Rambert ‘Hurricane’ reviews Rambert ‘Beach Birds’ reviews all Rambert reviews

We opened with a world premiere, At Any Time, by Rafael Bonachela. This was for six women and two men, set to Bach cello suites, played onstage by Ben Chappell. The dance in this seemed to switch between working with the music and working against it. Some of the movement looked very formal, with both women and men repeating the same movements: but at other times the movement had a strained, effortful quality - dancers tugging, pushing and pulling each other - which didn’t relate clearly to the music. The lighting was rather on the dark side. Nevertheless it looked a better crafted work than Bonachela’s previous work for Rambert shown at Sadler's.

This was followed by a guest appearance from former Rambert dancer David Hughes in a short piece, ‘Hurricane - a pantomime’ by Christopher Bruce, Rambert’s artistic director. Bruce has always had an affection for using Bob Dylan songs for narrative pieces - it previously brought memorable results in Moonshine. Your reaction to this work is probably going to depend on your fondness for Dylan - it’s set to Hurricane, a single 8 minute song, Dylan at his most verbose. I really enjoyed this piece, and I thought it marked something of a return to form for Bruce whose more recent Rambert works haven’t seen him at his best. For a single dancer in whiteface to somehow act out all the parts in this long and complex narrative sounds fundamentally unlikely, but Hughes is a remarkably charismatic dancer, and the movement is simple, economical and fluent. A very impressive performance.

Beach Birds followed after the interval. It was a delight to see, but it almost seemed too monumental for its surroundings. The musicians, with their pianos and rainsticks were tucked away in each corner: if you were seated down towards the front the separation of sounds was very noticeable. It gave the sense of practically being on the beach, with the action going on all around you. Its effect is calm, restful and meditative, with long passages of stillness or the gentlest, smoothest adjustments of posture as those birds turned on the wind. Lovely and very restorative, somehow.

The final item was an upbeat piece, Twin Suite 2, created by Glenn Wilkinson to music by Aphex Twin. This opened rather uncertainly with two of the women squabbling like petulant eight year olds, but rapidly developed into something much more interesting. The lighting built up slowly into more structured stabs of light, as the dance moved faster, with the dancers propelled in groups across the stage. It was fast and frantic at times, but never undisciplined. The women in particular looked very cool and self possessed. I haven’t seen anything created by Glenn Wilkinson before, but this looked a solidly made and well constructed work, and it didn’t outstay its welcome. A suitably rousing and upbeat item to close the evening, which received a very positive response.