SWAN LAKE at the Opera House Covent Garden - Swansong...

The Royal Ballet's big Spring presntation was scheduled to be the first revival of Liam Scarlett's SWAN LAKE; we saw it in 2018 and wanted to see it again as our favourite dancer Steven McRae was finally due to dance the lead role of Prince Siegfried.  Back in 2018 he was recovering from an injury so we saw William Bracewell instead.  But last October, we were in the audience when, while dancing des Grieux in MANON, Steven snapped his tendon onstage and he is still recovering, so again we saw a replacement, this time Federico Bonelli.

Devil Works: 1

This revival, while being well-reviewed and successful at the box office - hey it's SWAN LAKE!! - has yet appeared under a cloud as Liam Scarlett, instead of reaping the benefits of this revival of the Tchaikovsky classic, was suspended in January by the Royal Ballet for allegations of sexual misconduct which are still ongoing.

Devil Works: 2

This is all a shame as Scarlett's production - here staged by the Royal Ballet's Director Kevin O'Hare - is a wonderful, sweeping version of the 1895 Imperial Ballet, his choreography building on the legendary work of Marius Petipa and Lev Ivanov as well as the Neopolitan dance by Sir Frederick Ashton.  Unlike the museum piece that the Bolshoi Ballet presented a few years back, Scarlett's version seems vivid and new.  There are even overtones of Matthew Bourne's version when at the end Siegfried carries Odette's body towards us while behind him she appears floating illuminated behind the backdrop.

With the romantic design by John Macfarlane and moody lighting by David Finn still proving a triumph, we again had Akane Takada dancing Odette / Odile and, while I still feel her to be a bit antiseptic, she still dances with a fluidity of movement, like the ripples on her swan's lake.  It would be good to see one of the other female soloists do it such as Sarah Lamb or Natalia Osipova.

There was exquisite support from the ever-whirling James Hay as Benno, Kristen McNally as the Queen who realises too late the error of her ways, and the always hissable Thomas Whitehead as the nasty Von Rothbart.

Of course one must also praise the wonderful corps de ballet for the always dazzling work they do as Odette's swans - shaping and re-shaping themselves into dazzling groups, they are always an arresting sight.  We were lucky to have in the cast Itziar Mendizabal as one of the pairing of lead swans and a special shout-out to Gina Storm-Jensen for her dazzling Spanish dancer.

The Royal Opera House Orchestra as usual got the biggest ovation under the baton of Koen Kessels.  The night we saw it danced marked the 1,032nd performance of SWAN LAKE at Covent Garden and I am so glad we saw it again - I even had an icy tear trickle down my cheek at the end which has never happened before, unlike the Bourne version which has me full of sobs. 

But now what?  I cannot recommend you see it as thanks to the Coronavirus pandemic, Covent Garden as well as all other theatres has closed for an indefinite period.  Who knows how many months I will be robbed of that unique experience of alchemy between performer and audience.

Devil Works: 3

Somehow The Bard - as usual - sums up the moment best:



The rest is silence...

MANON at Covent Garden - High drama, emotion and tears - and a ballet too

It had been an evening I was looking forward to for several reasons: first to see again Kenneth MacMillan's dark and dangerous MANON which we first saw last year, and secondly we were finally to see the wonderful Steven McRae dancing the male lead of des Grieux as he was returning from injury.

Abbé Prévost published his novel of Manon Lescault in 1731 only to have the print run banned because of it's sexual subject but pirated copies made it hugely popular.  In the 20th Century it inspired seven silent and sound films, four operas, a Japanese musical and two ballets!  Kenneth MacMillan choreographed his for the Royal Ballet in 1974, the critics disliked it but the audiences loved it and here we are 45 years later and it is still in the repertoire.

MacMillan wanted his new creation to show off not only the Royal Ballet principals but to also showcase the ensemble, and MANON certainly does that.  It also gave him another chance to explore the presentation of dangerous, corrupted love through dance.  The score was commissioned by MacMillan from composer / conductor Leighton Lucas, compiled from works by Jules Massenet and it is a remarkable achievement as it does sound like a unified piece.

