Choreographed by BRB director Carlos Acosta after the original 19th century production by Marius Petipa, the show is based on Miguel Cervantes’ classic novel which tells of the adventures of the hapless knight Don Quixote and his squire Sancho Panza.

Set in Spain, it is a glorious comedic romp filled with colourful characters and technically complex dancing.

“Winter is the perfect time for Don Quixote,” says Carlos. “You go and see Don Quixote and you see the sun – it’s happy, it’s colourful, it’s funny, it’s a parody and it makes you laugh.

“You have this wonderful funny quirky duo in Don Quixote and Sancho Panza but then you also have so many other characters – gypsies, fishermen, dryads and all different kinds of dance.

“It is unusual in ballet because it has a happy ending, nobody dies at the end of the ballet like normal ballet tragedies. And it’s great for family, if you want to bring your kids, this is the ballet to go and watch.”

Carlos, who was a principal with the Royal Ballet, danced Don Quixote many times and created a version for the Royal Ballet in 2013 and so, when he took over as director at BRB in 2020, he was determined to create a new stage version.

With beautiful sets and costumes by Tim Hatley and video projection by Nina Dunn, the show premiered at Birmingham Hippodrome in 2022 before touring and was a huge hit with audiences and critics.

For Carlos, new work is part of the evolution of Birmingham Royal Ballet. In the past five years since taking the helm he has overseen the premieres of a host of new productions including the sell-out Black Sabbath – The Ballet, Luna, City of a Thousand Trades and Lazuli Sky.

“My aim is to bring new work to the company,” Carlos says. “It keeps people engaged and gives the dancers opportunities to perform works they otherwise wouldn’t have the chance to dance.

“Even with the classics like Don Quixote, I am always thinking outside the box, always trying to bridge the gap between the 19th century and today.

“We should be able to do more when we are creating a work, so I’m bringing projections or I’m delivering it in a completely different way with aesthetics so that it feels like we are doing it now instead of just a reproduction of Petipa.”

Don Quixote may be joyous to watch but, says Carlos, it is technically a very difficult ballet to perfect. And its challenge is part of the reason he was keen to introduce it to the company.

“The dancing is very hard in Don Quixote,” he explains. “It pushes the dancers and that helps them to improve.

“To me, what I am putting on stage is sacred and it is clear to everyone in the company by the way that I cast that I am pushing for excellence. I pushed and I worked so hard myself as a dancer and it’s the only way I know to get you there. I try to transfer that into the dancers.”

Carlos is eager for the BRB dancers to reach the highest levels of performance.
“It’s important to recognise that being a professional dancer means being consumed by what you do. It’s a lifestyle, it’s not something that you do occasionally.

“Maybe it’s not for everybody because it’s a very stressful environment, it’s the touring, the loneliness, the injuries. But it’s always going to be a battle of the mind over the body.

“By breathing it, by living it – that is the only way towards improvement. And for those who are willing to put up with the work and show results, I will be there to promote them. And there is a lot of great talent coming up through the company.”

Among that talent is principal Beatrice Parma who won the Outstanding Female Classic Performance at the National Dance Awards in June for her role as Lise in La Fille mal gardée and also won Dance Europe’s Dancer of the Year Award 2025.

“Beatrice is a very versatile ballerina,” Carlos says. “In Fille she is pure Ashton with great technical ability and then in Luna, that is very hard contemporary language so to have a ballerina who mastered those two spectrums of dance is incredible and people took notice of that.

“It is great to see how some people just rise to the challenge and she is a ballerina that doesn’t rest. She wants more, she is 100% committed and if you have that attitude you see the results.”

Carlos has also received accolades in the past year being awarded an honorary degree by University of Birmingham in July and winning the UK Theatre Award for Outstanding Contribution to British Theatre in October.

“The theatre award was amazing and unexpected,” he says. “It was for the productions I’ve put on, all the things I am programming. It was fantastic not just for me but also for the ballet sector to be recognised in the world of theatre.”

Looking ahead, Carlos hopes to continue to develop the company, encourage improvements in its dancers, expand its touring and create or commission new work for audiences.

“If you ask me, I want more, I want everything for this company – but only one step at a time,” he says.

“I think so far I’m very happy that I have contributed in a big way to this company’s history by taking them to places where the company had never been – Luxembourg, the Pyramid Stage at Glastonbury or the Kennedy Center in Washington. And then in the future I’m also looking for other opportunities to travel to other places and give them the experience of what it is to dance in some of these places.

“And I am proud of works like Black Sabbath and Don Quixote. I would say to people who don’t know Don Quixote to give it a chance because it’s packed with all the ingredients of a popular show. It’s a show which is going to give the audience a great feeling and great escapism.”

Birmingham Royal Ballet Carlos Acosta’s Don Quixote is at Lowry, Salford from 5-7 March 2026.

Feature image: Matador Scene featuring Brandon Lawrence as Espada Photo with Artists of Birmingham Royal Ballet; photo: Emma Kauldhar

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Inspired by Lewis Carroll’s iconic character from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, the company takes the audience on a magical journey of imagination and self-discovery, with Dominic Coffey and Robbie Ordoña sharing the role of the Mad Hatter.

Choreographed and created by Artistic Director, Joss Arnott, in collaboration with the dancers, this multimedia production pushes the boundaries of solo dance by combining it with storytelling, original music and animation in an immersive family theatre show for ages 5+.

