An Evening of Music and Dance - Birmingham Royal Ballet Review

An Evening of Music and Dance - Birmingham Royal Ballet Review

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Posted 2023-02-13 by dpmfollow

Sat 11 Feb 2023

Birmingham Royal Ballet moved to Symphony Hall for one night for An Evening of Music and Dance. The evening was presented by Birmingham-based broadcaster Marverine Cole who introduced the pieces and welcomed the audience back after a three-year pause in the event largely due to Covid restrictions.



An Evening of Music and Dance%% sees the Royal Ballet Sinfonia in the starring role. Rarely in the public eye and usually performing in the orchestra pit, the orchestra sits on stage at Symphony Hall offering the audience a chance to see, as well as hear, the skills of the musicians. Conducted by Paul Murphy, the Sinfonia performed some pieces only as music and some accompanied by excerpts of dance.

Much of the music took us to sunny Spain with a lively Overture to 'The Barber of Seville' by Rossini, a brooding 'Ritual Fire Dance' from de Falla’s 'El amor brujo' and a touch of tango with Albéniz’s España.

An Evening of Music and Dance gives BRB an opportunity to highlight some of the works being performed in the coming months and the first dance excerpt was a piece from Juliano Nunes’ 'Interlinked' set to music by Luke Howard. Premiered last year, the piece plays with gender roles with male and female dancers all dressed similarly and exchanging roles. Hugely successful, the work forms part of the triplebill to be performed in June.

Swan Lake, which BRB perform at Birmingham Hippodrome from February 14, was also featured with the pas de deux from Act III performed with total mastery by Brandon Lawrence and Céline Gittens.



The programme included pieces that are to be staged by the new BRB2 company on their tour later this spring. Max Maslen and Beatrice Parma brought sensitivity and romance to Frederick Ashton’s choreography set to Rachmaninov’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini. BRB director Carlos Acosta may not have been on stage but his choreography certainly was with a sexy pas de deux from his Carmen with Lachlan Monaghan and Sofia Liñares. And Tyrone Singleton and Sofia Liñares packed plenty of punch in the lively Diana and Actaeon pas de deux.

Students from Elmhurst Ballet School shared the stage, bringing lots of enthusiasm and energy to two pieces from Alberto Ginastera’s Estancia. The finale was a breathtaking performance of the pas de deux from Le Corsaire by Yaoquian Shang and Riku Ito.

The first Birmingham outing for BRB in 2023, if this is the standard of performance we can expect throughout the year, there will be plenty of great dancing to look forward to. For future events see https://www.brb.org.uk/

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!date 11/02/2023
74576 - 2023-02-12 17:27:53

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