Young Manon, on her way to a convent, arrives at a Parisian tavern to meet her brother Lescault.  He notices a passenger watching her so Lescault escorts him inside to arrange a meeting.  Outside, Manon meets student des Grieux and it's love at first sight.  They flee but another rich man, Monsieur GM, approaches Lescault and offers him a reward for Manon.  They track the lovers to their lodgings and Manon chooses Monsieur's diamonds over des Grieux's love.  The four meet again at a debauched party and Manon lets des Grieux know she still loves him. Monsieur discovers des Grieux cheating him at cards and again the lovers flee but Monsieur appears with police to arrest Manon as a prostitute and he shoots Lescault in anger.  Deported to New Orleans as a prostitute, a lecherous gaoler attempts to rape Manon, but des Grieux, who has followed her to America, kills him and again they flee... but in the swamps of Louisiana their love reaches it's tragic climax.

Partnered with Akane Takada's well-danced but colourless Manon, Steven McRae provided his brand of vivid, charismatic dancing as des Grieux and it was a joy to see him back onstage after an injury-strewn year and a half.  He partially tore his Achilles tendon at the start of 2018 which nearly ended his dance career and at the start of this year he injured his knee on the set of the upcoming film of CATS.  All in all, we missed four productions he was due to appear in so seeing him back on the Covent Garden stage for the first time in nearly a year was a joy.

The lights came up for the last scene of the Second Act; Des Grieux has rescued the wayward Manon from the corrupt clutches of Monsieur but is unaware that his rival is closing in.  Alone on stage, McRae executed two small gazelle leaps and two relatively small pirouettes then stretched up... froze for a second or two... then limped into the wings with his right leg raised.  After a moment or two a stage manager came on and asked us for a moment while they sorted out a problem.  The curtains were quickly brought in but not before we, his shocked audience, could hear Steven's heartbreaking wails from backstage.

Kevin O'Hare, the Director of The Royal Ballet, appeared to tell us what we all suspected, that Steven had sustained an injury and would not be able to complete the performance.  Reece Clarke who had just appeared as a guest in the party scene was able to play des Grieux for the final scene of Act II and all of Act III.

The show continued and Clarke has to be applauded for stepping in at such short notice and be able to focus on his own performance knowing that everyone's minds were obviously elsewhere. Congratulations too for Akane Takada who had only 30 minutes to recalibrate her performance to partner the taller Clarke who has a different style of McRae - needless to say both received a big ovation at the curtain.

Any difficulty in emotionally engaging with MANON's relentlessly shallow characters is enveloped in the glorious sweep of MacMillan's vision, recreated here by Julie Lincoln.  Manon's world is still wonderfully realized by the late Nicholas Georgiades' designs; the design suggests that behind the opulent world that Manon aspires to is desperate poverty and danger where people can be discarded if they overstep their class or usefulness.

The supporting characters were all performed by the same dancers from last year and were still excellent: James Hay as Lescault was well-partnered in his drunken pas de deux by Yuhui Choe as his mistress, Thomas Whitehead was very hissable as Monsieur and Kristen McNally gave the procuress a suitably decadent panache.  I am really glad I saw MacMillan's masterpiece again but I wish it had been under happier conditions.

Steven McRae's injury was diagnosed as a full Achilles tendon rupture and he will have surgery in the week starting 28th October.  He is the king of positivity but at 33 he must have worries about his future.  Hopefully the operation and recovery will be successful and we can see this magical dancer for a few years more.  Steven posted the pictures of him and Akane Takada rehearsing the famous pas-de-deux from Act III which he did not get to perform on the night which is a shame as it looks amazing.

All best wishes Steven!

WITHIN THE GOLDEN HOUR / MEDUSA / FLIGHT PATTERN at Covent Garden

Royal Ballet mixed programmes can be a curate's egg at times: it all depends on the arranging of the ballets - is it better to have three pieces that are all the same tone or if you have a mixture, where do you put the downbeat ones - does the audience leave moved to euphoria or sadness?  It's a tricky balancing act.

The latest mixed bill celebrated new choreographers and was an impressive evening, again showing the range and versatility of the Royal Ballet company.  First out of the gate was Christopher Wheeldon's WITHIN THE GOLDEN HOUR which we saw twice three years ago.  Since then, the late Martin Pakledinaz' costumes have made way for sparkly gold ones by Jasper Conran which are actually a bit distracting - the only ersatz moment in an otherwise wonderful piece.

It premiered for San Francisco Ballet in 2008 and features a score by Ezio Bosso - incorporating a section of Vivaldi - to which fourteen dancers twirl, slide and undulate through pas de deux and ensemble movements in a constantly evolving, surprising, thrilling production; it's final moments are extraordinary.  Our ensemble was wonderful with great contributions from Sarah Lamb, Lauren Cuthbertson and Alexander Campbell.

