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It didn’t turn out like that at all. To begin with, the event took place in the echoing vastness of the Royal Opera House’s Floral Hall and I wasn’t nearly as inconspicuous as I had hoped. Still, I managed to bluff my way through.

Christopher Bruce joined the Rambert as a dancer 1963 - in the days when it was still known as the Ballet Rambert - and created his first choreographic work for them in 1969. Over the years he has created many works, probably the most outstanding of which are ‘Swansong’, ‘Ghost Dances’ and ‘Cruel Garden’, a collaborative work he created with the performance artist Lindsay Kemp based on the life of the Spanish playwright Gabriel Garcia Lorca. His early training in classical dance has enabled him to move comfortably across the entire span of dancing - classical, folk and rock - and has earned him an international reputation (he has choreographed for the Royal Danish Ballet, Sweden’s Cullberg Ballet and the Houston Ballet amongst others).

From where I was sitting in the Floral Hall, you might have taken Bruce for a trendy architect; he’s a black polo-neck sweater sort of man, quiet of voice and steady of gaze. He confirmed in his low voice that he would be staying on as Rambert’s AD for at least another year, and would be very much hands-on in that time. He indicated that he would stay on longer if required. He felt, he said, that eight years was ‘long enough’ in the job. He wanted to get on with his many other interests - gardening, wall-building, drawing, writing etc. as well as learning at least one musical instrument. Above all, he wanted to spend more time with his family - he reckoned that in his 35 years of marriage to the artist Marian Bruce he had probably spent only half that actual time with her, and he’s looking forward too to the extra time he will have with his two young grandsons.

Someone asked the obvious question: Any idea of who the successor was going to be? They got the obvious answer: No - it would be a lengthy process etc....(interestingly, it emerged that there had been only six ADs in the company's 75-year history). I boldly mentioned that several names had already been mooted on Ballet.co and Prue Skene laughingly suggested that the list should be passed to her. She did say, though, that the new AD 'would not necessarily be a choreographer', leaving the Rambert’s door intriguingly wide open. It seemed quite evident to me that Bruce's decision to retire had taken the company unawares and that they were more than a little daunted at the task ahead of them.

As delicately as I could I asked if the bad press notices for the company's recent run at Sadlers Wells had anything to do with Bruce's decision to retire rather sooner than anyone might have expected. He laughed and pointed out that when 'Cruel Garden' opened in 1977 it had received 'some of the worst press notices I've ever seen' yet it had survived and was now a well-respected Rambert piece. He added that, conversely, he had often had good notices for work that he considered undeserving, so adverse criticism did not particularly worry him. I believe him.

Christopher Bruce will indeed be a hard act to follow as Rambert’s AD. Not many dance companies can boast an AD who is both a talented administrator and a gifted, prolific choreographer. As the latter, Bruce’s style falls usefully between classical and contemporary, allowing him to roam freely between works like the sassily rock-orientated ‘Rooster’ and the more serious ‘Swansong’, a three-man ballet , which, with its story of two uniformed men brutalising a helplessly chair-bound third, is often pressed into use at Amnesty galas and the like. Ironically, Bruce is on record as saying the piece has nothing to do with politics - it was created at a time of personal pressure in his life when his dancing career was drawing to an end and he felt trapped, for financial reasons, by the necessity to carry on (he had a young family at the time).

‘Ghost Dances’ is another piece with seemingly political overtones - the dancers, resembling skeletons, die into each others’arms and with its use of Andean pipe music, it is impossible not to think of the ‘disappeared’ of Pinochet’s Chile. It remains one of his most haunting and moving works, and looking at the body of his work, one is struck by its unique qualities of humanity and compassion. Offhand, I can’t think of any other contemporary choreographer with a social conscience to match Bruce’s.

His immediate future plans include a visit to the US in the New Year to stage 'Ghost Dances' for Ballet West in Salt Lake City and he will be doing further work for Houston Ballet.

The company's own plans for 2002 look enticing - their Spring tour, which opens in Truro in February and goes on to Sheffield, High Wyombe, Mold, Norwich, Newcastle, London and Brighton - includes a revival of Lindsay Kemp's 'The Parades Gone By' and will include works by Mats Ek, Siobhan Davies, Richard Alston, Wayne McGregor, Jiri Kylian and Bruce himself.

I asked Bruce finally how the Rambert dancers had taken the news of his impending retirement.. He smiled. 'They're a bit sad' he said 'but they wish the best for me and they know they'll have me around for little a while yet'.