Advent 19: Trills and spills
In a class for Mark Morris’s company a couple of years ago, I was playing the waltz from l’Étoile du Nord (that has to be someone’s nickname, surely?) better known…
Advent 18: Say it with cut Flowers
Actions speak louder than words, and this post is about an ‘action’ rather than a one-liner. It’s topical, since I happened to be swanning around at the opening night of…
Advent 17: Going up…
This is one of my favourite tales of ballet misunderstandings, but the context takes so long to describe that it’s almost untellable verbally. Let’s start with the main characters –…
Advent 16: Leg stories (2)
One of my favourite gigs of recent years is playing for the company of dancers that does the Raymond Gubbay Strauss Gala (choreographed by Christopher Hampson). In intensive rehearsal periods,…
Advent 15: Leg stories (1)
I think this is a Jackie Barratt-ism: describing a rather dull-looking arabesque, she said to the dancer concerned ‘that leg’s a bit…BBC2’
Advent 14: Brace yourself
Another from the incomparable Jackie Barratt, when she was ballet mistress at ENB. She was rehearsing two principals in Cranko’s Taming of the Shrew, which involves a lot of complex…