The Cecchetti Society Professional Development Weekend
An international group attended this weekend on 24th – 25th January 2009
Around two years ago a professional development weekend was held at Kate Simmons Dance Ltd. in Warrington. The occasion was so successful, in terms of attendance and input, that a second weekend was arranged for this January. This time the venue was the Elmhurst School for Dance, Birmingham, arranged by permission of Desmond Kelly OBE and the staff of Elmhurst. Desmond Kelly himself has only recently moved from Birmingham Royal Ballet (BRB) to be Artistic Director of Elmhurst. Needless to say, part of the attraction of the weekend was to visit this new school, about five years old since its opening, but the result of years of planning and fund-raising, and the result is magnificent, a complex that has received architectural awards. This includes a theatre, studios, circulating space, and catering space – the ‘Bistro’, which produced excellent lunches and refreshments for us.
Compliments are in order not only to the staff of the ‘Bistro’ but to all those on duty who so courteously dealt with our unfamiliar presence! So, once we had ‘homed-in’ from our accommodation in various spots over the city, we found ourselves in a quite admirable context. The only part of the buildings we could not see were the classrooms and the residential accommodation for the students, which from the outside looked to be just as well designed. Most of the students themselves were on a weekend ‘leave’ – allowing breathing space for their ‘house-parents’, and some of the most senior were away with BRB out on tour in the Far East. A selection of their very impressive artwork was displayed on the walls, together with large scale Birmingham Royal Ballet photographs to represent dance aspirations! The circulating space enabled us to enjoy such visual delights, and also provided us with access to the mobile Cecchetti ‘shop’ organised by Judith Wilson, which enabled us to catch up with new music as well as replenishing other resources.
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Left: a movement in class
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We found ourselves to be an international and thoroughly friendly group attending the weekend, relishing not only the magnificent studios and two lectures held in the theatre but the enthusiasm of the Faculty for the weekend. Kate Simmons and Gillian Hurst, as on the 2007 weekend, were two of the four responsible for work in the dance studios (two studios working simultaneously, and each group receiving much the same class). Kate Simmons is a choreographer as well as a dancer from The Royal Ballet School and Festival Ballet, who has many insights honed from running her own school, which includes dancers from across the globe in vocational training. She concentrated on the relationship between ‘barre’ work and the technique of ‘allegro’. Gillian Hurst is another outstanding teacher whose experience has included studying at the Royal Ballet School (RBS), teaching at the former Elmhurst school, and extensive freelance teaching. We know her too as Deputy Principal of the Kate Simmons School, as well as a superb exponent of Spanish dance. On this occasion, however, she was concentrating on her approach to the teaching of ‘pointe’ work. We might expect two such fine teachers from the same school to concentrate on some of the same details, with their own distinct variations. There was a coherent and consistent attention in the classes of the other two studios teachers. But it was fascinating to find the same focus of attention on one’s ‘back’ i.e. stance, top to toe, back of the legs and up through the torso to the upper back. Much has been learned since so many teachers were themselves in training, and there is much to transcend here as knowledge has developed, and that in a rapidly changing context which has changed the demands made on teachers and students alike.
Anita Young is a former Royal Ballet School and Royal Ballet dancer, taught by Nora Roche, and with profound knowledge of the repertoire of Sir Fredrick Ashton. She has taught at Northern Ballet Theatre, been responsible for the Junior Associates of the RBS in London, and has taught freelance in mainland Europe, the USA and South Africa. Now full-time at the RBS White Lodge, she also currently teaches the second year girls at the Upper School. It was immensely refreshing to appreciate her particular determination to recover the subtlety of detail required for true classicism in her classes on ‘port de bras’ and ‘adage’, so easily lost, but integral to classical style. She taught, in particular, the conversational challenge of the ‘Lilac Fairy’ to ‘Carabosse’ at the christening of the infant ‘Aurora’ – again, the expressiveness of ‘port de bras’, which is so fragile and vulnerable to performance without conviction. The fourth member of the splendid teaching team was Peter Parker, new to many of us as a teacher, following his training with Christopher Gable at Central School, and then his career with Northern Ballet Theatre, familiar to audiences in many principal roles, plus a further career as dancer and choreographer with international companies. Another excellent colleague both freelance and sometimes at the Kate Simmons School, he concentrated on the teaching of pirouettes, and was particularly helpful, as one might expect, to the men present, but not only to them, as most women are going to mentor boys at some stage. That said, it was notable throughout the weekend just how much attention was given to individuals, as all four teachers moved around and through the groups with whom they worked – a matter much appreciated, not least by older teachers.
Above: teachers in class
Another privilege of the weekend was to enjoy the rapport between the different teachers and superb pianists. John Taggart is a colleague of Kate Simmons and Gillian Hurst; Peter Flower is from Elmhurst itself; Jane Bartholomeusz plays for the Birmingham Royal Ballet Junior Assoiciates as part of her career as a freelance. Their ability to interpret what particular teachers want and what dancers will find helpful, not least when those teachers are strangers to them, never ceases to amaze us, especially when we attend to the fact that, whereas pianists can train to accompany other musicians, there is rarely if ever training available for accompanying dance. Given that all too many dancers may have had inadequate training in music themselves, and that teachers may take little trouble to develop themselves in music, it is remarkable that the kind of rapport we find between teacher and pianist as on this development weekend can exist at all, let alone at such a level of excellence.
We also had two presentations in the theatre. One was given by Shirley Hancock, doyenne of experts in understanding dancers, especially the young struggling with ‘growth spurts’, and now embracing work with Pilates instructors as well as many companies. What can so easily appear as ‘common sense’ in physiotherapy for ‘movers’ of various kinds is in fact the result of years of developing expertise, admirably demonstrated with clarity and humour, with the aid of a former professional dancer as ‘body’ – and again, how it all cohered with what had been said in our studio sessions! Our other major theatre presentation was by Richard Glasstone, himself now doyen of the legacy of Cecchetti in so many ways. From Cape Town University and much international work as dancer and choreographer, he taught generations of young male dancers for the RBS as well as firing some choreographers into life! We know him also as a writer, as Founder Director of the Cecchetti Centre and as Artistic Advisor to the Cecchetti Society. His concentration for his lecture on this occasion was ‘Understanding our Cecchetti Heritage’, most notably the links back to Blasis, the connections to the Danish School, and the tradition at Milan which produced the great dancers of the Russian Classics. It was indeed a feast to see not only film of young North American dancers, but of the Danish tradition, and especially of the memorable theatre occasion in honour of Nora Roche, the flowering of a whole tradition of teaching at the RBS. In our own study of Cecchetti Method, we need to know just how the work can be performed. The contribution made by Nora Roche was represented at our weekend not only by Richard Glasstone himself, but as he reminded us at the very beginning of his lecture, by Anita Young. Since we cannot understand what we do without knowing where we come from, we need precisely this kind of perspective in order to both participate in the Cecchetti tradition, and to make our own contribution to it. However small or relatively insignificant that may sometimes seem to be!
It has become evident that with Elizabeth Swan as Chairman and a lively Committee, the Cecchetti Society is very well-placed to offer such exceptional opportunities as were represented at this last weekend. Elizabeth Swan herself readily acknowledges those who did so much to organise things – especially Kate Simmons and Judith Wilson, with Geoff Wheatley providing unobtrusive but invaluable support not only for Richard Glasstone’s lecture, but for arrivals and departures to and from Birmingham. That said, she merits thanks and congratulations on a successful venture.
Ann Loades |
