Rambert Dance Company
Season of New Choreography (programme 1)
Queen Elizabeth Hall, London; May 22, 2009

Rambert Dance Company has always recognised the importance of promoting choreographic talent found within the company’s own ranks, and this year presents three evenings of works by company dancers.

Given that all the choreographers in this first programme were among the more experienced in the company’s ranks, much of the dance on show was disappointing. Like many of the pieces on show, Alexander Whitley’s “Iatrogenesis” seemed to be full of expansive arms, often used with great energy, at speed, and in huge sweeping movements that hovered up the space. While initially pleasant enough, the work rather drifted along with Guy Connelly’s lacklustre colourless score, never really developing, and never really going anywhere. Not for the only time in the evening I despaired for tone and contrast.

“Conversaciones”, a solo created and danced by Clara Barberá, similarly rather lacked conviction and connection with the audience. The programme talked about a spiral of anxiety, confusion and irrationality, but it was difficult to see any of that as she moved around the stage. Barberá may have been having a conversation with herself, but it was one that stayed very private.

Things picked up a little with Mikaela Polley’s “Meridian,” although it got off to a difficult start, the dancers seeming to be working against Robert Millet’s score, somewhat surprising since the work was billed as a collaboration. Although it never really took off, the work picked up considerably, especially in the main duet that formed its centrepiece that proved dance does not have to be high speed, high energy to make an impact. Apparently about male-female relationships, it was nice to see a work that communicated meaning and connected with the audience.

The largest work of the evening with a cast of 12 was Patricia Okenwa’s “Mammon.” Dressed in khaki costumes, and opening with two protagonists surrounded by the other dancers as if prize-fighters, it certainly projected more than a hint of menace and violence. Although sometimes muddled, and having many of the same problems as earlier works, “Mammon” did gain interest as it proceeded. It was certainly full of energy.

As last year, it was a work by Martin Joyce and Angela Towler that really stood out. In what was also by far the best programme note of the evening, they explained how they use music to inspire them. And it showed! “Brevity” was by far the most well-crafted and musical piece of the evening. The starting point was a game of chess. Initially there was an almost militaristic feel as the eight dancers moved vertically, horizontally and diagonally around the stage as if in a game of strategy and they were indeed chess pieces come to life. But it quickly developed into a much more courtly setting, the dance filled with delicate and meaningful courtly gestures and formations. The costumes, music, lighting and dance all came together in a highly satisfying, theatrical whole. “Brevity” definitely deserves a wider audience and cries out to be taken into the main company repertory.

This review will subsequently appear in the magazine with images.

Rambert Dance Company’s Season of New Choreography continues at The Place with two further programmes on 9 and 10 June.

I completely agree with David's comments and thoughts. The evening was -with the exception of Brevity, a beautiful and well developed work- a complete disappointment. The choreography shown on the stage resembled at times the kind of work one would expect from "A" Level students, not professional dancers under the banner of a national company.

But, I would like to highlight the programme notes that Mark Baldwin wrote for the occasion and that contained a dedication to Diaghilev as an "ex-dancer, choreographer and artistic director"....

No comments... simply no comments for such nonsense. The dance world should indeed celebrate Diaghilev and his achievements this year. However, that the director of a dance company that owes its very identity to the Diaghilev heritage should display his complete ignorance of who Diaghilev was and what he did is heart breaking... can anybody explain to me how such verbal nonsense came to be printed and handed out to the audience?

It seems to me dance is suffering from an alarming lack of memory. If we are not able to keep the memory of that which made dance great during the 20th century, who will??? If the directors and people in charge of honouring a genius like Diaghilev fail at celebrating his memory because they can't be bothered to know what his achievements were... what chance is there that future generations will ever know how 20th century dance developed?

Celebrating Diaghilev with Les Sylphides and Firebird is a bit shortsighted, celebrating Diaghilev as a means to showcase your male artists in residence under the "Etonne-moi!" motto is a bit deja vú, celebrating Diaghilev as an ex-dancer and choreographer is... well, insulting.