The next one was the new production MEDUSA choreographed by the 'hot' Belgian Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui - remarkable what a job with Beyoncé can do for your profile.  He has used a score drawn from the music by Henry Purcell, augmented by electro beats.  Cherkaoui was also responsible for the deceptively simple but effective stage design.  Oddly topical, Cherkaoui tells the tale of Medusa, a devoted priestess of the goddess Athene, who attracts both the human Perseus and the god Poseidon.  Poseidon traps her and rapes her but as the angry Athene cannot punish a fellow god, she punishes the victim.  Medusa is turned into a Gorgon whose mere glance can turn men to stone - and yes, her lovely hair is turned into a nest of venomous snakes.

She kills all men who cross her path but when faced with Perseus she allows herself to be killed.  Freed from the goddess' curse, the ghostly Medusa dances alone in the temple...  With a running time of only 40 minutes, it managed to be engrossing and a little anti-climactic at the same time.  Natalia Osipova was a magnificent Medusa, danced with a committed fervour and passion.  I also liked the imperious Athene of Olivia Cowley, prowling the stage with a vengeful fury.  It just felt a little dull, maybe with a couple of years under it's belt it will loosen up.

Finally it was time to see again Crystal Pite's intense and powerful FLIGHT PATTERN, vividly depicting an eternal flight of a column of refugees.  It is an extraordinary piece which seems to exist in a single moment in time and truly stands out as an artistic response to this shifting recurring tragedy of displaced people that we see across the world.

Pite's wonderful choreography moves in waves across the stage illustrating the flight, in all senses of the word, but also in tiny moments of a couple's experience of migration which were exceptionally danced again by Kristen McNally and Marcellino Sambé.  Jay Gower Taylor's monumental design and Tom Visser's exceptional lighting made it, again, a thrillingly memorable experience.

 

Congratulations to Kevin O'Hare's Royal Ballet for again providing such an enjoyable but thought-provoking evening of dance.

 

MAYERLING at Covent Garden: McRae's back... and firing on all cylanders

He's back,, and the Royal Ballet's still got him!   After ten months away from the stage recovering from an injury, Steven McRae,the most charismatic of Royal Ballet male stars, is back and dancing up a storm!  However as one returns so another is up on bricks: Edward Watson who was due to dance the role of the tortured Crown Prince Rudolf for some performances in this revival has had to limp away injured.  I hope he recovers quickly.

Kenneth MacMillan's brooding masterpiece is now 40 years old but has lost none of it's power to unsettle - luckily there are two intervals for you to exhale after the pressure-cooker atmosphere his choreography engenders.  The bleakness of the tale of Crown Prince Rudolf and his teenage mistress Mary Vetsera casts a strange, disturbing atmosphere.

Rudolf was a death-obsessed womanizer addicted to morphine and addled with syphilis. His politically expedient marriage to Princess Stephanie of Belgium left both miserable but his wish to separate was refused by his parents Emperor Franz Josef and Empress Elizabeth which was jaw-dropping hypocrisy as they both had lovers and lived separate lives.

Countess Marie Larisch, a former mistress and one of his mother's ladies-in-waiting, knew Mary Vetsera's mother and, as they both wanted advancement at court, they affected an introduction between the 30 year-old Prince and 17 year-old Mary, who was obsessed with him.  After a secret three month affair, he invited her to the royal hunting lodge of Mayerling.  Mary probably knew why - she left a letter saying they were going together into an uncertain beyond - but the result was two dead bodies and a revolver.

MacMillan's ballet begins and ends with Vetsera's secret, moonlit burial in a monastery cemetery - in real-life a ghoulish affair where her corpse was driven in a carriage to the site, wedged between her two uncles with a broomstick pushed down the back of her coat and a hat covering the bullet wound in the back of her head.  Her uncertain beyond was to be written out of history initially while Rudolf was mourned supposedly dying of a heart rupture.  But eventually their dangerous liaison was revealed...

Thankfully Kenneth MacMillan wasn't in the mood to make Rudolf and Mary tragic victims of a devastating love or a cruel world who refused them happiness as in the film versions of the story; all the characters in his ballet are presented with a clear-eyed realism which makes it hard to sympathize with them but you remain riveted as the lovers pirouette closer to their abyss.

