"Electric Counterpoint," "Asphodel Meadows," "Carmen"
Royal Ballet
Royal Opera House, Covent Garden
London
5 – 15 May, 2010
Royal Ballet
Royal Opera House, Covent Garden
London
5 – 15 May, 2010
by Judith Cruickshank
copyright 2010 by Judith Cruickshank
The novelty, and the centerpiece of the evening was a new work by Liam Scarlett, 24 years old and a first artist – the second lowest rank in the Royal Ballet hierarchy. Scarlett, a graduate of the Royal Ballet School, has taken every opportunity to choreograph, both as a student and on graduating into the company. "Asphodel Meadows" is his first piece for the main stage and it proved to be a highly promising debut.
The music he chose was Poulenc’s Concerto for two pianos, commissioned by the Princesse de Polignac in 1932 and very clearly influenced by the jazzy elements which featured in Ravel’s G major piano concerto, premiered the year before.
Scarlett has chosen to make a very dancey piece, using three leading couples and a corps de ballet of 14, equally divided between men and women. In an interview he states that the nature of the work was influenced by the other ballets scheduled for that programme, (Christopher Wheeldon’s "Electric Counterpoint" and the Ek "Carmen") describing his own ballet as “a dance piece – abstract, and with minimal sets – that would complement the other two”.
Whether it is a completely abstract piece I doubt. The title, ‘Asphodel Meadows’, refers to the area in Hades where, according to ancient Greek belief, ordinary people spent eternity. And in the first section, beautifully led by Marianela Nuñez and Rupert Pennefather, there are hints of a story, or at least shades of strong emotion. For part of their inventive pas de deux, she avoids looking at him – almost a reversal of the Orpheus story - and as the movement ends and they leave the stage she holds her hand across his lips as if forbidding him to speak.
The second movement is more rhapsodic and features Tamara Rojo and Bennet Gartside, while Laura Morera, partnered by Ricardo Cevera lead the fast and furious finale. All three couples are on stage for the last moments, but surprisingly, the three ballerinas run off the stage, leaving their partners and the supporting dancers to form the final picture.
It’s a really accomplished piece and Scarlett’s handling of the corps de ballet is particularly impressive – more experienced choreographers could take note. Sometimes he uses them as an ensemble, at others a couple or a single dancer will echo or counterpoint the movement of the principals. It’s not all perfect though; at times I thought the stage looked uncomfortably crowded and, given the 23 minute length of the concerto, the entries for the three leading couples are of necessity somewhat brief.
John Macfarlane has designed both set and costumes. I liked the unexpected dark colours he has chosen for each pair of principals, though I’m less sure of the uniform beige for the corps. The women’s calf length dresses are elegant in outline, but unnecessarily fussy in detail and much the same applies to the men’s sleeveless jackets and tights. But the curious gaiter-like leggings they wear spoil the line of their feet – a particular problem in the swift movement and multiple jumps of the last section. The constant movement of the black and white set was also a distraction, though not to the extent of the projections which feature so prominently in ‘Electric Counterpoint’.
Wheeldon created this ballet in 2008 using four dancers; Sarah Lamb, Eric Underwood, Eric Watson and Zenaida Yanowsky. Yanowsky, who is married to the singer Simon Keenleyside, is currently on maternity leave after the birth of their second child, and her role was due to be taken by Lauren Cuthbertson. But the latter is unwell, so in the end Leanne Benjamin took over the part and a new film sequence was recorded so that each dancer could react with his or her own filmed image and recorded voice. Curiously, the second cast appears with the recorded voices and images of the first.
It’s always a pleasure to see Benjamin, one of the Royal Ballet’s most interesting dancers who more than compensates in personality what she lacks in inches when compared with the tall Yanowsky. And her fluid, fluent style is well suited to Wheeldon’s choreography.
But I still find this piece something of a puzzle. The first half is danced to Bach played on the piano and consists of solo entries for each dancer accompanied by film of him or herself and recordings of their answers to questions about what it means to be a dancer and to appear on stage. The second half is danced to Steve Reich’s Electric Counterpoint where a guitarist plays live against 11 recordings of himself. The choreography is typical Wheeldon, a series of duets with complex partnering and all the while multiple shots of dancers are projected onto the backdrop, providing a virtual corps de ballet.
I can see where Wheeldon is coming from and it’s a nice intellectual conceit, but while I admired both choreography and dancing I can’t relate the anonymous filmed dancers of the second half to the performers actually on stage and in the end I wasn’t any more gripped by the piece on second viewing. And, somewhat mischievously, it occurred to me that while a filmed corps might be useful for a small company such as Morphoses, there were upwards of forty dancers available at Covent Garden to fill that space.
Mats Ek’s "Carmen" completed the programme with Rojo as the eponymous, cigar chewing heroine and Thomas Whitehead as the hapless Don Jose. But the evening was principally notable for Scarlett’s debut in the main house. It seems that he will have to wait at least a season before he gets another chance at Covent Garden, but hopefully there will be opportunities elsewhere and he will be allowed time and space to experiment, even fail, and eventually to develop and refine his own choreographic voice.