Tread Softly, Carnival of the Animals, The Comedy of Change
Rambert Dance Company
Sadler’s Wells Theatre, London; November 3, 2009

To say that Henri Oguike’s new work, “Tread Softly”, is busy would be an understatement. The calm, slow, and silent opening in which a man approaches a woman laying on the floor, and carefully stands on her stomach is quite lovely. It is a motif repeated and varied later in the work. But it is also a rare moment of peace in a work that is an orgy of almost relentless action.

Although the piece is danced to Mahler’s 1894 orchestration of Schubert’s “Death and the Maiden,” death is not what the music or dance is about. It is possible to read short narratives into the multiple duets that come and go, but Oguike’s choreography is, pure and simple, a reflection of the energy of music.

And what energy. The dance is infused with fast, often edgy movement, with several references to Oguike’s African dance style. Some things are overdone. I don’t think quite so many pelvic gyrations to get the message, but on the whole Oguike doesn’t stay with an idea for so long that you get bored.

Yet there is almost too much action and too little contrast. I suspect that “Tread Softly” is one of those pieces that will benefit from multiple viewings. There is so much going on that afterwards the movement itself all seemed rather a blur. What did stick in the memory was Yaron Abuulaifia’s alluring lighting, often shadowy, but at its best when he constructs lines of light on an otherwise almost dark stage that define different spaces.

Respite came with Siobhan Davies’ “Carnival of the Animals.” Maybe it is because each piece of music is so short that it is difficult to develop an idea or character, but more than one choreographer has struggled to create an entirely satisfactory work to Saint-Saëns’ score. There is also a very fine line between taking only the movement quality of a particular animal, and imitation or mime. The latter, which Davies succumbs to on occasion, can easily lead to pantomimic humour, something I have never enjoyed.

The best parts of “Carnival” come when Davies focuses on the qualities inherent in the music and in a particular animal’s movement rather than attempting to reproduce or abstract certain aspects of the movement per se. Alexander Whiteley was sublime as the swan, moving beautifully from one graceful arabesque or attitude to another. The only direct reference to a swan comes when he makes the shape of a swan’s neck with his arm. It is so subtle it is easily missed. Other highlights include the “Characters with long ears” - actually a dancer walking on his hands, and the waltz in the aquarium, although I could do without the later swimming mime.

Davies also scores well by setting the work in the context of a good-mannered house party, with everyone in white jackets or tailcoats. This is a clever reflection of the weekend get together enjoyed by Saint-Saëns’ and his friends during which the music was composed.

Animals were also the theme of Mark Baldwin’s “The Comedy of Change” that closed the evening. Made to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the publication of Charles Darwin’s “On the Origin of Species,” this is rather a different take on animals and their behaviour. The title comes from the idea that mistakes and accidents that are fundamental to the process of evolution, although the work also seems to owe much to that of the late Merce Cunningham.

It is a fascinating and extremely watchable piece. It opens with seven chrysalises on stage, designed by Kader Attia, from which the dancers emerge, although the almost translucent structures are immediately and unceremoniously pushed to the back of the stage and soon disappear, never to be seen again.

Dressed in Georg Meyer-Wiel’s simple but strikingly effective unitards, white at the front and black at the back, the dancers dance a series of highly engaging rituals, full of effortless intertwining bodies, jumps and lifts. Despite the chrysalises of the opening, most of the movement inspiration comes from birds, especially their mating dances. The costumes are partly a reference to animal camouflage but also indicate the opposition between survival and extinction but on a practical level allow the dancers to disappear into the all black or all white background very easily.

Julian Anderson’s new score, similarly inspired by the sounds of animals and birds, is decidedly not tuneful, but it does provided a structure for the work. And unlike Oguike’s earlier work, “The Comedy of Change” is uncluttered and he allows time and space for the audience to take everything in.

Rambert Dance Company continue on tour to Bath, Norwich and Northampton in 2009. In 2010 they are due to visit Brighton, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Aberdeen, Mold, Newcastle and Sheffield. See www.rambert.org.uk for details.