Steven McRae was remarkable as the narcissistic Rudolf, seeming to dance at times to crazed music playing in his own head, emanating an icy disdain for all around him seemingly not connecting with anyone, you suspect that for McRae's Rudolf even Vetsera was simply a means to an end.

Akane Takada danced the role of Mary and did so with a technical precision but I never felt any particular heat from her, the last time I saw it Lauren Cuthbertson danced the role and had been violently passionate.  Meaghan Grace Hinkis was a suitably scared Princess Stephanie and there was the usual very good work from Kristen McNally as the Empress Elizabeth and Laura Morera as the scheming Countess Marie Larisch. 

It's a ballet where the best roles are the women's but Luca Acri was very good as Bratfisch, Rudolf's coach-driver, who has a great solo in the tavern scene which he repeats for the doomed couple in the final scene but falters and stops when he realizes nothing can distract them from their deadly solipsism.

The revival is again staged by Christopher Saunders, Grant Coyle and Karl Burnett and the late Nicholas Georgiades set designs are still wonderfully evocative. However it's the presence of MacMillan that pervades the whole production, for both his artistic and choreographic brilliance and the sadder thought that it was during a 1992 revival of MAYERLING that he collapsed and died alone backstage at Covent Garden from a heart attack.

SWAN LAKE at Covent Garden - Scarlett's swans take off...

This December I will see my fifth production of Matthew Bourne's SWAN LAKE at Sadler's Wells and I am sure I will blub again at the last scene, it gets me every time.  But three years ago, after we had our Paulean conversion to the Royal Ballet, we decided it was time to see a 'classic' production of Tchaikovsky's masterpiece.

In 2016 we saw the visiting Bolshoi production, and what a disappointment that was!  Technically proficient yes, but danced with no sense of emotion or connection to the audience - it felt like they turned up for work and did their job, no more no less.  So the news that the Royal Ballet were going to stage a new production by Liam Scarlett set us off... finally a chance to see it done properly.

The night we went marked the 1,026th performance of SWAN LAKE at Covent Garden and Scarlett's version has replaced Anthony Dowell's production which had lasted in the repertoire for thirty years!  As I have frequently mentioned, it is jaw-dropping how long productions run in the ballet and opera houses of London - can you imagine the idea of the National Theatre only ever staging revivals of productions from the 1980s and 1990s?

But SWAN LAKE goes even further back, because - as is the case with practically all productions - it is based on the version staged by Marius Petipa and Lev Ivanov for the Imperial Ballet in 1895.  The main body of the ballet is theirs: Petipa's choreography is used for the palace scenes, the famous lake side scene is Ivanov's while Scarlett has devised a new final scene as well as the featured dances for the visiting princesses - apart from the Neapolitan princesses dance which is by Sir Frederick Ashton!  With all these choreographic strands to be woven together, Scarlett has said that his biggest challenge is to make it flow together as if from a single vision - and he succeeded; it was a thrilling production.

With the romantic design by John Macfarlane and moody lighting by David Finn, Scarlett's production swept you up in the swirling drama of Tchaikovsky's monumental score and the oft-told tale of Prince Siegfried who, when ordered to marry by his imperious mother The Queen, falls in love with the beautiful Odette who is under the spell of the wicked magician Von Rothbart who has disguised himself as The Queen's chief courtier.

Odette is transformed from a swan into a woman only at night but Siegfried is tricked at a sumptuous palace ball by the sorcerer into proposing to the mysterious Odile who resembles Odette.  As soon as he does, Odette is doomed to remain a swan forever but can Siegfried save Odette in time?  Of course it ends unhappily but this only makes Tchaikovsky's score all the more powerful and all-encompassing.

The biggest ovation of the evening was for the orchestra, under the baton of Valery Ovsyanikov, which filled the auditorium with the full grandeur of Tchaikovsky's score

Originally we had booked on this particular night to see Steven McRae dance the role of Siegfried but a recent leg injury put paid to that so instead we saw William Bracewell who performed the role well enough but it did not stop me thinking how much more thrilling McRae would have danced the love-lorn prince.  Akane Takada danced the dual role of Odette / Odile, but while her Odette was a graceful, captivating presence I felt she missed out on the seductive danger of Odile.  I will long remember though her slowly rippling arms showing the exact moment that Odette transforms back into the Swan.

