Ballet Central Diary

Glasgow- cold winds, warm hearts

February kicked off with a bang yesterday- I went to Glasgow for an audition for Scottish Ballet. Lots of my friends went, and when we got there, there were loads of dancers from other schools that we knew. The dance world is so small, and all the dancers within a certain age group all tend to know or know of each other- schools, summer schools, associate programs and now and then, a few parties!!
The audition took the form of a class and then a call back later to learn some of the company’s repertoire. Ashley Page seemed so nice and actually eager for everyone to get something out of the audition, and I really got a friendly and relaxed vibe from everyone in the building. Even the city as a whole was friendly- although Glasgow is the coldest place I think I’ve ever been in my life, the people are incredibly warm. I did have a tiny tourist problem however with the language- I felt like the cockney gran character from Catherine Tate most of the time. Luckily, there was a northerner among us- Jenny Wagstaffe from Durham, who adopted the vital position of interpreter (and is supremely talented at languages- she speaks brilliant French and is one-eighth welsh!) helped us communicate with some lovely train officials at the station who went out of their way to help us find the company’s studios. We also made friends with a man on the plane coming back, who not only didn’t mind us playing guess the celebrity and word association games at the top of our voices (which, believe me, is loud), he even joined in!!
I was really pleased to be one of seven girls who got called back to learn some repertoire with the ballet mistress. We learnt a short section of material from Ashley Page’s ballet Fearful Symmetries. It was hard but exhilarating and since being home I’ve looked it up on Youtube (the most wonderful thing ever that deserves a Nobel Prize) and the piece looks amazing. It was great to learn something so physical and challenging, and also to work with the choreographer himself- he didn’t just watch, he really got involved and worked on the detail of the movement with us. I was really glad I’d had the opportunity to do Waltz of the Flowers so much at school, because I felt almost as though I had a head start on the style- still very much a novice, but not completely groping in the dark. Even though that helped me, while learning this phrase I realised how much more I could bring not only to Waltz, but also to a lot more of my dancing, so that one hour really taught me a lot. I will hear soon from them what the outcome was, so watch this space!

More job news to report- last weekend my good friend Ruan Crighton went to Bratislava to audition for the company there, and got the job. Apparently the money there is almost chocolate buttons, and Slovakian can't be too hard to pick up, so I reckon he’ll have a great time!! Kate Ewing, our Canadian Ballet Central member has a contract with Cedece in Portugal- she’ll have a permanent tan!
As March 12th approaches with dogged determination, we are doing a number of little amuse-bouche Ballet Central platters for various events. Last week, some girls went to the Critics Circle Awards at the Opera House to perform some of Choice, and there is another Quite Important event approaching. Friday 8th is the Central Friends preview. We’re doing quite a few pieces for it- I’m doing David Nixon’s piece, which now has a name and shall henceforth be referred to as Steps to Bach. (Or possibly just Steps if I’m in the middle of creative literary flow.) I’m also doing the Rose in Waltz of the Flowers, which is scary because in the last rehearsal I fell over spectacularly in the first section, moments before our director Bruce Sansom walked into the studio to watch the piece. I don’t really fall over very much, but when I do, it’s at important times when I really shouldn’t, and it tends to be quite epic. (Better then than at the Linbury, though!) It’s also scary because this piece has nine people dancing as big as they can with a huge amount of energy at breakneck speed in a smaller space than they are used to- it’s going to be such a rush!
An extraordinarily long entry- possibly even rivalling War and Peace. Should really shut up now……..

Posted by Rym Kechacha at February 2, 2008 09:55 PM