The Art of Touch, Rainforest, A Linha Curva
Rambert Dance Company
Sadler’s Wells Theatre, London; May 25, 2010

Every so often you come across a piece of contemporary dance that is so beautiful, so at one with the music and everything around it, that you just can’t take your eyes off the stage. The lucky Sadler’s Wells audience got two such gems on Rambert’s latest London programme.

Siobhan Davies’ 1995 classic “The Art of Touch” considers the different ways dancers touch the floor with their feet, touch each other and the space with their limbs and, most of all, make contact with the music with their dance. Part play, part conversation, always thoughtful, it is an utterly beguiling composition the like of which is rarely seen from contemporary choreographers today who seem to prefer the loud, instant, in your face approach.

Against David Buckland’s burnished copper coloured set, mysteriously lit by Ian Beswick, the dancers perfectly embodied the sounds of Carole Cerasi’s playing of Matteo Fargion’s juxtaposition of Scarlatti harpsichord sonatas with his own gentler compositions. The cast of seven embodied perfectly the different emotions in the music. At times they even seemed to be plucking the notes out of the air with their bodies. There was so much detail, so much complex choreography, so much to watch, especially in a delicate adagio danced by Angela Towler and Jonathan Goddard, and a supremely expressive solo by the outstanding Pieter Symonds.

Class was just as equally written through Merce Cunningham’s “Rainforest”. It may be over 40 years old, but this 1968 work remains utterly mesmerising. As ever with Cunningham there is no literal depiction of the setting. Instead the dancers are presented against and amongst Andy Warhol’s silver helium-filled pillows that float around the stage as if engaged in their own weird abstract ballet. With the dancers as light as a feather too, it seems like gravity, perhaps even reality, has suddenly been suspended. It all makes you wonder if someone dropped something in your intermission drink.

The drug induced atmosphere was added to by David Tudor’s soundscape of assorted humming, rustling trees and tropical sounding bird calls, roars and hums. In their torn, nude-look torn unitards the dancers come and go. They cuddle, touch, meet and part. The unexpected becomes the norm. Relationships form and break without warning. It is all classic Cunningham choreography, with a superb display of classic Cunningham technique to match. Even the pillows join in, forever doing the unexpected. Occasionally one is kicked by a dancer. Sometimes, as on this occasion, one settles right downstage slightly obscuring the view. It all adds a chance element, making every show different.

Rambert Artistic Director Mark Baldwin was certainly spot on when describing the programme as one of contrasts. If “The Art of Touch” and “Rainforest” are classic dishes from the high table of choreography, perfectly seasoned and served with grace and delicacy, Itzik Galili’s “A Linha Curva” is definitely McDonald’s fare. Not that there is anything wrong with the occasional Big Mac and shake - and boy did the dancers shake - I just wouldn’t want to feast on it all the time.

“A Linha Curva” is all very tribal. Originally made for the Balét de Gdade de Sao Paulo, it certainly has the infectious energy of Brazilian carnival or beach life. In their colourful lycra shorts and mesh tops the cast of 28, so big that the company had to call on students from the Rambert School to make up the numbers, yell, stomp, show off and fool around to their utmost. They rush in and out like waves crashing and receding on a Brazilian beach.

This was all accompanied by four percussionists perched on a raised platform above the action. They played Dutch composer Percossa’s score with great verve, their drumming, singing, chanting and body percussion perfectly synchronised with the light and action below.

The audience lapped it up. The youngsters whooped and hollered with the dancers. Mind you, that seems to happen so often these days it has stopped being any indication of quality. Examine Galili's choreography carefully and there is not much more there than an awful lot of repetitive pelvis thrusting, hip wiggling and bum shaking. For the 20 minutes it lasts it is fun, but by I am not sure I wanted any more, and I have grave doubts the work would stand up to repeated viewings.

Rambert Dance Company’s autumn tour takes them to Salford, Llandudno, High Wycombe, Norwich, Bath, Stoke, London and Plymouth. See http://www.rambert.org.uk for details.