Tag Archives: Ballet

Choreography & scenario: Cathy Marston Music: Philip Feeney Director: Cathy Marston Reviewer: Edie Ranvier This May marks two hundred years since the birth of Queen Victoria, and Northern Ballet is marking the anniversary with a touring production of Cathy Marston’s new ballet Victoria, which reimagines this most paradoxical of monarchs through the eyes of her youngest daughter Princess Beatrice. Following ...

Choreography: David Bintley Music: Glenn Buhr Reviewer: Peter Jacobs Although not one of the ‘classic’ ballets, Beauty and the Beast has a similar provenance from folk and fairy tales, originally appearing in print as early as the 1550s before Perrault’s Tales of Mother Goose in 1697 and being retold again in the 18thand 19thcenturies. In the 20thcentury Jean Cocteau made a striking ...

Director & Choreography: David Bintley Musical Director: Koen Kessels  Reviewer: Dominic Corr Sixteen years ago, David Bintley reimagined what is perhaps fairy tales' most recognisable story. Returning to the stage, the Birmingham Royal Ballet seeks to capture the illustrious nature of the piece, whilst showcasing some of the nation’s finest dancers in the timeless classic – Beauty and the Beast. ...

Choreography, Direction & Scenario: Cathy Marston Dramaturgy & Scenario: Uzma Hameed Music: Philip Feeney Reviewer: Beverley Haigh Queen Victoria is most notably recognised as an iconic elderly lady who spent most of her life in mourning for her late husband Albert. Previously the longest-serving monarch in British history until Elizabeth II stole her great-great-grandmother’s crown in 2015. In celebration of ...

Venue: Theatre Royal Plymouth Choreography: David Bintley Music: Glenn Buhr Reviewer: Helen Tope The ballet begins with a familiar scene. Belle stands at the top of a bookcase, mired deep in words. She is the original bookish heroine; an outsider in her own family. Her father is a ship merchant, deep in debt – and the bailiffs are called. While ...

Music: Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Choreographer: Matthew Bourne Director: Matthew Bourne Design: Lez Brotherston Reviewer: Lauren Humphreys It isn't hyperbole to say that Matthew Bourne's Swan Lake changed the face of classical dance forever. Retaining Tchaikovsky's original score, the rest of the ballet is turned completely on its head. For all its fantasy, in Bourne's hands the story takes on a ...

Music: Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Version and Direction: Victor Smirnov-Golovanov Artistic Director: Ludmila Nerubashenko Choreographer: Marius Petipa Reviewer: Janet Jepson There is a certain magic in the air when a ballet is performed, and an evening at the ballet seems to hark back to that previous era of classic theatrical opulence and privilege. To properly partake in the experience, one feels ...

Writer: Dylan Thomas Music: Cerys Matthews MBE, Mason Neely Choreographer: Darius James, Amy Doughty Reviewer: Beverley Haigh Ballet Cymru’s festive offering is A Child’s Christmas, Poems and Tiger Eggs, a reworking of the poems of Dylan Thomas by Cerys Matthews. Whilst spending Christmas in South Carolina in 2015, Matthews’ love of Dylan Thomas was reawakened and she was inspired to ...