Thomas Whitehead added yet another villain to his collection as the hissable Von Rothbart, Kristen McNally was an imposing presence as The Queen while Marcelino Sambé hit all the right notes as Benno, Siegfried's friend, in particular with his dazzling leaps.  SWAN LAKE of course allows the ballerinas of the company to shine and they were glorious as the elegant, ever-watchful swans.

A special mention to the tripping cygnets danced by Isabella Gasparini, Elizabeth Harrod, Meaghan Grace Hinkis and Romany Pajdak, while Itziar Mendizabal was on eye-catching form as the Spanish princess and a special mention to the whirling excitement of Olivia Cowley as the Spanish dancer attended by Reece Clarke, Téo Dubreuil, Fernando Montano and Giacomo Rovero.

I suspect this production will be visited again in years to come; I now look forward to seeing the Matthew Bourne version with new eyes in December at Sadler's Wells.

MANON at Covent Garden: Love, Death and MacMillan

In 1731 Abbé Prévost published "L'Histoire du Chevalier des Grieux et de Manon Lescault" to instant notoriety and it's print run banned in France.  Pirated copies filtered out to an eager public and Prévost's tale of the tragic love affair of Manon and des Grieux went on to inspire writers and to be referenced in novels such as "The Lady of The Camillias", "The Red and The Black", "Venus In Furs" and "The Portrait of Dorian Gray".

The tale is also the basis of seven silent and sound films, four operas, a Japanese musical and two ballets!  The last of these dance versions was choreographed by the great Kenneth MacMillan for the Royal Ballet in 1974 and although it was greeted with unfavourable reviews, it became an instant hit with audiences and last week I saw it's 274th performance at Covent Garden.

MacMillan had been looking for a new, sweeping ballet which would show off not only the Royal Ballet stars but also give the ensemble a chance to shine, and the teaming locations of Manon and des Grieux's love proved ideal.  It was to be the first original work after his controversial ANASTASIA and it can be seen as a further exploration of where the physical boundaries were for the female and male dancers of his time (and after).

"Manon Lescault" had been suggested to MacMillan as a subject by the designer Nicholas Georgiades although it had been on the choreographer's mind since it had been mooted to the previous Royal Ballet supremo Sir Frederick Ashton but he had rejected it as he felt it was too close to his "Camille" ballet MARGUERITE AND ARMAND.  There's only so many demi-mondaines to go around...

MacMillan asked composer and conductor Leighton Lucas to compile a score from the work of Jules Massenet whose opera version of the tale was in the Royal Opera repertoire and it is a remarkable achievement as it does seem like a whole unified score.

I will agree with the criticism levelled at the piece that it's hard to feel totally engaged with the characters but maybe it is down to the performers dancing on any given night, I am sure if Steven McRae had been dancing des Grieux I would have been more involved in his character but he was unable to dance due to an injury.  Instead we had fellow-Australian Alexander Campbell as des Grieux and Akane Takada as the eponymous anti-heroine.

Young Manon is on her way to a convent when her coach stops at a bustling inn outside Paris; there she meets her brother Lescault who promptly notices a fellow-passenger is lusting after her, Lescault, an enterprising heel, takes the passenger into the inn to sell his sister to him.  In the courtyard Manon meets young student des Grieux and the pair - of course - fall in love at first sight.  They decide to flee to Paris immediately, leaving Lescault high and dry - and the old man penniless as Manon has stolen his money!  Another rich man, Monsieur GM, approaches Lescault and offers a reward if he too can have Manon.  Lescault takes up the challenge...

In Paris, Manon and des Grieux are living in his lodgings and, despite their obvious love for each other, as soon as Lescault and Monsieur GM track her down and entice her with Monsieur's riches Manon chooses diamonds over love.  Some time later, at a debauched party at a brothel, the four meet again and Manon intimates to des Grieux that she still loves him.  Attempting to deprive the rich man of his cash, des Grieux is discovered cheating at cards and they flee to his lodgings, where Monsieur appears with police to arrest Manon as a prostitute; in the melée Lescault is killed.

Deported to New Orleans as a common prostitute, Manon is singled out by a lecherous gaoler, but des Grieux, who has followed her to America, murders the gaoler and, again, the couple are on the run but in the shadowy swamps of Louisiana their love reaches it's tragic climax.

