Jonathan Still, ballet pianist
Music, dance, IT, trivia. Not necessarily in that order.
Ballet classes seem to be full of things that aren’t quite what they should be: polonaises that are really boleros, waltzes that are mazurkas, mazurkas that sound like minuets, rhumbas that…
Anxiety about turning up late for class or rehearsal is so basic to being a ballet pianist (for me, at least) that I almost forgot to add it to my…
I’m not a particularly tidy or obsessive person, except when it comes to scores that I have to play from. If it’s for a performance, I’ll want to know exactly what…
Above is a little fragment of daily life as a ballet accompanist – keeping your ears open while a rehearsal is going on so that when the choreographer or coach asks…
One way or another, tempo is at the heart of most of the anxieties in this advent calendar. Playing for ballet is like driving on a busy motorway in torrential…