Dance diary. February 2014
…uring the last year of the company’s four year stint in Canberra. When the company moved to Adelaide in 1993, becoming Meryl Tankard Australian Dance Theatre, Ryan went with them. She danced in all the works Tankard staged in Adelaide and was an especially wonderful tap-dancing fairy in Aurora. In the interview she explains that tap had been one of her childhood specialties when she was learning to dance at the Croft Gilchrist School of Dancing in…
La Bayadère. Queensland Ballet
…he den as the dream of Solor faded and we watched as he was hunted down, found in the den (after efforts by the dealers to hide him failed) and brought back to the reality of his impending marriage to Edith. The golden full moon and star cloth of Harris’ set was instantly arresting and his tutus for the Shades—a half tutu with a choli-style top—made brilliant sense. Neneka Yoshida in La Bayadère, Queensland Ballet, 2018. Photo: © David Kelly The v…
From 1993 …
…ng. The Protecting Veil, like Gloria, takes its name from the music that accompanies it, in this case John Taverner’s composition for solo cello and strings inspired by ancient Byzantine church music. Murphy has produced a strong work that is theatrical without being excessively so, and that consolidates his position as a choreographer whose originality constantly astonishes the viewer. In a structure that recalls last year’s Synergy with Synergy,…
Carmen Sweet. Expressions Dance Company (2)
…technological trick in the book throughout the evening, Expressions Dance Company finally (and rightly) made dance look as though it was the centrepiece of the evening. Natalie Weir, her collaborators, and her tiny team of six dancers, deserve the utmost praise for their courage, their exceptional skills, their well-considered focus on what constitutes the danced performance, and their intelligent understanding of the art of collaboration. Thank…
Talking to Shaun Parker
…ople ‘swanning around in dinner suits with their wine’ and the ‘thousands being slain under the watch of the rich and powerful’. Dancers from Shaun Parker & Company in KING. Photo: © Prudence Upward KING is a music-dance collaboration between Parker and his dancers and Bulgarian vocalist Ivo Dimchev who composed the entire score. Parker says of Dimchev: Ivo is the protagonist. He is a phenomenal opera, cabaret, blues, pop singer. There is no one l…
Dyad 1929. The Australian Ballet. 2020 Digital Season
…ged the work in 2013, giving comments at the end of the rehearsal. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FSCna0tIhXc Looking back at Wayne McGregor’s program note from both 2009 and 2013, I noticed he had dedicated Dyad 1929 to Merce Cunningham, who died in 2009 the year of the premiere of Dyad 1929. McGregor wrote of Cunningham that he was ‘a choreographer whose curiosity, sense of adventure and seamless collaboration knew no bounds.’ I can often see s…
‘Mim’. A personal memoir of Marie Rambert. Brigitte Kelly
…e strength and weakness of Mim and Ashley lay in the fact that they wanted complete autonomy over their enterprises, an understandable wish since they could then keep control over the artistic standards they set themselves’. There were serious and ongoing consequences especially of a financial nature according to Kelly. A jolt to the Australian story is that the company left for Australia hoping to pay off large debts with profits made on tour. Th…
Dandré-Levitoff Russian Ballet. Divertissements and dancers in Australia, 1934–1935 tour
…stage. Any additions or corrections, preferably with sources cited, are welcome. Other online material about the tour is at this tag: Dandré-Levitoff Russian Ballet. All textual material contained in these appendices and in the article is the intellectual property of The Society for Dance Research and should not be reproduced without permission. Full bibliographic details. Michelle Potter, 23 September 2013 Featured image: Finale, Les Sylphides, D…
Valentin Zeglovsky. Further Australian notes
…in the previous post that Zeglovsky completed the various procedures to become a permanent resident in Australia and to acquire the status of a British subject. One document that was part of that process contains a short but closely packed, typewritten section entitled ‘General Remarks’. The document, dated 11 December 1945, was typed not by Zeglovsky but by a public servant from information provided by Zeglovsky. Under ‘General Remarks’ the docu…
Dance diary. January 2016
…e creation of the dance by a local Yanyuwa man, Frank Karrijiji, and in an online article with a wider, more balanced account. Then in March the National Film and Sound Archive will host a season of Stephen Page’s Spear. This film, which had a world premiere in Canada at the Toronto Film Festival in September 2015, and an Australian premiere in Adelaide the following month, marks Page’s debut as director of a feature film. The Canberra season begi…