Although it has been a long journey in the making, there is more ambition to come for ‘Meet the Hatter’. The show forms part of a trilogy of shows for Arnott, that is yet to be completed. And there are plans for an international tour.

Anastasia Tirca meets him to find out more.

What does it mean to you for ‘Meet the Hatter’ to be an anniversary production?

Joss: “It’s been a long time coming really. I’ve always wanted to venture into multimedia for the last few years and I felt that naturally the work that we produce has always been described as really cinematic and very visual anyway. It’s always been in the back of my mind that I just wanted to delve into the digital world with this anniversary production and ‘Meet the Hatter’ was the perfect choice.

“For the show itself, we’ve gone really small scale with the set, but try to create a large scale spectacle. So the only set that we have is a gauze that’s from ceiling to floor, wing to wing, and everything is projected onto this gauze and interacted with the performer. It’s very immersive in that sense and it’s been really interesting to see what the possibilities are with a digital performance.

“We have two performers who share the roles, but it remains a solo show. They are Dominic Coffey and Robbie Ordona and we’ve been in rehearsals with both”.

Why did you pick the Mad Hatter when you started creating this show?

Joss: “The whole concept of multimedia was the real starting point for us. And when we were thinking about if we’re going to tell a narrative story, we thought what characters could create this kind of spectacle. As well as, what if it’s going to be a solo show? What kind of character could really hold a space for an hour? The Mad Hatter has always been really fascinating to me and what you can do with the Hatter. There have been loads of interpretations over the years, but we spent a lot of time thinking about what makes this character unique and how can we make him relevant. We did a lot of development work when we were making the show with kids in schools and making sure that what we were creating was really relevant for our target audience.

“In the show, there’s subtle nods to different characters. We have a rabbit animation, we worked with an animator for that. There are reminders to characters in the original books. When we were developing the show, we were doing a lot of our research, in schools, community groups and not everyone actually knew the story of Alice in Wonderland. But it was great because we could reinvent a new story, we could reinvent the character.

“Dom and Robbie are amazing and they’ve done a lot of theatre and acting as well as dance. So their performance quality is everything they can offer rather than just their dancing skills”.

What inspired you when creating and structuring this piece?

Joss: “The whole multimedia side of things has been able to elevate our work and this piece is heavily driven by narrative. We incorporated 12 different scenes in the piece. Each scene has its own landscape, environment, visual concepts. We dive into what is really exciting and different about each of the scenes and how we can be transported to different places. So it was quite limitless, which was amazing, but challenging at the same time because it was so open. We really had to narrow down the parameters of actually what we want to do and what we want the audience to feel.

“It is quite a long time for one person to be on stage by themselves, but it’s quite interesting that both of the dancers say that they don’t feel by themselves because the show is so immersive for them and it’s interactive with the digital screen, the music and the lighting.

“I mean, we spent about 2.5 years in development and then in creation. We spent the majority of last summer making the show and finally, we premiered in September. Now we’re just coming to the end of our first tour and we hope to go on tour for the next couple of years”.

How has the show evolved since its premiere?

Joss: “It’s the first time that I’ve made a solo show, which at the beginning, I felt quite nervous about, the challenges and how that’s going to be different than working with a big ensemble. It’s just been really amazing to have to see how the audience reacts to it and also the developing of the stylistic movement qualities of the work that are very branded to our classical contemporary work. We’ve had such a good time on tour and by seeing what works, everything is always in development.

“We have been funded by the Arts Council, England and project grants as well which have made us feel supported throughout the production.

“This is our 2nd work in a trilogy of works that are targeted for children and young people. We created Tinman in 2022 and then toured that for two years whilst the Hatter was in development. Now we’re developing a new, indoor version of Tinman, a 20-minute version”.

What do you want to achieve and express with this performance?

Joss: “Our target audience has been 5 to 11 with this show, but it’s been really great to see the amount of adults that are coming up to us and being able to find relevance within the show as well. I think it’s just really giving people a positive experience.

“There’s a lot of emotional, pathways and journeys within the show and people are able to say that they’re feeling that and that they’re able to project their own experiences onto it. Considering there is a gauze on stage, where sometimes the performer is either behind it or in front, it is good to know that there is not that disconnection when the performer is behind the gauze.

“No matter where people have come from or like what their experiences have been, they can still enjoy it. It’s 65 minutes straight through as well, so no intervals. We wanted to keep it full length, as opposed to stopping in between and then having to pick it back up again”.

What did you enjoy most about the process of this show?

 Joss: “I think that the team has been amazing. Whether they’ve been lighting designers, multimedia, artist, drama, dancers, there’s just been a lot of people involved in the creation of this show. It does have quite a universal meaning of being able to find your community and find your belonging and purpose in the world and overcoming loneliness, so to see actual feedback come back from audiences saying they completely got that, that was great for me. It has been really lovely to know that we’re actually sharing something that has meaning”.

 If you could say anything to your audiences, what would you say?

 Joss: “I feel people should come and see the show because it is real escapism. It’s a very cinematic spectacle. Regardless of which space it’s in, whether that’s small scale, mid-scale, large scale venues, it is still very relatable. I think it creates a lot of dialogue between the audience and the performer and it’s just a really lovely experience for people to be able to witness that, and share that with their families”.

What is the main message of the show?

Joss: “The concept is exploring the Hatter’s sense of belonging and acceptance in society and his longing for connection and community and companionship. Realising that he’s not alone and that people can be there the whole time.

