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PREVIEWS | DANCE
BALLET BALLET BLACK King’s Theatre, Edinburgh, Sat 8 Jun
In a few short years, Sophie Laplane has gone from company dancer with Scottish Ballet to its choreographer-in-residence – and now a sought-after dance maker outside Scotland. Her latest triumph took place in March, when Ballet Black premiered Laplane’s new work Click! at the Barbican in London.
‘We get requests pretty much constantly from choreographers who want to do something with us,’ says Ballet Black’s artistic director, Cassa Pancho. ‘But as we’re quite a small company, we can only make so much new work in a year. Sophie is someone who’s been at the top of my list for ages, and being from Scottish Ballet she already understands what it’s like to be a ballet dancer and to dance en pointe.
‘I said to her I want something really enjoyable, because the other two pieces in the triple-bill are heavy. I knew Sophie had a very quirky, fresh and individual style, and she came up with a gorgeous, fun piece that gets the biggest cheer at every performance.’
The ‘heavy’ pieces Pancho refers to include a return of
Martin Lawrance’s popular Pendulum, and a powerful new work by Ballet Black dancer, Mthuthuzeli November. A fusion of ballet, African dance and singing, Ingoma looks at the struggles of black South African miners in the 1940s. ‘We’ve wanted to take on more issues that relate to our own cultural backgrounds for a while,’ explains Pancho, ‘but we’re very aware that we need the right voice to tell those stories. In our long history, we’ve worked with a minute amount of black choreographers, but our dancer Mthuthuzeli came to us having already worked as a choreographer in Cape Town. At the moment, we’re the only company in the UK that can tell this kind of story and it’s really been resonating with our audiences.’ (Kelly Apter)
BALLET / CONTEMPORARY BA MODERN BALLET GRADUATION PERFORMANCE Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, Glasgow, Thu 13–Sat 16 Jun
You can hear the stories and watch from the sidelines, but nothing prepares you for a career like doing it yourself. Which is why the young dancers on the BA Modern Ballet course at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland are so lucky. Run in conjunction with Scottish Ballet, the course will wrap up this summer with third year students touring Scotland in the company’s Wee Hansel and Gretel.
‘We’ve had a lot of fantastic opportunities on the course,’ says student Hannah Cubitt. ‘Principal dancers from Scottish Ballet have taught us work from the company’s repertoire, and touring with Wee Hansel and Gretel will be a great insight into the professional world.’
Before that, however, Cubitt and her peers will be dancing their hearts out at their graduation performance. Delivering sections from Giselle and Christopher Hampson’s Cinderella alongside contemporary works created specifically for them, the soon-to-be graduates will be hoping to make a good impression on future employers. Although for Cubitt, that box has already been ticked.
‘I’m going to be joining Scottish Ballet in September,’ she says, clearly delighted. ‘I trained with Scottish Ballet’s Associate Programme, so I was one of those little kids looking up at the big professionals and thinking “I want to be like that”. Dancing with the company was a dream I never thought would come true and I still can’t quite believe it.’ (Kelly Apter)
DANCE THEATRE WASTELAND Tramway, Glasgow, Fri 14 & Sat 15 Jun
In 1994, ten years after the miners’ strike which led to the widespread closure of many British collieries, workers in the village of Grimethorpe gathered to watch their old pit being demolished. Wasteland marks the 25th anniversary of the South Yorkshire colliery being torn down, at the same time as the illegal rave scene was just coming up. As working class communities struggled to adjust to the new landscape – many of their residents
had gone without pay for a year during the bitter industrial disputes of the 80s – derelict work spaces found a new purpose. Abandoned warehouses were taken over for big parties, where dance and music forged new communities. Touring the UK this year and next, Clarke’s Wasteland celebrates the euphoric, defiant rave subculture that allowed a feeling of togetherness and hedonism to thrive, despite the political backdrop. As well as shellsuit tops, bucket hats, sweaty naked torsos and Clarke’s artful, high- energy interpretations of ‘big fish, little fish, cardboard box’ moves, the production also features rare archive footage of mining’s last days and early raves, with a sound score by Charles Webber. ‘For our generation, the future was bleak with very little prospect,’ says choreographer Gary
Clarke. ‘The rave culture gave many of us the opportunity to escape these grim and grey realities and go into a new world of music and dance, where we could express our inner feelings, desires and frustrations. My passion for dance grew from this discovery.’ (Claire Sawers)
1 Jun–31 Aug 2019 THE LIST 119