21 year old Andreas Kaas of Royal Danish Ballet could be the luckiest boy in ballet. His resume includes several leading roles, a Straight Flush at the Erik Bruhn Awards and recently the male lead in John Neumeier’s “Lady of the Camellias”.
Six months later they meet up again. It is the Erik Bruhn Prize competition in Toronto for young dancers from the four companies most associated with the Danish and International star. John Neumeier is one of the judges and Ida Praetorius and Andreas Kaas leads Denmark to a total triumph by winning Best Male, Best Female and best Choreography. It proves to be a happy reunion and Neumeier obviously recognizes that his inkling was right. Not only does he invite the two 19 year olds to participate in his annual Nijinsky Gala. He also decides to teach them his own pas de deux from “Daphnis and Chloe”, which they perform at the gala.
“Winning the Erik Bruhn Award was an amazing experience. We danced the “Kermesse in Bruges “pas de deux, which has not been danced at the competition for a decade. We contrasted it with a new piece by Alessandro Pereira from Danish Dance Theatre. The contrast between the two ballets gave us range.
At one time we took a look of the numbers and discovered patterns. Ida is the third Danish girl to win the competition. I am the third Danish boy to win. We are the tenth winners of the competition. It really put us on the map and we have performed on the international scene several times since”, says Andreas Kaas.
On Home Ground
Coming home from Hamburg however was something of a downer:
“I came home to find myself cast as a mouse in “The Nutcracker”, but it was okay. I am a young dancer and luckily I got some very nice roles later in the season.”
When RDB in 2013 once again runs Neumeier’s “Romeo & Juliet”, Ida Praetorius was cast as Juliet. Andreas Kaas as Paris and an understudy for Romeo. In company terms he is in parenthesis. It is company standard that primary younger dancers gets the chance to learn a role, but is not certain of a performance.
The production made Ida Praetorius a household name in Denmark. But the ballet environments knew that Andreas Kaas too would soon make headlines. And when Nikolaj Hübbe is asked by a leader newspaper to build the perfect ballet dancer, Kaas is listed at the best ballet feet in the company.
Soon after Andreas Kaas is cast as Carelis in Ib Andersen’s production of Bournonville’s “Kermesse in Bruges”, giving him the possibility to work with a dancer and director, whose early career path shares several similarities with Kaas’ own.
“It was a great experience to work with Ib and to learn from his experience from a long career at RDB and NYCB. Dancing the full “Kermesse in Bruges” in performance also put the Pas De deux into the right perspective.”
The Big One
A year later Praetorius and Kaas is told that Neumeier have chosen them for one of the leading cast for the rerun of his highly successful production of “Lady of the Camellias”. The roles have never been danced by such young dancers anywhere. It is a daunting task.
“I think we were very lucky to learn the roles in segments. First Kevin Haigen came to Copenhagen to teach us the second act Pas de Deux, which we cast to do at the RDB summer tour. Then we went to Hamburg again to learn the third act Pas de Deux , which we performed at the season opening performance at Rosenberg Castle and then we learned a third segment for a performance in Aarhus, Jutland. So when we started the real rehearsals, we actually already knew large parts of the ballets” says Andreas Kaas.
Praetorius and Kaas is third cast. The two other casts of experienced company principals had done the parts the first around.
“It can be difficult when you are third casts, because the focus is more on the first casts. Luckily for me my fellow Armand’s Alban Lendorf and Ulrik Birkkjær took time during the rehearsals to share their experience with me, like: ”I usually do the lift on six”. I got a lot a practical advice and also learned from their game plan. I am so grateful for their help.”
Armand is really a beast of a role and he is on stage almost non-stop. And as Andreas Kaas experienced the audience sits very close as the scene is built to cover a large part of the orchestra pit. He even has to do a very intimate scene with Armand’s pay back amour, Olympia almost on the lap of the audience.
“I accidently looked up and locked eyes with an elderly lady sitting a few feet’s in front of me. That was a sobering experience.”
It is not the first time that RDB have cast young upcoming dancers in leading role. Neumeier himself famously casted 19 and 20 year old Mette-Ida Kirk and Ib Andersen as the first Romeo and Juliet and there are other examples. But is not company custom to give so big a role to such a young dancer with a relatively small repertoire behind him as Kaas had.
Still he managed to build a believable and touching character. He was able to pace himself to save energy for the whole performance. In all an outstanding result, and a great promise for the future.
Class of 2012
Andreas Kaas is part of the largest and - one may already conclude - one of the most talented classes from the RDB School.
“We were 16 in the same year and 8 of us became RDB members, Astrid Elbo, Ida Praetorius and I started on the same day and have done the whole walk together ”
The Copenhagen group was supplemented by four students from the satellite schools in Odense and Holstebro, opened to make it possible for children in the provinces to study ballet. The large class gained notoriety early as they were the class Thomas Lund choreographed his children’s ballet “Teddy Goes Ballet” based on a popular children’s television show. Andreas Kaas was leading boy Aske, Ida Praetorius the Swan princes and Astrid Elbo “The Sylph”. Later Esther Lee Wilkinson choreographed “Neglected Spring” ,based on a Danish novel on a school class, for the group.
But for Andreas Kaas the big revelation was when he as an aspirant came under the tutelage of the late Truman Finney, the renowned American teacher and former Hamburg star:
“He started by bringing us back to the absolute basic and then builds us up again. He remains the greatest influence on my dancing”.
Andreas Kaas has an ideal build for classical ballet with great flexibility and long limbs. Or rather he almost goes beyond the ideal.
“I am very flexible. But I needed to build more strength to be in control of the flexibility.”
Home & Abroad
Today he can enjoy a career that includes leadings roles at home and abroad. He is cast as Gurn in Nikolaj Hübbe’s upcoming new interpretation of “La Sylphide”. He is an understudy for the Soloists in “Etudes” and he will soon go to Canada to do the Nutcracker prince:
In the Canadian production the prince is also a part of the first act, so there will be more to do than in our current Balanchine “Nutcracker”. I once saw an NYCB performance, where they had cut the prince’s solo. That did not sit well on me.”
But Andreas Kaas is also lucky to have the height to partner his fellow school mates, who are fondly known in-house as the super models, due to their impressive heights and beauty. It forms the base for some long lasting partnerships, where the dancers can develop together and reach the mature interpretation at the same time.
He is indeed a lucky boy.
Photos of "Lady of the Camellias" with Andreas Kaas & Ida Praetotius by Costin Radu. Copyright(c) Royal Danish Ballet
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