Zwielicht Concours interne de promotion, Paris Opera Ballet, December 23rd 2003

January 19th 2004 Twilight. The title is taken from a truly eerie song in Schumann's Liederkreis, op. 39, based upon diminished fifths. Its song-text (by Schumann himself ?) begins, Dämmrung will die Flügel spreiten and ends, Manches geht im Nacht verloren hütte dich, sei wach und munter ! How very like the atmosphere of this sombre little event ! *** The purpose in disputing this annual contest at Paris, one followed around the world, is to rise through the ranks to attain that of premier danseur. In the interest of transparency, the Concours was instituted in 1860 as a PUBLIC event. It is now by invitation only, even for the press ! WHY ? ? As the old saw goes: A Cat may look at a King. *** The contest is held at the Christmastime, viz., at the height of the ballet season, when people are exhausted, and consequently at risk of injury. Some will be rising at six in the morning for over a month to prepare the Concours, and the first man or woman to go down onto the stage at nine o'clock, will have been up at dawn, although they may have danced until eleven o'clock the night before. So critical to one's career is this event, that people have been known to go down and dance on a fresh injury, and then be off ill for weeks thereafter. I find that outrageous. Others will no doubt howl that "it's the rules of the game". But these are not winsome puppies being pushed by their handler into Crufts Dog Show. They are professional artists, who are being tested in the real world, on a real stage, 150 nights a year. To see them thrust back into a frightened-schoolboy state is an unpleasant experience, and I am beginning to think that it is the last year I shall ever attend. The more so, as one invariably walks away from the Concours with a queasy feeling that the dice have already been rolled beforehand, and elsewhere. Not on stage. *** By current rules, the corps de ballet is judged by a Jury made up of Management, the odd étoile and premier danseur, two prominent teachers or ADs from outwith the National Theatre (although few, one imagines, would care to contradict the views of POB Management), and jurors elected from amongst the corps de ballet itself. The marks are - so we are told - weighted. Twenty points are given by the Jury, based upon one's dancing on the day of the Concours, while ten points are a Management prerogative and purportedly reflect both one's attendance at class, as well as an imponderable, defined as conscience professionnelle. A curious parallel to the French criminal justice system, where, by law, the Judges may rely upon what is known as intime conviction (innermost belief) in handing down their finding, and disregard, if they choose, the evidence produced before them. Lest we forget - one is being judged not only by one's friends, but, as one approaches the more august ranks, by one's RIVALS. A practice, that may lead to the most awkward little misunderstandings, n'est-ce pas  ? Unfortunately for the credibility of the system, the most gifted individuals will never be mamma's boys, or All-American cheerleaders whose life's goal is "popularity". For its part, Management has pursued over the last decade a perfectly clear promotion policy, one fully coherent with its views on choreographic art. Having seen this week the corps de ballet of the Bolshoi Theatre, we all of us in this fair city of Paris might wish to be a shade more modest about our technical accomplishments, and perhaps even to ponder whether there might be more to dancing than just using one's legs and feet. *** Finally, the Concours fosters a dog-eat-dog mind-set, unlikely to promote brotherly love. I, for one, would like to see it scrapped. *** With a few notable exceptions, over eight or nine hours, a display of raw force, harsh landings, and muscular derring-do, whereby variations of many a style and period, were bulldozered down to much of a muchness. One finds oneself, willy-nilly, calculating the degrees in height of an arabesque, or the angle of aperture of an articulation. A shrill witness to present "artistic" trends. To give one, easy-to-understand example, cambré. Cambré is an affect. In the dancing of the woman, it can evoke rapture, it can evoke abandon, it can evoke quiet resignation, and so forth, while in the dancing of the man, it can evoke a gathering of one's strength, or a thousand other things. But it must evoke something, whether compelled by the drama, or, if the piece be abstract, by the music. It cannot just mean: "Now I bend backwards" - unless we are in the circus. Has all this been seen before ? Yes, in 1846. This is Bournonville speaking: "There is a flexibility that degenerates into weak-jointedness, a bravura that transforms dancing into gymnastics, and the question "How", into "How Many" ? What warrant can be found in the entire realm of art, for a leg lifted to the height of the shoulder, nay, even to the crown of the head ? Is it a pleasing impression that is produced by an entire solo sur les pointes.... ? 