“The idea, that he is very much an outsider and the importance of being different and using that as a superpower rather than seeing it as a negative. So I think that’s quite important for young kids in the chaos that is the world at the moment to be able to see themselves having superpowers – that their own individuality is something that makes them special”.

Meet the Hatter is at Z Arts, Manchester on 14 and 15 February and Heywood Civic Theatre on 20 and 21 February, 2026.

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By Diane Parkes

When choreographer and dancer Michael Keegan-Dolan was creating his production MÁM, he turned to the music and landscape of his native Ireland for inspiration.

“I was born in Ireland in 1969. There was a lot going on politically and economically. I think much of the work I make comes from where and how I was formed,” he says.

“I perceive the world through that history, our native language, the landscape and our musical tradition – and MÁM is very linked to that. When I made the piece in 2019 it was an expression of my relationship to many of these things – from land to history to folklore to mythology to music to religion, to spirituality.”

Having moved to Irish-speaking West Kerry in the year he created the work, Michael says the spirit of Ireland is inescapable in the land and its people.

“The foundations of the making of the piece were my moving to the West Kerry Gaeltacht,” he recalls. “When I stand in my garden in West Kerry, I can see Skellig Michael, the iconic island, a UNESCO site, kind of floating in the distance in the Atlantic Ocean. And we grow some of our own food here, in that ancient West Kerry soil, so when we eat our carrots, broccoli or cabbage, we are kind of imbibing Kerry!

“When I go to the supermarket and I talk to the people there, they might speak with a particular rhythm and they might make a joke about something West Kerry. When you speak in the Irish language your brain is functioning in an entirely other way. So it’s a powerful place to reevaluate who you are in an ancient landscape where people have been living for a long time. It has endured conquest and famine and war but people are still here – living, breathing, talking, making music and celebrating life.”

Musicality is an integral part of MÁM which features the music of Irish traditional concertina player Cormac Begley and European music collective s t a r g a z e performing live on stage alongside 11 dancers and a young girl.

“My relationship to the traditional music in MÁM is through the lens of Cormac, through the ancestry and connections that Cormac has,” Michael says. “Then my aspiration was to put around his sound a European classical/contemporary sound. It could be from any time – they play some Telemann, 17^th century German music, in the show also, so there’s a European tradition around an Irish tradition in conversation.

“Through that, we made a piece that feels direct, immediate and visceral, poetic and imaginative.”

Michael was artistic director of Fabulous Beast Dance Theatre between 1997 and 2015 before founding Teaċ Daṁsa in 2016. The company features dancers from across the globe performing works strongly grounded in Ireland’s heritage. The company’s first production, Swan Lake/Loch na hEala in 2016 combined dance, storytelling and live music in a new interpretation of the classic ballet.

This was followed by MÁM which was nominated for an Olivier Award for Best New Dance Production when it performed to sell-out audiences at London’s Sadlers Wells in 2020. MÁM has toured to venues in Europe, New Zealand, Australia, North and South America and Taiwan and Michael says audiences everywhere respond to it well.

“MÁM creates an experience for the dancers dancing it, connecting, releasing and breathing in these rhythmical ways. And there’s this lovely collective truth about MÁM – it was made collectively and is performed collectively and I think that’s a beautiful thing to behold.”

The show is coming to Lowry on 3 and 4 February, the first date of a 9-venue tour presented by Dance Consortium, a group of 24 large-scale venues aiming to bring the best contemporary dance from across the world to local audiences in the UK and Ireland. And Michael says each audience member will have their own unique response to the production.

“An important aspect about dance is how it can connect you to your being, to reality. It kind of forces you into life. I’ve made work built around stories like Swan Lake and they are exciting but ultimately what we probably need most as a species just now is to switch our brains off a bit more and to allow ourselves to feel a bit more. That’s what I’m working on with the dances I’m making.

“It’s challenging sometimes because audiences’ expectations have been conditioned over time. We go, we sit, we get impressed and we think there is something to ‘get’ and if we haven’t ‘got’ it then it hasn’t been a good experience.

“But I think we also need to work a little bit more to empower audiences that whatever you take is valid. It’s yours. If what you feel is really strange and nothing like the person next to you that’s really exciting for me – and to own that and to feel empowered by your own imagination and your own perception of reality, I’m all for that.”

MÁM is at Lowry, Salford on Tuesday 3 & Wednesday 4 February at 7.30pm. Tickets: 0161 876 2000

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The fairytale show, which tells of one girl’s dream to be the greatest dancer in the world, is based on the Academy award-winning film of the same name by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger.

This is the first time New Adventure’s magical dance version has toured since its 2020 tour was cut short due to the pandemic. Choreographer Sir Matthew Bourne talks to Quays Life about the story’s timeless appeal and the challenges of bringing it to the stage.

What is it about ‘The Red Shoes’ that attracted you as a story to adapt for dance?

Matthew Bourne: “It’s the story that Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger fashioned around Hans Andersen’s story of The Red Shoes for their seminal 1948 movie that really attracted me.

“I have loved the film since I was a teenager with its depiction of a group of people all passionate about creating something magical and beautiful. It seemed to be saying that art was something worth fighting for, even dying for, if the rather melodramatic conclusion is to be believed! It was a world full of glamour, romance and creativity populated by larger-than-life personalities. In short, it was a world that I wanted to be part of!

“The film’s genius though was to take that highly theatrical world and turn it into a highly cinematic, and at times, surreal piece of film-making. My challenge has been to capture some of that surreal, sensuous quality within the more natural theatre setting”.