Any difficulty in emotionally engaging with the relentlessly shallow characters is offset by the glorious sweep of action that MacMillan conjures - his production is recreated here by Christopher Saunders and Julie Lincoln.  MacMillan's wish that his MANON would showcase the ensemble is fulfilled as they give colour and life to Manon's world.  Georgiades' designs also help MacMillan's subtext that the opulent world that Manon aspires to sits like a bubble on top of a society of desperate poverty and danger, his sets are always juxtaposed against backdrops of decaying clothes hanging as silent witnesses to the corrupt world of Monsieur GM, where people can be discarded if they overstep their class or usefulness.

As I said, while technically excellent, Takana and Campbell were low on star wattage but the pas de deux that define their relationship were thrilling to watch: full of the passion and desire of new love, then more hesitant and incomplete as Manon wavers between the worlds of love and wealth, then the desperation of love in the face of death.

The supporting performances shone brighter: James Hay was excellent as the opportunistic Lescault and was well partnered by Yuhui Choe as his mistress, Thomas Whitehead brought his own air of menace to the lethal Monsieur GM and Kristen McNally also gave the Madame a suitably decadent panache.

MANON, an enduring testament to the genius of Sir Kenneth MacMillan.

The HUMAN SEASONS / AFTER THE RAIN / FLIGHT PATTERN at Covent Garden - joy and pain

Think of The Royal Ballet and you probably will think of the artistry of classical ballet - a heroine in white tulle, an athletic leading man to support her and a full corps in attitudes around them.  But there is another Royal Ballet and it's gaining ground in the repertoire...

Contemporary Dance has always been vital to the company in helping establish new choreographers and allowing established ones to experiment with new forms and also for the dancers in the company to explore new ways of - literally - stretching their talents.  The Royal Ballet's resident choreographer Wayne McGregor is constantly finding new ways for Contemporary Dance to connect with the Opera House's audience and last week we saw their latest triple bill of one-act ballets which showcase the work of three fellow contemporary choreographers.

The first was THE HUMAN SEASONS choreographed by David Dawson and based on a poem of the same name by John Keats.  To be honest I didn't get that coming through, Dawson's piece purportedly charts the four seasons of man's life and while it had a spare elegance - with an ever-changing set of black and gold panels and neon straight-line lighting - and standout work from Eric Underwood, Marcelino Sambé and Sarah Lamb, it also was the one that I could skate over the most.  Speaking of which, I noticed a distinct trend across all three choreographers which was to get the dancers to slide across the stage... it gets noticeable after a while.

Christopher Wheeldon's AFTER THE RAIN was next and although I had seen it last year in a Wheeldon triple bill, it's elegant simplicity was a joy to see again. Danced to the hauntingly sparse music of Arvo Part initially by four dancers as embodiments of skittish rain drops, the piece is made truly memorable by the end pas de deux, a mesmerizing combination of delicacy and concentrated energy which is the perfect length to leave you wanting more.  This wonderful showcase for two dancers was danced beautifully by Zenaida Yankowsky and Reece Clarke.

The crowning achievement of the evening was the final ballet, Canadian choreographer Crystal Pite's FLIGHT PATTERN which featured a large ensemble of 36 dancers.  This was Pite's first work for The Royal Ballet and was danced to Henryk Górecki's Third Symphony.

This astonishingly sombre work is Pite's response to the eternal dilemma of displaced people: three rows of muted, cowed dancers slowly surge onto the stage from stage left, suggesting waves of people moving as a mass but made up of individuals.  They slowly move across the stage but as they do some of them break away, to fight among themselves, to seek support.

They reach a place to rest and while doing so, a man and woman break free and while mourning a lost child they are again on the move, towards a slowly closing door with gently falling snow beyond it.  The couple are left alone but this time it is the man who explodes into a violent solo as his wife sits slumped with her back to him, broken.

Crystal Pite's remarkable choreography was tensely hypnotic - only when the curtain fell could I exhale loudly - and it perfectly mirrored Górecki's haunting music.  There were such wonderful moments within the choreography that you left knowing it had to be seen again; the constant surging movements within the company - suggestive of both a death marches and mass exodus - the amazing moment when the rippling forms made a heaving wave which supported the grieving woman, the exhilarating movement of the ensemble's arms to almost suggest the wings of birds flying...

The dancing was stupendous from the whole ensemble with remarkable vignettes from Kristen McNally and Marcellino Sambé as the suffering couple.  Jan Gower Taylor's set design was hauntingly lit by Tom Visser and it was wonderful to see it on that stage, in that theatre.

A perfect evening within which to explore and experience the possibilities of contemporary dance - I would love to see them all again.