'But it is the fashion, Paris fashion', people say, 'we must go along with the times !' " *** Another thought: there is a particular mental state perceptible in the dancing of the men, that tells of one thing: after a quarter-century's rule at the Paris Opera School by a woman to whom one may tactfully refer as "forceful", and a decade's rule in the troupe, by another, it has become a matter of urgency to set up a men's section in the school, that shall have its own Director, who shall be a man, and who shall run that section in accordance with his own lights, and as he please. Another thought: Why, in a country where no less than twelve percent of the population is African or North African, does one see class after class go by, one hundred strong, year in, year out, and not a single black man or woman at any rank ? *** Anyway, to the free variation: how does one sensibly compare someone who attempts to present a difficult classical piece, to some puff of candy-cane floss from Roland Petit, or to a girl writhing about upon the lavatory furnishings in the Bidet Scene from Mats Ek's Appartement ? That this sort of thing be tolerated, even encouraged, speaks volumes. Let's get this straight. Classical dance does not depend on fluffy tutus and pink satin shoes. It is, in a nutshell, a step-based art form. Evolved over several hundred years, those steps respond to the tonal system in music. They will never go away, just as tonality will never go away, corresponding as it does, to something innate and eternal in the human mind. Unless it be step-based, it cannot be classical dance, and to pretend otherwise, is consumer fraud. In his Ton und Wort (published in French in 1979 under the title Musique et Verbe" ), Wilhem Furtwängler has discussed this with far more knowledge than I can: "Tonality (....) is what allows music to clothe itself with 'form', the structural element that allows a piece to take on a shape, to build a beginning, a development, and an end. Here, as support to defining a form whose growth is organic, tonality will never 'wear itself out' (....)° tonality cannot wear out, because it is the living vessel of an organic function. We are ourselves organisms, the laws of organic life are our own laws, and so are we bound by them. (...) Moreover, as a composer myself, I would never forego (...) what, in my eyes, remains the most critical aspect: the universal value of what one wishes to express. The moment one abandon that principle, one comes up against 'individualism', everywhere hard at work today digging the grave of art." Be that as it may, as the usher solemnly carried a bidet out before the poker-faced Jury, one had to stifle a fit of raucous laughter. *** The class that has attracted most attention internationally is that of the Coryphées, contesting promotion to Sujet, the reason being the presence of Mlle. Dorothée Gilbert, aged 20, promoted. Currently touted as France's answer to Alina Cojocaru, Mlle. Gilbert has been placed onto the fast-track for appointment to première danseuse, just as was the disappointing Eleonora Abbagnato four years ago. Well, we shall all of us have to be getting up very early in the morning, to match the deep seriousness, the spiritual elevation, and the simplicity, of the Romanian angel. Meanwhile, in forty-seven years in the trade, I have seen any number of twenty-year-olds touted as Major Talents. Few stick the course. Whether quadrilles, coryphées or even Sujet, this Theatre boasts a number of ladies who may well lack Mlle. Gilbert's pretty jump, her pinpoint accuracy, her startling fluency, but who nonetheless strike this theatre-goer as equally, perhaps more, talented. They have already been brushed aside as "too old" - at 23 or 24, say (!) - and, like pine-trees standing idly about in the forest, are given neither role, nor repertory, to get their teeth into. Thus, one's sole opportunity to see them, other than in a cast of thousands, is on the day of the Concours . Which is, in point of fact, the main reason this writer attends. To advance one's technique, and one's stagecraft, one needs roles to work on. How can one tell what those ladies would do, if given half a chance ? What worries me has been better put by Bournonville, "a materialistic view of art, that makes physical endowment the foremost qualification.... a handsome appearance, combined with careful instruction, is enough to let one appear with success in principal roles, and even to evoke an enthusiasm which, at a distance, resembles that aroused by genius." In all events, the strongest contest in this class was, to my mind, put in by Severine Westermann, who did something most intelligent and artistic with Lifar's Shadow variation from Mirages. *** In the class of coryphées, M. Matthew Ganio (19), a danseur noble well over six foot tall, was promoted to Sujet, and highest ranked. Through no fault of his own - the lad is clever, and a very good dancer - this is a chessboard move. Promoted to Sujet as well, the Italian-trained Simone Valastro, who is one of the theatre's few truly expressive artists, without ever being coarse or careless. A man of slight build, M. Valastro's dancing is sharply-focussed and theatrical, and his musicality infectious. *** In the class of the men Quadrilles contesting promotion to coryphée, the set variation from M. Lacotte's Sylphide is notoriously anti-musical and, also, notoriously too difficult, and one accordingly found one's mind wandering. Wandering, to whether there might have been rather more pizzazz and razzamataz, had M. Mehdi Angot not been deemed "too plain", and packed off to England, to cool his heels in driving sleet and eddying pools of icy water. Amongst the ladies in the Quadrilles, contesting promotion to the rank of coryphée, let us salute Miho Fuji. One generally breaks out into a sardonic grin, as the serpent-infested basket gets knocked about like a tambourine in that dreadful variation of Nikiya's - but Mlle. Fuji drew tears to the eyes, and, yes, cambré did evoke something, while one quite forgot to calculate angle of aperture ! A young Bulgarian, Sarah Kora Dayanova did some astonishingly beautiful things in her free variation (Aurora). But should one