'The Unknown Soldier', 'Infra' & 'Symphony in C' at the Royal Opera House

The Royal Ballet prepared a triple bill of one-act ballets to commemorate the centenary of the ending of the First World War, including a ballet especially produced for the event, 'The Unknown Soldier'. That was the first ballet to be performed, followed by Wayne MacGregor's 'Infra' and then Balanchine's 'Symphony in C'. Essentially, we had an evening of a narrative ballet, an abstract ballet and a traditional ballet. I really like the Royal Ballet's triple bill evenings because there's always something to fall in love with  as well as appreciating the skills and athleticism of those dancers across the range of pieces. It also gives us the opportunity to see a broad range of dancers.

'The Unknown Soldier' was commissioned especially for eh centenary of the First World War and included narration through video sequences by Florence Billington, who told her story of falling for a British soldier marching off to war, and of Wally Patch, the last surviving British soldier from that war. We also get various video sequences projected onto the stage as the dancers do their thing.

There were some lovely sequences in this ballet as our protagonists meet and fall in love before war intervenes and we learn that they'll marry when the war is over at Christmas. Of course, that's not what happens and tragedy intervenes in so many lives. While I really enjoyed the dancing I think I was more affected by the testimony of the video contributions than by the young people on the stage before me. The dance didn't really live up to the power of the stories of the old folks.

The second ballet was Wayne MacGregor's 'Infra', a far more abstract piece  with eh dancers on stage reflected above by animated characters walking back and forth, always busy.  There were small groups of dancers and couples performing while the endless trudging of the animated characters continued, over and over again, until the stage was almost invaded by hordes of dancers walking across the stage, flooding the place like a rush hour train station.

It was very different to the first ballet but seemed linked somehow, with individual stories playing out against a background of the mass of humanity. It was a different experience to the first narrative ballet but felt in place rather than different for the sake of it.

The third ballet was, for me, the glory of the evening. Balanchine's 'Symphony in C' was what I think of as a traditional ballet, with the ballerinas up on tippy in white tutus and the lads in black doublets and white tights, forming groups and separating to do their own thing before coming back to together again. I loved it. And their were hundreds of them on stage - or at least that's how it seemed as more ballerinas joined those on stage to create complex patterns of synchronised dancing. How do they do it? How on earth can they stay in place and position while everything around them is changing? I was most impressed and loved this performance.

The three ballets fitted together very well, I thought, building on each other and taking us in slightly different directions and experiencing different emotions. My favourite was 'Symphony in C' which just crystallised the ballet experience for me and I'd happily see it again.

Just for the sake of completeness, 'The Unknown Soldier' was the second ever performance by the Royal Ballet at the Royal Opera House, 'Infra' was the 18th performance and 'Symphony in C' was the  61st performance. Don't you just love the detail in the Royal Opera House's cast lists?

'Jewels' at the Royal Opera House

A couple of weeks ago we went to see the 32nd performance of 'Jewels' by the Royal Ballet at the Royal Opera House. Choreography is by George Balanchine based around the jewels of emeralds, rubies and diamonds. It was also broadcast live to cinemas a few days later.  I like the triple bills the Royal Opera House puts on, where you can see three very different - or similar - ballets in one programme. In 'Jewels', rubies for passion won hands down for me.

First up was 'Emeralds' in which the ballerinas wore green bodices and the lads didn't. Why didn't the male dancers wear green doublets? That's something that bothered me throughout the whole sequence of dances. And it shouldn't have. It was distracting. It was all very stately and pretty but wasn't very exciting. It almost felt like going through the motions - slowly. I want fire and ice, I want passion, and that's what was missing from this ballet. I suspect part of the reason was the music by Gabriel Faure which was very poised and measured and lacking any real dynamism. However, there was lots of tippy work so that was a good thing.

Next was 'Rubies', a far more dynamic ballet that never stopped or slowed down. This had music by Stravinsky so was very dramatic and encouraged dramatic and speedy dance moves. This was gorgeous and gives the show it's poster with Steven McRae and Sarah Lamb pulling some signature moves. Both were excellent in this short ballet, never silent and never still, ramping up the movement and passion as the ballet progressed. The really impressive thing is that it didn't look practiced and pristine, it looked like it was natural to them, it's just what they do. And they do it so well. It's only a 20 minutes show and, given the energy on that stage, that's probably just as well to keep the dancers from flagging. I was exhausted at the end of it.

My favourite section was when Steven runs and leaps round the stage followed by the other lads and then he nods his head as if to say 'keep up lads' and then launches into a set of twirls round and round, faster and faster as he crosses the stage and into the wings at ridiculous speed. Wow, it was exhausting to watch and I hope there was a pile of mattresses in the wings for him to collapse into. That was really impressive and effortless from a dancer at the top of his game.

The final ballet was 'Diamonds' with the dancers dressed in white with lots of sparkly stuff on them.  It was a return to the stateliness of the first ballet but with more speed and far more dancers on stage, at one point there were 34 of them (I counted). This had a lot of energy going for it and I much preferred the ensemble dances to the more delicate solo dances. There's something about a stage of dancers all doing the same thing at the same time that is very watchable.

I think this is why I really enjoyed the final section with all 32 dancers of the Royal Ballet on stage with the two Principals all doing the same moves, synchronised perfectly with the music again and again, turn and stretch, move and leg left then leg right. It was almost mesmerising. The Principals here were Marianela Nunez and Thiago Soares who led their company with great style and grace.

It's a great triple bill and it's great fun to see so  many different dancers doing their different thing to different styles of dance and music but my favourite has to be 'Rubies'. Steven and Sarah made a great partnership and Steven's big show off moves at the end embody all that is exciting in ballet. Go on you other Principals of the Royal Ballet, follow that!