A vast black studio space, lighting either blinding or obfuscating, over-amplified recorded sound, no sets, but when Royal Ballet principals Yasmine Naghdi and Reece Clarke dance the balcony pas de deux from Kenneth MacMillan’s Romeo and Juliet, all that falls away. I see Margot Fonteyn in Naghdi.
They need no set, they have each other; they see only each other in their all-consuming love. And we see only them: they are transcendental. A wonderful way to end a mixed bag of an evening—this is the benchmark. What a catch for our impresario Jamiel Devernay-Laurence.
The first half ends with the stars of the night, too: Naghdi and Clarke in a short 1959 pas de deux by Soviet dancer and choreographer (and Maya Plisetskaya’s uncle) Asaf Messerer (1903–1992) to a joyful Rachmaninov romance, Spring Waters. He is all Bolshoi bravura, she a Galina Ulanova, light as air, flowing like water, spring is on its way, the snows are melting.
Founder and AD of the Ballet Nights concept Devernay-Laurence seems to like to stir us a special cocktail of classical, contemporary, old with the new, piquant and sweet. There’s an extra surprise ingredient tonight: tap dance from his brother Guy Salim, a Stomp member, dancing to the Morse code music of his own feet.
Both halves open with a solo from English National Ballet Artist Chloe Keneally: the Étoile Variation from Paquita and Aurora’s solo from act III of Sleeping Beauty, both by Petipa. She is one to watch, but performing these two so close to the audience, it feels as if she’s up for an exam, so exposing. Are we qualified to judge?
Jordan James Bridge, of Company Wayne McGregor, returns with a new piece. This is what he has to say about it: “my self-made solo, And So The Rhythm Goes, is a short exploration of the embodiment of musical layering by emphasising sound through movement language. It’s performed to ‘Recovery’ by the British electronic musician and composer Rival Consoles and is an incredibly punchy and athletic creation”. I go along with that, a very supple, sway-backed, loose-shouldered performance.
Laurel Dalley Smith, Principal Dancer of the Martha Graham Dance Company and Guest Artist with Yorke Dance Project, also returns with her Solo from Seven Portraits by the late lamented Robert Cohan, which I believe he made during lockdown. Stag jumps, ground crouches, fluttering hands, she is both flora and fauna. Music is by Nils Frahm. Lovely.
Another returnee is Joshua Junker’s introspective 324a made during lockdown. Tonight’s pianist Viktor Erik Emanuel, who lulls us into the right frame of mind with pieces by Ravel and Schumann at the opening of each half, plays soothing Bach as Felicity Chadwick, 2022 Rambert School graduate, emotes. First Artist of The Royal Ballet Junker has just made a splash at his home base in his Never Known in New Works.
The Pett | Clausen-Knight duo returns, too, with a very interesting new work, Nerve Wire: it is completely their baby. Their music (Pett’s), their choreography, their design—yes there is a design concept of six ‘Dan Flavin’ fluorescent light posts changing colour as the mood shifts. A mysterious tense atmosphere—I think Hitchcock—in identical grey and black outfits, they are inseparable, shadows—is one the daemon spirit of the other?
They say: “in the tension of silence, the mind fabricates a shifting dark… stretched in the corner of the eye… a visible heartbeat, a stark spike, breaks the edge of black…” Fear… Hitchcock, as I said, or maybe The Shining? Wonder what they were thinking about.
Watson & Woodvine, a duo debut commissioned and developed by Jamiel Laurence Creation to music by Ben Lukas Boysen, is danced by its creators, Cydney Watson and Liam Woodvine, spotted at his ballet classes. Hair over their faces, they are children playing, trying out their strengths—it feels like a student work in embryo.
So something for all palates, Ballet Nights returns in April. A way to entice people who have not considered ballet as their thing: compère Devernay-Laurence works very hard to promote his choices with his informal introductions to each piece.