be astonished ? Mlle. Dayanova is, I believe, being trained by a lady who would appear to be our answer to the late Professor A. Pushkin, viz., Noella Pontois. Apart from three intelligent teenagers - Mlles. Levy and Giezendanner, and, more especially, Mlle. Laure Hecquet - there are other, slightly older personalities in this class, who are more than strong enough to be tested at roles - but the roles are never forthcoming. Left to moulder away their youth in the obscurity of fatuous choreography. A Depressing Appointment For promotion to premiere danseuse, the set variation for the Sujets was a little gem of choreography, Neumeier's variation (Louise) from the Nutcracker Grand Pas. A keenly-felt and regretted absence, that of Mlle. Fanny Fiat (who rather recalls Alla Sizova, by the bye), a lady who not only has the technique, but above all, a mind exciting enough to wear the laurel wreath of première danseuse. For unknown reasons, she did not present herself this year. Our freshly-promoted première danseuse is Mlle. Isabelle Ciaravola. As her head and torso are generally tucked well out of the way behind outlandish hyper-extensions, this writer's attempts to appreciate her work have heretofore failed. So depressing an appointment must give one pause. In quite different ways, Mlles. Nathalie Aubin (33) and Myriam Ould Braham (21) were impeccable in both variations. Like the exquisite Miteki Kudo, whom one longs to see, but is never to be seen, Mlle. Aubin is a high-level artist, who, for reasons impenetrable to an outsider, has been relegated to bit parts and stand-ins since the appointment of the current Director in 1995. Contesting the Concours for the first time in four or so years, hers was probably the strongest, but the lady was not even ranked. Was it in allegory to the situation into which current policy appears to have plunged her, that she selected as her free variation Nureyev's Cinderella , in rags, and scrubbing the floor ? Otherwise, the finest work from this class was put in by Myriam Ould-Braham, a perplexing mixture of delicate classicism, footwork of crystalline purity, and gruesome hyperextensions. One would have preferred a deeper plié, but again, that's the trend here. May one nevertheless issue a warning: one would not like to see the bod' wrecked and the ligaments stretched out, by a combination of shallow plié, and picking up the leg. Despite the obstruction created by those hyperextensions, one cannot but be swayed by her art. A small, fair-haired creature, Mlle. Ould Braham looks exactly - and I do mean exactly - like the Fouquet miniature at Den Haag, painted for Simon de Varye's Hours. At so early an age, the lady has already developed a line unique to her alone, her arabesque, in particular, being quite unlike anyone else's, in the same way that the timbre of a certain singer's voice cannot ever be mistaken. We are in the presence of a most unusual personality. Mlle. Ould Braham seems to be listening, with quiet fervour, to some inner voice. As the strains of music died away, a knot of people in the trade were heard to breathe as one: "C'est elle !" But it was not. Mlle. Ould Braham was ranked fifth. It is apparently felt that she must diversify into works excreted by the New Dark Age we are currently struggling through. Lastly, but not leastly, a disservice was done the class by small errors, but errors nonetheless, heard from the piano. Iron in the Soul And so, the 2003 Paris Opera Internal Promotion Concours has come and gone. No contest was held this year for advancement to premier danseur for the men, for reasons that some would wish opaque. On January 6th, Management pulled off a major publication-relations coup, unveiling to the world three teenagers, in the Ivan the Terrible leads. Talented as the young people are, let me slam my dainty little fist down onto the table, just for once ! In the class of Sujets are to be found, one man who is a genius - Emmanuel Thibault - (and who enjoys the somewhat off-beat honour, if that is the word, of being this writer's Muse), amongst several remarkably able and dedicated artists. These people are not toy-boys who entered the profession looking to marry into the European aristocracy. They are grown men, who have a degree of competence, and a sense of responsibility towards the public, that can be compared to a structural or nuclear engineer. In the face of such commitment, one would be entitled to expect from Management a serious attempt to provide them with interesting and intelligent things for them to dance. The last time I can recall several of these gentlemen being given a proper role, was, if I'm not mistaken, in March 2003, nigh on a year ago. A year without a role, in a dancer's brief life on stage, is an eternity, and it becomes increasingly difficult to maintain, not only one's technical standards, but the creative intensity that allow one to speak directly to one's public. Yes, let us give youth a break, and so on, and this may be the Consumer Age, or whatever, but a classical dancer is not a packet of chocolates, to be consumed, crumpled and tossed into the rubbish at age thirty. Troubled times, where the Muses themselves go in want of a muse. Were the world not plunged into economic crisis and earthquake-like political instability, the ideal solution would no doubt be to set up a new troupe, with people from here there and everywhere, who have something important to say in the classical dance, but nowhere to say it. A counterfoil, to the Orwellian throng of "Dancer-Athletes" currently wreaking havoc worldwide, with whatever is left of the art form. *** K.L. Kanter Return