What are the main themes of the story?

Matthew Bourne: “The main message of The Red Shoes is that nothing matters but art. As Michael Powell said, ‘The Red Shoes told us to go and die for art’. Whilst acknowledging the exaggeration here, I believe it was a piece that asked us to take art seriously as a life-changing force: something that gives intense joy but also asks for and requires sacrifices”.

How does it speak to the audience of today?

Matthew Bourne: “In today’s culture there seems an obsession with what it takes to become a great performer or artist. In recent years, the most popular shows on television have been about finding someone with star quality (The X Factor) or watching someone aquire the skills and dedication to become a great dancer (Strictly Come Dancing). Katherine Hepburn was once asked what ‘star-quality’ was and she replied, ‘I don’t know, but I’ve got it’. It’s an indefinable thing but we seem fascinated by it. The Red Shoes gives us a glimpse into that world, an insight into the art form of dance, a revealing backstage story into the minds of artists and the creative life”.

What are the differences between a dance company in 1948 and today?

Matthew Bourne: “The Red Shoes is a story about dance and dancers, something that we in New Adventures know a thing or two about! However, a dance company in 1948 was very different to dance company life today. When The Red Shoes was released in 1948, ballet was a relatively new and mysterious art form and the film was a genuine insight into a rare and extraordinary world of flamboyant personalities, glamorous women, fey men and obsessive, uptight creative figures with strange names and a range of international accents! Most, if not all of this has changed, of course, but I did see a similarity between the life of a hard-working touring company, full of slightly eccentric personalities and the world of New Adventures today. I don’t think a contemporary ballet company today would necessarily create the right atmosphere to re-create the company we see in the 1948 film. The family atmosphere of New Adventures with its group of talented, highly individual performers, who tour around the UK and the world as a tight knit community, seemed the right company to recreate the fictional Lermontov company of yesteryear”.

The performances and personalities in the famous film are legendary. How have the New Adventures dancers approached playing these characters?

Matthew Bourne: “Who can imagine The Red Shoes without Moira Shearer, Robert Helpmann, Leonide Massine and perhaps, most of all, Anton Walbrook? This is something that we have all had to contemplate and boldly address. I think the New Adventures dancers, whether they knew the film before or not, have all fallen in love with these unique performers. Our task had been, I think, to honour them with the odd little ‘tribute’ but then to create our own characters as dictated by the story we are telling. Trying to recreate ‘special’ performers or performances is always a mistake and I’ve encouraged the dancers to find their own way. That has not stopped us though from all delving into countless biographies and YouTube clips to look for inspiration into the flavour of the period in which we are working and to gather anecdotes about dancers and dancing in the 1940s and 50s. All our ensemble dancers were given a famous dancer of this era to study and the clues are in their given names in the programme!”

You have chosen the music of celebrated Hollywood composer, Bernard Herrmann rather than the original Oscar-winning score from the film. Why?

Matthew Bourne: “I have a great affection for Brian Easdale’s very fine score for The Red Shoes Ballet in the film. It’s an impressive achievement by any standards and a first for a mainstream film to include an unheard of 15-minute ballet as its central story-telling device.

“A feature film that includes a featured ballet is very different from a full-length wordless dance piece in which the music has to not only serve the ballets that the company perform, but also the backstage life of the company and, most importantly, the emotional story of Vicky Page, Julian Craster and Boris Lermontov. I found this variety of ideas in the work of one of my favourite Hollywood composers, Bernard Herrmann. Herrmann is probably most famous for his work with Alfred Hitchcock but Terry Davies (who has brilliantly arranged the music) and I decided to concentrate on the pre-Hitchcock music and have uncovered some real gems.

“I’m very proud to be presenting much of this music in the theatre for the first time. There is so much to enjoy musically here; I think it is one of the revelations of this piece”.

Design always plays such a big part in New Adventures productions. What were the challenges on this project?

Matthew Bourne: “My Associate Designer, Lez Brotherston, took on another enormous challenge with this production. Firstly, to create an adaptable theatrical space depicting both on-stage and backstage, as well as and a range of locations from Covent Garden to Monte Carlo, but also to allow for those flights of fancy that take us out of the literal theatrical world and into the sensuous and surreal world of artistic endeavour. For this Lez and I also rely heavily on the brilliance of our lighting designer, Paule Constable who always manages to surprise and thrill me with her own vision of what we are all trying to achieve”.

Do you relate personally to any of the characters in the story?

Matthew Bourne: “Perhaps not surprisingly I have found myself agreeing with much of what Lermontov says in the movie. I am nothing like him, of course, and I do acknowledge that some of his views are a little extreme today, but I do understand his particular kind of love for Vicky and his love of his company and dance in general. Nothing else seems as important to him. As I get older, I recognise that sentiment more and more”.

Matthew Bourne’s production of The Red Shoes is at Lowry, Salford from 25-29 November 2025. Recommended age 7+

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The Nigerian megalopolis of Lagos is massive, youthful and exciting. Due to become the world’s biggest city by the turn of the century, it is one of the beating hearts of Africa. And this autumn the spirit of Lagos comes to UK stages in a dance show by Nigeria-based The QDance Company.

Created by Lagos-born dancer and choreographer Qudus Onikeku, Re:INCARNATION is inspired by the city, its people, its past and its present.

