repertory sells the same volume of tickets. She will have no problems with the ENB board as long as  her new repertory attracts audiences but the minute her programmes fail to do so she will have far less room to manoeuvre as far as repertory is concerned. Earlier in the year she attempted to expand the company's active repertory by programming two works well known to London ballet goers, a new production of  La Sylphide, a ballet which the company last performed about thirty years ago during Schauffus' directorship, and a work new to the company, MacMillan's The Song of the Earth. I have no idea how well this programme generated ticket sales in the regions but it did not play to full houses in London. The company has just finished a run of London performances of Sleeping Beauty and again there were plenty of empty seats at most of the performances which I attended. I have no doubt that the RB's new Swan Lake and BRB's performances of Romeo and Juliet did not help ENB's ticket sales but the fact remains that the company is unlikely to have met its target ticket sales for this run of MacMillan's production of Beauty and that is likely to have an impact on Rojo's ability to make ambitious plans for the company's future repertory .

[Ashton Fan]

I should be extremely grateful if someone could explain what a ballet "relevant" to modern audiences actually looks like. Does it simply mean appropriating the title of one of the handful of really well known nineteenth century ballets and then staging whatever you want or is there something more to it ? I will simply say that I saw Khan's  Giselle and while others say that they found all sorts of emotional depths in the narrative and the choreography, it did nothing for me. Perhaps the problem is that I am not a true believer in his choreographic style or much of the work of the other choreographers whose works are said to be relevant and accessible to modern audiences. 

Edited June 21, 2018 by Ashton Fan

[meunier fan]

27 minutes ago, Ashton Fan said:

I have no doubt that the RB's new Swan Lake and BRB's performances of Romeo and Juliet did not help ENB's ticket sales but the fact remains that the company is unlikely to have met its target ticket sales for this run of MacMillan's production of Beauty and that is likely to have an impact on Rojo's ability to make ambitious plans for the company's future repertory .

 

For the above reason I was surprised when I read that ENB are briefly taking Manon out on tour and playing it in London for a week given how poorly it sold when ENB last did it.  (I seem to recall that one performance in Manchester had to be pulled altogether due to lack of ticket sales).  That said - in London - it is one week aside three for Nutcracker and two for Swan Lake which stand a good chance to be a full capacity so that too may well have been part of the programming which is certainly brave.  I would I think fear more for Wheeldon's Cinderella at the Royal Albert Hall.  I seem to remember that certainly struggling for capacity when DNB did it at the Coliseum with the original casts.  I pray that it is able to at least break even for ENB ... or perhaps they are playing there against guarantee in which case such concerns would not be a consideration.  

Edited June 21, 2018 by meunier fan

[California]

2 hours ago, meunier fan said:

For the above reason I was surprised when I read that ENB are briefly taking Manon out on tour and playing it in London for a week given how poorly it sold when ENB last did it.  (I seem to recall that one performance in Manchester had to be pulled altogether due to lack of ticket sales).  

When I saw Manon on the ENB schedule, my first thought was that they would be able to take advantage of Aaron Robison, who did this ballet in 2015 with Houston Ballet. I wish I could see him do it with ENB. Here's a rehearsal clip:

https://www.instagram.com/p/6tB82IlJPB/embed/?v=4

[Ashton Fan]

ENB's Manon is a gamble but then so is Wheeldon's Cinderella. Staging Manon was part of Eagling's plan to extend the range of the company's repertory seen in London and the regions. The Board vetoed his plan to drop the Nureyev Romeo and Juliet and revive Ashton's version in its stead. As far as the Wheeldon Cinderella is concerned , like many other choreographers with Royal Ballet connections he seems to spend more time avoiding anything resembling Ashton's choreography for Cinderella than actually responding to the music. I should like to be proved wrong but I am far from convinced that it will sell that well but you can never tell how  a family audience, perhaps with children who feel that they have outgrown Nutcracker, will respond to it. When it was first seen in London the audience was essentially the regular ballet audience  rather than a family one.

ENB's Manon presents its own problems one of which is the limited number of dancers in the company for whom MacMillan's style is at all familiar. Here I think that once the casting is announced it will be somewhat clearer whether or not it will sell in London.Miah Stensgaard's designs for the ballet don't help. They force ENB's dancers to work far harder to establish the time. place and mood of the ballet  than the Royal's dancers need to do. It is not a simple question of familiarity with Georgiadis' design  but of the relative effectiveness of the designs which the two companies use. The Georgiadis designs establish the essentially squalid and corrupt society in which the action of the work is set. The  designs used by ENB are far less specific as to time place and mood and the costumes are more like light weight  generic ballet costumes  than anything else. The RB is staging several mixed bills over Christmas as well as its perennial Nutcracker. Les Patineurs , Winter Dreams and The Concert before Christmas and The Two Pigeons paired either with Scarlett's Asphodel Meadows or the new work he is making for students of the Royal Ballet School.  it will be interesting to see which bill of fare  tempts the  London ballet most.

 

[Drew]

I was surprised by Cirio’s announcement too, but he really did dance oddly few of the major male leads for an ABT principal despite ABT’s less than stellar current roster, and for all we know may have other private reasons for moving to ENB.

Edited June 21, 2018 by Drew

[meunier fan]

1 hour ago, California said:

When I saw Manon on the ENB schedule, my first thought was that they would be able to take advantage of Aaron Robison, who did this ballet in 2015 with Houston Ballet. I wish I could see him do it with ENB. Here's a rehearsal clip:

https://www.instagram.com/p/6tB82IlJPB/embed/?v=4

I will very much look forward to this    Agree Robison is a wonderful artist.  He was simply dazzling in the new Forsythe (Playlist 1,2,3) at Sadler's Wells.  

Edited June 21, 2018 by meunier fan

[Mashinka]

13 hours ago, Ashton Fan said:

I should be extremely grateful if someone could explain what a ballet "relevant" to modern audiences actually looks like. Does it simply mean appropriating the title of one of the handful of really well known nineteenth century ballets and then staging whatever you want or is there something more to it ? I will simply say that I saw Khan's  Giselle and while others say that they found all sorts of emotional depths in the narrative and the choreography, it did nothing for me. Perhaps the problem is that I am not a true believer in his choreographic style or much of the work of the other choreographers whose works are said to be relevant and accessible to modern audiences. 

That is a subjective view,  Akram Khan throughout his career as a dancer, in both the contemporary and classical Indian style, was for me  the finest British dancer in any genre.  His choreography is superb and he has served ENB extremely well, first with 'Dust', then with Giselle, which is almost universally admired. 

ENB's Lest we Forget programme of which Dust was a part was very relevant as it was premiered in 2014 to mark the centenary of World War 1, many older people in Britain had fathers that fought in that war and they don't forget.  All three ballets were beautiful and moving.  I've found some film of Dust which is diminished here by the venue.  The actual dancing starts around 3.44.

 

[sandik]

Oh, thanks for this link -- I hadn't seen this yet! 

[miliosr]

Looks like Max Westwell has rejoined:

https://www.instagram.com/p/Blvw-tyAIIv/?hl=en&taken-by=max_westwell

 

[Josette]

Thanks so much for the link to Dust, Mashinka -- I loved it. 

[kylara7]

It's lovely to see former National Ballet of Canada dancers Emma Hawes and Francesco Gabriele Frola getting on so well at ENB They have both been dancing principal roles (as has Jurgita Dronina) in the great rep there (e.g., Manon, Cinderella, Swan Lake, so far).

This photo of them for Cinderella is gorgeous!