Dance2go & Hubberiet
Various works
Royal Danish Ballet
March 2010
Seeing the Royal Danish Ballet on stage in the two reach out programmes "Dance2go" and "Hübberiet/The Hübbery" is seeing a well-maintained company. All works,solos and segments are performed to the max. Established stars shines, newcomers blossoms and the corps is in great shape. The tragic and the humorous content are performed with conviction and flair. It therefore seems a bit strange when you're reading the daily press and once more see reporting on trouble in the relationships between the dancers and the management. It seems like two different companies. On stage Byron Mildwater is a happy camper in "The Concert". Off stage he is the spokesperson for a very disgruntled lot. Newly appointed chairman of the board Stine Bosse has taken charge of the problems and is positive that she can negotiate an agreement. Ms. Bosse comes with a background from the business world, and although she is understanding she is also firm. So fingers crossed for a fair solution.
Looking at the two programmes it is clear that Hübbe must combine not only the existing repertoire but also include snippets from upcoming programmes and reuse elements from Kompanie B and the aspirants repertoire to fill an evening. It is cleverly handled but it also shows the consequences of the financial cuts, and as next season will bring the loss of yet another production, Hübbe will face the difficulty of producing enough variety and the challenges of catering for the broad talent base. As it is, most roles are shared by multiple casts which is one way to give everybody a slice of the cake, but for some dancers it will be a slice of the wrong cake. However the casting of both programmes have managed to be both daring and strong.
New Talents
The only relatively new ballet in the programme, "Tchaikovsky Pas de Deux" is shared by three casts. The two expected principal pairs Crandall/Lendorf (who I reviewed in a earlier post), Grinder and Kupinski and newcomers Camilla Ruelykke Holst and Jonathan Chmlensky. Susanne Grinder and Marcin Kupinski, a pairing I have questioned often, managed a pleasing although not 100% clean performance. It was clearly more his turf than hers. While his light to weightless qualities shined, she seems too loose and unfocused in the movements. Hübbe uses Grinder in almost any genre and the stretching overstretches her.
The revelation came with the pairing of Camilla Ruelykke Holst and Jonathan Chmlensky. Young Chmlensky has been the last minute replacement for roles like "Bournonville Fantasie" and "The Nutcracker" cavalier and it was nice to see how well he can dance when given realistic preparation time. But it was Ruelykke Holst who was the greater surprise with a full ballerina performance, taking care of both the technical contents and the light romantic settings. Ruelykke Holst has been absent for a longer period since she showed early promise at the 2005 Bournonville season. This season she has shown her qualities in numerous demi roles including Dewdrop and several Bournonville roles. She looks like a dancer who can be a real force in the company. What they did especially well was to combine the various elements in the work and not only the virtuoso content. The youngest and most inexperienced couple gave the fullest performance.
Postcard from Mt. Olympus
It has been a great week for Marcin Kupinski as well. On top of his pas de deux he also managed a career-best in a segment of "Apollon". Somehow he found both the gravity and the presence, which has been lacking in most of his works so far. Kupinsky was also able to use his long arms and lines very well, but it was the pairing with the gravity that made his boy-man-god convincing. He was paired with Caroline Baldwin, the young American dancer who did so well in several solos in "The Sleeping Beauty" last year. Baldwin has a wonderful three dimensionality in her dancing and she speaks Balanchine fluently. She is more a woman than a muse and she has an surprisingly fresh attack in her dancing. She complements Kupinsky more than mirror him and my only complaints is that he sorts of hide behind her ad let her take too much of the initiative in the pas de deux. He need to be more egoistic in his performance in the pas de deux and focus 100% on the audience.
"Apollon" will be part of the Stravinsky Balanchine-programme, planned for April, and "Hübberiet" also included the "Agon Pas de Deux", danced by J'aime Crandall and Jean Lucien Massot. Without foregoing my review for the programme, I can conclude that this looks like an interesting and strong performance, getting a piece of casting-against-type to work really well. In Denmark the trend has been to cast "Agon Pas de Deux" with a lyrical adagio ballerina and a noble partner. Seeing two energetic, less perfect lined dancers, give an interesting and different result.
Another look forward was a glimpse of John Neumeier's upcoming "Lady of the Camillias" with Susanne Grinder and Alban Lendorf. Without jumping to reviewing based on a segment, I dare to conclude that we will get a big helping of what Neumeier does best - and worst. Based on the segment it looks like an interesting performance for Alban Lendorf whereas Grinder needs to break trough the "do it like Marcia Haydee" wall. but as it is long time to the premiere she has time and hopefully the courage to create a more personal interpretation.
Knocking on the Door
The aspirant class of 2010-12 is the largest class ever and includes a lot of talent. Led by Ida Prætorius, who I no longer see as an aspirant but as an up and coming ballerina, not only based on her strong performance as the pupil in "The Lesson" , the group shows that the school can produce very talented dancers. "Hubberiet" showcased the group not only with a segment of Esther Lee Wilkinson's "The Neglected Spring" made for the group but also by letting Prætorius and her three classmates Astrid Elbo, Victoria Falck-Schmidt and Stephanie Chen Gundorph perform "Pas de Quatre" which they also performed at the Lausanne final last month. It was pleasing to see not only the grip the four girls has on the romantic style, but also how well they performed and how easily the take to the stage. The group has had the advantage of Kompanie B, the children's company which makes performances with the RDB school and has also had much stage time during their aspirant years and it shows. Hopefully there will be funds to hire a large segment of the group.
"Hubberiet" also introduced yet another Prætorius, Tobias the younger brother of Ida, who took on the solo from "Who Cares" , not normally done but a fifteen year old. Still a gawky teenager, he showed a lot of skills and Nikolaj Hübbe, after coaching him on stage, concluded that we would see more of him in the coming years. I also hope to see more of "Who Cares" which I see as a perfect fit for the RDB, and hopefully before Tobias Prætorius is old enough to dance it. The Prætorius children also include a younger brother in the ballet school, and are the children of Carolina Lohfert, who was a promising dancer outside the RDB and who danced with the Hamburg Ballet. It is nice to see thar her talent has been inherited and also that the RDB school is now catering to children all over the country and works with and not against the private schools.
The press is still busy with commenting on the management issues. One can only hope that we may get to the stage where is will be as joyful to work at RDB as it is to watch it.
See pictures of "Tchaikovsky Pas De Deux here:
http://www.blueballet.net/Webtako/index_tchaikovsky.html
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