Following its UK premiere at London’s Southbank Centre, the production comes to The Lowry, Salford on 8 & 9 October. Featuring ten dancers and two musicians, it promises to be a rich exploration of one of the world’s most fascinating cultures.

“Lagos is very much captured in the show,” says Qudus, whose work has been showcased across the globe. “The energy of Lagos, the vibrancy, the youthfulness, the craziness, the madness, the beauty, the ugliness – are what I was really inspired by.

“This is a show that was created in Lagos, and it is showcasing the young energy encapsulated in the city with a lot of joy and a lot of colour.”

Re:INCARNATION combines a live soundtrack featuring West African music genre Afrobeats with dynamic dancing – contemporary, salsa, hip hop and street styles wacking and krump. Vivid masks and costumes and colour-soaked lighting complete the picture. For Qudus, all the elements are fundamental to creating a successful spectacle.

“I try as much as I can to involve the artists, whether it’s the costumier, the lighting designer, the sound artist, the dancers or the scenographer, in a collective creative process where we also highlight the authenticity and originality of each individual,” he says.

In Re:INCARNATION Qudus is exploring how young people fuse life today with influences from the past.

He is connecting that spirit of youth with the ancient philosophy of the Yoruba people, who have lived in Nigeria for centuries.

“The notion of dying and rebirth, and dying and rebirth again, in a continuous circle of reincarnation, is more or less what I wanted to capture in the show. The young dancers, despite their seeming disconnection with ancient philosophies, are in fact reproducing the codes and forms of the past without being conscious of it.

“The Yoruba don’t believe in life after death, they believe in different cycles of life, different types of incarnations. An experience doesn’t need to be in one lifetime, it could be in cycles of lifetimes. We try to remember that when we do a performance.”

Qudus trained in France but returned to Lagos in 2014, establishing the social enterprise The QDance Center and building a reputation for new and exciting work. Re:INCARNATION was premiered in France in 2021 and has toured extensively since then.

“One amazing thing about this show is that whether we are in Europe or America or Africa, people connect to it in a very interesting way,” he says. “Maybe that’s because it was created after Covid and Black Lives Matter and there was a certain kind of openness and an awareness of alternative philosophies or ideologies.

“Also Instagram and TikTok have done a good job in popularising dance and music forms coming from West Africa so it feels like we are adding into a tradition that is already ahead of us.”

Qudus is looking forward to the show’s tour to nine UK cities which is presented by Dance Consortium, a group of 19 large-scale venues with a shared passion for bringing the best global contemporary dance to Britain and Ireland.

“We are very excited about Re:INCARNATION coming to the UK,” he says. “It is a country that has a long history with Nigeria and Nigerian culture. So this work becomes an addition to that palette, or archive, of Nigerian artists and artforms which have been able to make a significant presence in the UK.

“I’m talking about the likes of Chinua Achebe, Wole Soyinka, Fela Kuti, Ben Okri, Chris Ofili. These are people that I consider to be like kin. To be in the spaces where they have been seen and heard is really an honour for me.”

Qudus first toured the UK as a solo performer in 2012 returning in 2015, and the country holds a special place for another reason – shopping!

“The UK always feels like home. I never knew how many similarities there were between Lagos and London before I went to London. I love the shopping, I love going to the pound stores – I always find something interesting there!

“Also I’ve always read my books in English, so every time I’ve had the opportunity to go to the UK, I go to book stores a lot. I love the Caribbean music – I have been there for the Notting Hill Carnival.”

And he is eager to share Re:INCARNATION with British audiences.

“It’s a show that is quite multi-faceted but one thing that I know people have always got out of it is this vibrancy, this young energy that we are bringing. It’s a shared moment of beauty and vivacity and I hope that we can add joy to our world.”

The QDance Company’s Re:INCARNATION is at The Lowry, Salford on Tuesday 8 and Wednesday 9 October 2024.

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Ground-breaking New York dance company, Ailey 2 embarks on its largest European tour in more than a decade this autumn, visiting 12 venues across the UK. Presenting a programme of hugely popular audience favourites alongside ambitious contemporary pieces, the company comes to The Lowry, Salford on 13 and 14 October.

About to celebrate its 50th anniversary, Ailey 2 is the second company of one of the most iconic dance companies in the world – Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater – and it offers the exceptional dancers from The Ailey School their first professional roles.

This tour, says Ailey 2 Artistic Director Francesca Harper, is a rare chance for UK audiences to see this next generation of performers.

“What’s so exciting about Ailey 2 is that we are catching the enthusiasm and raw talent of the dancers at the beginning of their careers” she says.

“There’s such a rich history to the company of fostering and nourishing young artists. They are so talented and Ailey 2 gives them the opportunity for that talent to flourish.”

The programme for 12 dancers features four works – excerpts from Francesca’s Freedom Series and William Forsythe’s Enemy in the Figure along with Robert Battle’s The Hunt and Alvin Ailey’s Revelations which is a signature work of all the Ailey companies.

“Revelations is Mr Ailey’s most famous work and it’s a masterpiece,” says Francesca. “It reflects the cultural heritage of the African American community and Mr Ailey’s blood memories. It embodies this reverent grace and spiritual elation.”

Ailey 2 has also adapted The Hunt which was originally created for six male dancers by Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater Artistic Director, Robert Battle.

