dance
Cinderella, Royal Ballet review - the first British ballet learns the language of flowersSaturday, 01 April 2023
The urge to redesign a heritage ballet is a curious one, given not just the expense but the fact that the main draw of an old ballet is the steps and the music, which stay the same whatever the stage dressing. Read more...
|
Tom Dale Company, The Place review - immersive and genre-bustingWednesday, 29 March 2023
With all the talk – and, frankly, fear – around AI and the increasing dominance of the digital world, it’s fascinating to see what dance has to say about it. Read more... |
Turn It Out with Tiler Peck, Sadler's Wells review - America's ballet wonder-woman raises the barreTuesday, 14 March 2023
She can do anything. That’s what choreographers say about Tiler Peck, the peppy New York City Ballet principal who has launched a stream of projects above and beyond the day job. You want speed? Wham, you get it. You want complexity? She can learn a tricky phrase in seconds then reverse it and riff on it. You want nerve, verve, musicality? Those choreographers are right, this dynamo has it all. Read more... |
Woolf Works, Royal Ballet review - Wayne McGregor's modern classic impresses all over againMonday, 06 March 2023
The more Wayne McGregor’s superb Woolf Works is staged, the richer it seems to become. It has started a third run at Covent Garden since its premiere there in 2015, which, considering the house lost over a year of performances, is some achievement. It is the mark of an instant modern classic. Read more... |
The Sacrifice, Dada Masilo, Brighton Dome review - eye-popping dance from South AfricaFriday, 24 February 2023
The Soweto-born dancer-choreographer Dada Masilo has made her name telling classic European stories in African dialect. The last piece she toured in the UK was a striking Giselle in which the avenging Wilis were not undead brides but ancestral spirits led by a witch doctor. In his hand, instead of the traditional myrtle branch, symbol of chastity, he carried a fly whisk. Read more... |
Creature review - Asif Kapadia shines light on a dark dance pieceFriday, 24 February 2023
Filmed ballets involve a different way of watching: you may know a piece well, but you aren’t used to staring into its lead dancers’ eyes as they perform their roles. Not all dancers give good close-up, either. But a new film by the Oscar-winning director Asif Kapadia of Akram Khan’s Creature, made for English National Ballet in 2021, has transformed the original live version into a moving drama. Read more... |
Julie Cunningham & Co, Sadler's Wells review - a fine piece of work, with added spiceTuesday, 24 January 2023
At the arthouse end of contemporary dance no one expects a packed house, still less serial packed houses for more than a week. Yet Sadler’s Wells was fully confident when it invited the dancer-choreographer Jules Cunningham – one of its New Wave Associates – to premiere a new work on its main stage. Read more... |
Swan Lake, English National Ballet, Coliseum review - the story of a deluded princeThursday, 19 January 2023
So there’s this prince, see, and he’s not at all happy. For a start, he never got over losing a parent when he was a child. He’s at odds with the world, sick to death with royal protocol and convinced that no one understands him. Worse, having too much time on his hands, he suffers from delusions. Meet Prince Siegfried, who found his soulmate, and met his nemesis, on a moonlit night by a lake. Read more... |
Best of 2022: DanceFriday, 30 December 2022
Come the end of the year, the ritual glance over the shoulder, what we crave is celebration – this year of all years. "Look, we have come through!" is what we all want to hear from arts practitioners who took such a battering in the previous one. Read more... |
Matthew Bourne's Sleeping Beauty, Sadler's Wells review - a gothic romance with loads of goth and not much loveSaturday, 17 December 2022
Matthew Bourne is not the first choreographer to tinker with the story of The Sleeping Beauty and he won't be the last, such is the lure of Tchaikovsky's score and the potency of the plot. Read more... |
Pages
latest in today
Help to give theartsdesk a future!
It all started on 09/09/09. That memorable date, September 9 2009, marked the debut of theartsdesk.com.
It followed some...
Music Reissues Weekly: Roots Rocking Zimbabwe
“Soul Scene,” by Echoes Limited, is built from elements of the James Brown sound. But it’s put together in such a way that the result is...
Supergrass, Barrowland, Glasgow review - nostalgia played wi...
It is a family affair at Supergrass shows these days. There were plenty of parents and offspring filing onto the Barrowland’s famous old...
Louis Cole, Roundhouse review - nothing is everything
London's iconic Roundhouse, packed to the rafters, provided the perfect setting for the UK premiere of Louis Cole's groundbreaking album ...
Album: Peter Doherty - Felt Better Alive
Following on from an impressive set with the Libertines – last year’s No 1 album All Quiet On The Eastern Esplanade – Peter Doherty...
Here We Are, National Theatre review - Sondheim's sensa...
You don't have to be greeting the modern day with a smile unsupported by events in the wider world to have a field day at Here We Are....
Riefenstahl review - fascinating fascism? Portrait of the Na...
There used to be an unwritten rule among BBC commissioners about how long an interval had to pass before greenlighting a new documentary on a...
Giant, Harold Pinter Theatre review - incendiary Roald Dahl...
When Mark Rosenblatt was preparing his debut play, the miseries of the assault on Gaza were still over the horizon. Now they are here,...
'Classic-era prog’s Olympian pinnacle': Pink Floyd...
Pink Floyd’s “Echoes”, the ineffable progressive rock epic that occupies side two of...
The Surfer review - Nicolas Cage is relentlessly down and ou...
“Don’t live here, don’t surf here,” is the menacing motto (sounds more scary with an Australian accent) of the tanned, muscular denizens of Luna...