The Royal New Zealand Ballet's Giselle

Gillian Murphy (Principal Guest Artist) Photo: Ross Brown

I love ballet.  For those of you who were not following this blog at this time last year we went to see, and I blogged about, Sleeping Beauty at the Napier Municipal Theatre.  I am fortunate enough to be able to see more ballet here than I would ever be likely to see in the UK.  As soon as the annual programme is announced and the tickets are put on sale I immediately book the seats.  So the best seats in the house for next March and November are already booked and paid for.  Early bird, worm and all that.  So on Saturday the cream linen jacket came out once more.  It's one of the few occasions when, on the whole, I see people, relatively speaking, dressed up in Napier.

The ballet on Saturday night was Giselle which has had rave reviews. In my humble opinion well deserved rave reviews.  I had not seen it before although I know Adam's music for the ballet well.  The Royal New Zealand Ballet's Giselle web site is has more information.  Their 2013 programme and information is here.  

This post probably sounds like an advertisement and, in a way, it is.  I appreciate that relatively few of my readers are from New Zealand but whereever you are if you want to see artistes with this sort of athletic ability and poise then go to the ballet:

Advertising Photo for Royal New Zealand Ballet

Information: The images on this blog are from widely publicised sources.  I do not hold the copyright but am working on the basis that as they are being used to further the aims for which they have been distributed that will be acceptable.  If it's not I will happily remove them.

Dance Express

Catriona and Fraser go to hip hop dancing at the dance studio featured in the last posting (Wall Paintings). Until now I, like Wendy when they said that's what they wanted to do, have rather dismissed hip hop. I suppose because of its association with the New York of the 1970s and the rap movement hip hop had negative connotations in my mind. Having seen the recital on Sunday my view has completely changed. And with it, as a result of a little bit of research to satisfy my curiosity, my sub-conscious prejudices.

Hip hop is far more multi-faceted and complex than the dancing we saw and yet that which we saw was exciting and, on the whole, more entertaining than the other dancing that day.

The Recital (an annual event to case show the efforts of the school and its pupils) comprised 35 dance routines performed by somewhere over a hundred participants - mostly young children - but ranging from about 5 to 35. The organisation alone was very impressive.