“I asked Robert if we could have women perform in it as well so we are the first company within the Ailey organisation to have The Hunt performed by an all-female cast,” says Francesca. “It’s a very athletic work and is set to really powerful music by French percussion band Les Tambours du Bronx. Robert was inspired by modern sports and the rituals of gladiators so it has this very ominous and threatening energy. For the women to be as ferocious and athletic as the men is really exciting and an important statement.”

Francesca also brings her own stamp to the programme in the shape of William Forsythe’s Enemy in the Figure. From 1991 to 1999, she was a dancer in Forsythe’s hugely influential Ballett Frankfurt, rising to principal for the last five years.

“I thought it was so important to bring Forsythe’s work into the company because he was one of my mentors when I left New York and it helps the dancers understand who I am as an artist,” she says.

“Enemy in the Figure was inspired by Thom Willems’ percussive and electronic score. William had this sense of abstract storytelling where he would take his personal stories and deconstruct them. It’s a powerful work and will leave the audience on the edge of their seats.”

Francesca’s own work, Freedom Series, was inspired by her taking up the post of Ailey 2 artistic director and her emotional responses to returning to the Alvin Ailey family – she trained at The Ailey School where her mother Denise Jefferson was director.

“This is my home, it has always had that familial feeling,” says Francesca who has also choreographed for Broadway shows and was the ballet consultant for the film Black Swan. “It grounded me to see all of these people of colour and diverse representation living their dreams, following their passions and feeling empowered. And to see them transform and develop and flourish. Over the years I feel so fortunate to have witnessed that and for it to have been an integral part of my development. When I’m back here I feel the power that is in that kind of cyclical journey.

“Freedom Series carries so much weight for me. I have so many memories that live in the building and this organisation. I created a series of vignettes that imagine this hybridity where these memories strive to influence my vision of the future. It examines identity and community and being an African American woman as well as the diversity that Alvin embraced.”

Francesca is looking forward to sharing the programme with audiences in the tour presented by Dance Consortium, a group of large-scale theatres which aims to bring the best international dance to venues across the UK and Ireland.

The tour also features an extensive community outreach project for young dancers with workshops, masterclasses and open rehearsals. This forms part of the Ailey Project UK which was launched in 2021 with Dance Consortium member venues.

“We’ve established this wonderful relationship through the Ailey Project UK,” Francesca explains. “It really falls in alignment with spreading the message of an inclusive voice so it’s exciting to bring those two worlds together with this tour.

“Our outreach programme is so important to us. It’s sharing and spreading our mission to these young aspiring artists. As a young African American girl, I just didn’t see people like myself doing the things and performing the way that I dreamt of so for us to reach young people who may have dreams of dancing or becoming being involved in the arts in some other capacity, it’s so important. It can change lives.

“One of the most exciting things is that this tour is launching our 50th anniversary season as 2024 marks 50 years since Ailey 2 was founded. Audiences to this tour can expect excellence and heart, they can expect innovation, they can expect cutting edge work and they can expect these young artists at the height of their expression.”

Ailey 2 is at The Lowry, Salford on Friday 13 & Saturday 14 October at 7.30pm.

The post New York’s Ailey 2 celebrates 50th anniversary with UK tour appeared first on Quays Life.

First, can you tell us a bit about your inspiration for the show?

Kate: “I think once I knew it was a possibility that I might be able to use Sting’s catalogue of music to tell a story, we did our first workshop where I interpreted six different songs and tried some ideas out. Within that workshop, it felt like this story of a broken family and going on a journey and it quickly became linked to ideas of mass global migration and refugees.

“Once that seed was sown, it was remarkably easy to jigsaw together all of his amazingly diverse songs with such different topics, poetry and styles, and actually form this story about refugees.

“Listening to Sting’s music and loving it all my life, I never knew that when I was going to try and tell a story, it would be something that was quite so vital and horribly sad. But also I know the show is ultimately incredibly joyous and a celebration of love and family and all that the human spirit can endure and how resilient people are”.

How does it feel to be working with Sting and his music?

Kate: “From the first time I met him, he’s always been the most down to earth, friendly, kind, and just a lovely person. Particularly making dancers feel really comfortable and appreciated.

“He has not stood in the way of a single one of my ideas, of how I could translate his music. He’s been incredibly trusting, which is weird for me, because I’m a superfan who went to see him at Wembley when I was a teenager. He’s like a global superstar and now I get to put his music on stage”.

What is your process when devising a new show?

Kate: “Since I’ve become a mum so much of my process has been at a desk rather than in a studio. All of Message In A Bottle is written up as a story, a story that no one will ever read, but it’s written for me and for the company and creatives to try and understand this fictional world that we’re making, who these people are, and give them some motivation for their choices.

“It’s also in my imagination. I listen to the music, and I scrutinize the lyrics and then I imagine it on stage, and if I can see it in my head, then I’m like, that’s all I need.
So, it’s all on paper and it’s structured, and then I set it out on stage, not as dance but as actors moving around the space. Once the structure is there, then I start turning it into actual steps and choreography and trying not to lose sight of the structure”.

Is it important to you that the real-world issues are reflected in your work?

Kate: “I think every production that I’ve ever made, whether I’ve intended it to initially or not, has always ended up in a really prominent way being about something that’s current and real, and people are experiencing.

“Everything we’ve made has been about something that’s true and important to me. Hopefully not in a preachy way. Always trying to do it in an entertaining way. I don’t want dance to be about nothing. I really don’t like abstract dance. I struggle with that. I want a real intention of meaning”.

How does it feel to have Message In A Bottle return for such a significant tour across 2023/2024?

