Eva Kistrup

More on the Outside

 

Helgi Tomasson:

“Romeo & Juliet”

San Francisco Ballet at

The Opera, Copenhagen

 

October 30, 2019

 

Helgi Tomasson´s career is one of the best stories in ballet history. It is the story of a gifted boy growing up on Island, taking classes with a Danish teacher and become a dancer at the Pantomime Theatre in TIVOLI, the culture and amusement park in Copenhagen, Denmark.

I have always wondered why Niels Bjørn Larsen, who at that time was Artistic Director for both the Royal Danish Ballet and The Pantomime Theatre did not sign Helgi Tomasson and future Stuttgart and Cranko star Egon Madsen to the national company.

Well, he did not make the obvious move and instead the two gifted dancers both had brilliant international careers in NYCB and Stuttgart Ballet. Their gain and probably our loss.

Second Change a Treat

 

Tina Tarpgaard:

Corpus Dogma #2

Corpus

A-Salen

October 10-2019

 

This season, the in-house company, Corpus is testing whether set limitations could be a creative tool. Two choreographers Tilman O´Donnell and Tina Tarpgaard has agreed to choreograph within a list of 16 limitations, which much be included in the final work. Tillman O’Donnell had his performance last month. Read my review here:   https://danceviewtimes.typepad.com/eva_kistrup/2019/09/ballet-by-rule-book.html#more

Last night Tina Tarpgaard showed her interpretation. A performance that proved that it was indeed possible to create an interesting work under the limitations.

Where Tilman O´Donnell put his dancers in a ring, with hardly little communication between them, Tina Tarpgaard kept the team of five dancers close together as perhaps the rest of a tribe. She was also much more tuned toward movements and speed. A large percent of the choreography was performed on floor level, but still managed high speed dancing.

Yes, several of the limitations did not help the creation, like the two minutes in black space.

However, Tarpsgaard´s clear plan for her work kept being interesting as a narrative and original movements. By the end, each dancer invited a member of the public to a little tete a tete. An intimate meeting only shared by the two parties.

If Tarpgaard can create as well under last night´s limitations, it would be even more interesting to see what she could deliver without them. As far as this experiments goes, we can conclude that the limitations did not hinder good choreography. However, the limitations did not necessarily promote it either.

 

Photo:

Copyright (c) Corpus

Taking Stock

Thomas Lund:

Teddy Goes Ballet”

The RDB Children´s School

The Old Stage:

October 10, 2019

 

Culture Night Gala

Apprentencies and Company B program

 

Nikolaj Hübbe:

Except from “Weimar”

 

Victor Gsovsky:

“Grand Pas de Deux

 

Liam Scarlett:

Excerpts from “Queen of Spades "

 

August Bournonville : Pas de Deux from “Flower Festival in Genzano”,

 

Mikhail “Fokine:

“The Dying Swan”

 

Gregory Dean:

Except from “Blixen”

 

Adam Lüders:

“Suite Italienne”

 

Marius Petipa/Nikolaj Hübbe

“Raymonda pas de six”

 

George Balanchine:

“Nutcracker Pas de Deux”

 

August Bournonville:

“Life Guards at Amager Pas de Trois”

 

Gregory Dean:

Excerpts from”Cinderella"

 

The Old Stage

October 11, 2019

 

With the opening of Royal Danish Ballet´s 2019/20 season, I realized that my first three visits would be to ballet productions, I already had reviewed several times recently. I therefore decided to add each review with an analysis of one of the RDB´s challenges respectively:

• The financial cuts back which limits the opportunity to run the best productions in store
• The celebrated tradition for developing outstanding male dancers of which the company has produced very few of in the last years
• The ballet school´s problem in turning ballet children into professional dancers on a high level.

Luckily, Liam Scarlett´s hit “Queen of Spades” showed performances on an even higher level, propelling Tobias Praetorius outstanding performance as Hermann to the front of both the company and a leading daily.

However, revisiting “Teddy goes Ballet”, as charming as usual, I became somewhat worried as the boys ensemble number knows as the Aske boys, where a group of boys combines ballet and street dance. My attention was on the fact that the normal ratio between the big and the smaller boys included very few big boys. Was that another confinment that the RDB is still not producing male talent?

Luckily, I did not have to wait more than one day to learn that this was certainly not the case.

The First – or Last – of the Line

Royal Danish Ballet

Liam Scarlett:

“Queen of Spades”

The Old Stage

October 3, 2019

 

April 2017, a young dancer got the opportunity to dance not just one but two leading roles in a new created ballet on the company. Originally, he was also supposed to do corps duty. As the new creation would only have a short and compressed run, the dancer feared that he would not get the change for the leading role, due to lack of rehearsal time.

However, the chorographer could see how big his potential was, and pulled him from corps duty, giving  the dancer time to focus on the two major roles as, second cast in the supporting role as Tomskij, the friend of the leading role and third cast as the protagonist Herman, the soldier turned gambler. A role that is on stage on most of the performance.