Season start at Royal Danish Ballet
And “ As I knew them” by Erik Ashengreen
When Nikolaj Hübbe entered the make shift stage at the "Grønnegaard Teater" in Copenhagen as Apollon, it was not just a reminder of the young dancer making his first try in the historic role almost 20 years ago, it was a promise of what Hübbe would bring as the next Ballet Master of his parent company: direction, quality and presence. With his three muses, Silja Schandorff, Caroline Cavallo and recently appointed soloist Femke Mølbak Sloth, Hübbe showed not only what a great piece Apollon Musagetes is but how great dancers can interpret and keep a ballet, almost 80 years old, young and vibrant. Hübbe at the end of his dancing career is a better Apollon than he was as a young dancer. He is grounded, three dimensional and shows his understanding of the part, although his physical decline is obvious. Silja Schandorff of the same generation as Hübbe has all her technical ability intact, and her allure and mystique is ever present. Terpsichore has always been her best Balanchine role, and she flows through the slower-than-slow movements a true goddess of dance. Caroline Cavallo, who often shares roles with Schandorff, cannot match her line or drama and is, in this performance almost overshadowed not only by Schandorff but by Femke Mølbak Sloth, who is clean and calm as the third muse.
There are great dancers in the company but most of the leading stars are in their late thirties and will face retirement within a few years. The generation of dancers around 30 is sparse and unfortunately prone to injury. Mads Blangstrup is still out with a serious back injury and that has led to the bulk of major roles given to Kristoffer Sakurai, the youngest Danish solo dancer. Sakurai is a talented dancer with an elegant line and a reserved intriguing stage persona, but he is not a strong technical dancer and with the lead in Le Sacre and as Struensee in Caroline Mathilde done simultaneously, he too succumbed to injury. Sad, but not surprising. As the young Polish dancer David Kupinsky has left the company, the male wing is suffering and it will be one of Hübbe's major challenged to develop and groom the young generation, Ulrik Birkjær, Alexander Stæger and Sebastian Kloborg to handle the mantle.
Another challenge is to develop the foreign dancers to shine beyond the international standard repertoire. Save Lloyd Riggins the company has not yet been able to create a strong imported male Bournonville dancer. Tim Matiakis is still touted as Gennaro and still underperforming the part. A jumper he is not, and without the jump and a solid grip on the style and dramatic flair, you cannot succeed as Gennaro. But the major challenge regarding Bournonville is the mime. Save Flemming Ryberg and Lis Jeppesen, who are always a treat, the mime in Napoli is not on the level it should be. Thank god for Diana Cuni and Morten Eggert who as Terersina and Golfo showed how to dance and act Bournonville.
Hübbe will also need to take a firm hand in getting the right new choreography for the company and in choosing what can be revived. Unfortunately there is not a lot worth saving. But as a dedicated follower of Henning Kronstam he might be successful in reviewing pieces from Kronstam's first seasons like the Tetley ballets Voluntaries and Firebird. When commissioning he simply has to be right every time because every performance is needed if he shall succeed in building a strong new generation based on a strong new generation, but also a generation without the real stand-out stars.
The man who came to dinner
If
we are trying to look forward, the doyen of Danish ballet critics Erik
Ashengreen is looking back in his book “As I knew Them (Som jeg kendte
dem)” as series of portraits of ballet dancers and cultural
personalities. The criteria to be included in the book is to be dead
and to have dined with Erik Ashengreen. Two unfortunate criteria,
because it limits the book as a portrait of a generation that the
Danish ballerina Kirsten Simone is not included with her peers (she is
still very much alive) and secondly because Erik Ashengreen clearly
valued dancers more on their hospitality and acceptance of him than on
their stage performance.
There can be many motives to become a ballet critic, and even though Ashengreen is the first Danish doctorate of ballet and the founder of ballet as an academic study, the book makes it clear that what Ashengreen craved was to be part of the ballet environment, and for a non-dancer the role as critic was the only possible entrance. He remains surprised of his colleague, the late, great Henrik Lundgreen, who had no taste for the after premiere parties but so much passion for the art form and the courage to keep the bar for critique high. Ashengreen even wonders why dancers seemed more interested in Lundgreen's reviews, which could be both harsh and glorifying, than in his own niceties. He is slightly insulted by the position of Henning Kronstam, who did not believe in mixing socially with the press. Ashensgreen's last book on the creator of “Etudes,” Harald Lander was an impressive work trying to re-establish a man, whom the book proved did not really had the talent to create other ballets of staying values that Etudes, but like in “Lander,” Ashengreen in this book keeps ruining his own conclusion. Yes he a very enjoyable evening in Paris with Hans Brenaa, but Brenaa later called Ashengreen a bore. He feels that Kronstam must have been inspired by his [Ashengreen's] book on “La Sylphide,">yet he quotes several dancers arguing it was not so. But if Ashengreen instead of taking on the place as the extra diner guest and instead had written on the artistic merits of his subjects, it could have been an interesting book, and it would not have mattered what was on the table and whether Ashengreen was invited in.
Comments