Kate: “It’s a bit of a dream, to be honest, to be going abroad with this work. To think, that I could go to the Sydney Opera House in Australia, where I’ve never been before, and actually my name would be somewhere, like a little show that I’ve made up – that’s amazing.

“In the UK we’re toured twice with ZooNation and had young people from all over the UK who’ve trained with us. Growing up near Southampton, I didn’t have access to anything like that and I wish I’d been taken to stuff like that when I was younger. Going to a theatre is such a privilege, so hopefully we’re making this kind of work more accessible”.

And what’s it like sharing the work with audiences?

Kate: “I love watching audiences watch Message In A Bottle. They have this double reaction of loving the music and loving Sting’s work and realising, even for some people who might not know every song, how much more of the music they do know and how much it’s been in their lives. And then watching audiences watching those dancers, you get the sense of ‘how they are doing that?’ and ‘how are they are still going?’

“What I like about our company is it’s about how different each of them are. I hope that means that more people can see themselves on stage and they can also have a life of being a storyteller on stage, being a dancer if they wanted”.

What would you say to someone about coming to see a dance show for the first time? Why is Message In A Bottle a good choice?

Kate: “With Message In A Bottle, I would advise people to come with no expectations, no preconceived idea of what it is they come to see.

“When I was at the Olivier Awards, I was grabbed by a very nice lady who had brought her husband to see the show. He wanted to talk to me and He was like: ’I hate musicals and I hate dance shows. My wife always wants to go, and I never want to go.’

“But this show completely transformed and changed his mind. He loves it. He wants to see it again. He’s obsessed by it. He didn’t know things like this existed. He didn’t know that he could feel this way. He cried and he doesn’t know why he cried because he would never cry at something like that”.

The dancers are incredibly talented. Was it hard to find dancers with such a wide range of expertise?

Kate: “Yes. It’s always really hard. There’s a certain degree of skill exchange that happens throughout the rehearsal period and during performances. It’s impossible to find a breaker who’s a world class contemporary dancer. They do exist, but it’s rare.
We have always taken dancers on the basis that their training continues whilst we are in rehearsal. Some of the stronger breakers will spend time with a ballet or contemporary trained dancer and help them learn. And equally a ballet or contemporary dancer will help breakers learn to turn and jump, have lines and all the rest.

Message In A Bottle contains many different styles of dance. How do you put together all of those different styles in one show?

Kate: “There’s a contradiction in my mind when it comes to talking about dance. On one hand, I don’t think any dance should be pigeonholed, and on the other, I think it’s so important to understand the history and foundations of every style of dance and to train yourself in those styles so that you can be authentic and honour the style.
Art in itself has to be an expression of freedom. If something is expressing freedom, you can’t apply any rules to it, which means, dance is sacred, and you should be able to do anything you want with any dance.
It is a battle I have in my own mind because I can tell you there are hip hop foundation styles in the show, and there’s some more classical shapes and balletic moves. There’s a massive breadth of dance. And at the same time, there’s nothing but one thing and it’s just dance.

If it’s all dance, then what’s dance at its essence?

Kate: “I think dance is an expression of self where words aren’t sufficient. I think dance is something that every single human being is capable of. Our instinct as babies and children, when we hear music, is to dance. I think society educates us out of being able to dance. And that’s really sad, because it’s the most lovely, free, joyful expression of being alive”.

Message In A Bottle is at The Lowry, Salford from Thursday 27 to Saturday 29 July 2023.

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Acclaimed South African choreographer and dancer, Dada Masilo brings together European and African influences in her latest show which comes to The Lowry, Salford in March.

The Sacrifice blends contemporary dance with the unique rhythms and moves of Tswana, a traditional African dance inspired by one of the continent’s most iconic small animals – the meerkat!

Soweto-born Dada was 12 when she started contemporary dance and ballet classes. She went on to study in Brussels, one of just 30 dancers accepted to study at the acclaimed P.A.R.T.S school. However, on her return to South Africa she struggled to find productions which brought together the different international elements of dance and music which she enjoyed so much.

“To begin with I didn’t want to be a choreographer” she says. “But we had to create work as part of our training. Then when I came back to South Africa there were no choreographers making work that I wanted to perform.

“I wanted to do the narrative, the dance drama…and nobody was creating that kind of work. So, I thought ‘well if no-one is doing it, then it has got to be yourself!’

She has since created a series of hugely successful works which take Western classics and fuse them with elements of storytelling, movement and music from her own African heritage. Her re-interpretations of Carmen, Romeo and Juliet, Swan Lake and Giselle have been critically acclaimed worldwide.

Dada both creates the work and performs in all of her productions. “For me it’s easier to be both choreographer and dancer because I’m not sitting out watching what I want people to do, I’m doing it too. I want to feel what everyone else is feeling. Then I know that when I’m tired then everybody is tired. I need to be there, it is what I love to do.”

For The Sacrifice, blending traditions meant a lot of work for Dada and her dancers. The Tswana dance, traditionally performed at festivals, originated among the people of Botswana and is also popular in South Africa and Namibia. Although Dada and her cast knew of the dance, it took a lot of work for them to master its intricate movements.

“Tswana is a dance from my heritage which is inspired by the meerkat,” says Dada. “The meerkat is a very small, very fast animal and I was drawn to that because I love to move very fast. In the past, I’ve fused contemporary dance with flamenco, with ballet and many other things but not with a specific dance from my own culture so this is an opportunity to do that.

“I had to learn Tswana from scratch – I spent three months with a teacher, just by myself, and then we brought in the company for about a month. It was incredibly difficult but I always love learning something new.”

Dada also sought the advice of the elders of her community to ensure the work remained respectful of her people’s traditions.

“There is a section where we call out all our surnames, basically calling the ancestors and saying the ancestors have come, and I had to ask the elders whether that was all right to do. I needed to get their permission.”

The Sacrifice is inspired by Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring but Dada and her team have developed a new soundscape which is firmly rooted in African music.

“There are so many versions of The Rite of Spring set to Stravinsky’s music that I wanted to create a new score. I have four musicians, a percussionist, a violinist, a keyboard player and a singer, and they listened to Stravinsky’s music. Then I said ‘OK, what can we do with those references?’ and they created the score while I created the movement vocabulary. We worked closely together as the live music is such an important part of the show.”

The UK tour, which comes to The Lowry Theatre on 21 & 22 March, is presented by Dance Consortium, a group of 18 large-scale theatres with a mission to bring the best international dance to stages across the UK and Ireland.

“I’m forever grateful that we can take our work to different people in different countries,” says Dada. “It’s great to talk to different audiences and find out how they feel and what they think – because a lot of the time they will feel something different.

“It’s great to return to the UK. With this tour, we are going to quite a lot of new places so I’m really excited about being back in Canterbury.”

Dance Consortium presents Dada Masilo’s The Sacrifice at The Lowry, Salford on 21 & 22 March.

The post Dada Masilo on her new work inspired by the meerkat appeared first on Quays Life.

Is it right that you created Clorinda Agonistes – Clorinda The Warrior during the pandemic?

Shobana: “Well, I’d had the idea long before. My starting point was the beautiful baroque music of Claudio Monteverdi’s Il combattimento which I first heard almost 20 years ago. When the pandemic took hold – and especially when it turned out that 2021 was going to be a non-year – I decided it was time to really tackle the piece. That was what Clorinda would have done.”

Tell us a bit more about the character of Clorinda and the story of the piece?

Shobana: “She’s incredible. She is a character from a story set in the first Crusades. A female Saracen warrior with plenty of attitude. I was fascinated by her. In Monteverdi’s piece she is fighting the European crusader who is actually in love with her but doesn’t realise it is his beloved he is fighting. And Clorinda refuses to tell him her name. I have always wondered why”.

Can you say a little bit more about the music?

Shobana: “The first part of the work is set to Monteverdi and the second half is to a brand-new composition by the Syrian American composer, Kareem Roustom. I wanted to prolong Clorinda’s presence and thrust her into the 21st century to tell her own story. What would she be like? Would she be fighting in the streets of a Middle Eastern city? Four dancers play the role of the modern Clorinda. Kareem’s music evokes his own friends, families and colleagues who were forced to flee Syria or to stay and suffer in war-ravaged cities. I think it became quite personal for him”.

You’re also working with the singer Ed Lyon who features not just as a singer but a dancer too

Shobana: “Ed is a wonderful singer and a performer and I have really enjoyed working with him. He has been very generous, taking on my choreographic requests (which includes rolling on the floor) as well continuing to sing brilliantly”.

And what are you most looking forward to about performing the show at The Lowry where your company is making its debut visit?

Shobana: “The Lowry has always been a supporter of my company and it’s wonderful to be coming back”.

Clorinda Agonistes – Clorinda The Warrior is at The Lowry, Salford on 18 and 19 October 2022.

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The former Royal Ballet principal, who was born and grew up in Cuba, created Acosta Danza in 2015 to promote young talent and showcase performers from his home country. Since then the company has become hugely popular in Cuba, the UK and beyond.

“I had this great idea to create a company which didn’t look like any other company out there. The journey was always going to be hard and it needed a whole team of people who really believed in the idea,” says Carlos. “But I have managed to do it and I learnt a lot from it. I learnt that everything is possible.

“We called our first tour Debut because we were still in our early stages. But now we have a company which is more mature and with more repertory which means we can create a programme like Evolution. We have been evolving from that very first tour and I want to share that. With this programme, I know that we can do that.

“If you have the right energy and you convey your idea to people who believe in it, you can do wonders. That is what tells me to keep dreaming big.”

Carlos has always dreamed big. As a young boy growing up in hardship in the Cuban capital of Havana, he dreamed of being a football player but his father sent him to ballet school to keep him off the streets and to instil some discipline.

Initially reluctant to dance, Carlos’ talent impressed teachers and he went on to win a host of awards including the prestigious Prix de Lausanne. After performing with renowned companies around the globe, he joined the Royal Ballet in in 1998 becoming Principal Guest Artist in 2003. It was on retiring in 2016 that he created Acosta Danza, returning to Cuba to find his performers.

“When I audition dancers, I am looking for strong personalities, great commitment and great technique, whether contemporary or classical,” he says. “The dancers come from various different backgrounds and companies so I was looking to create a foundation on which to build.

“At the beginning I didn’t know how it would turn out because we started from zero – but everything has turned out just fine!”

It is a journey which continues. In 2017 Carlos opened the Carlos Acosta Dance Academy in Havana to train young dancers.

“We have 51 kids in the academy at the moment. We have a special programme for talented kids from disadvantaged backgrounds and we have children from other countries including the Dominican Republic, Brazil, Spain and Colombia,” says Carlos

“We are training them from an early age and giving them the signature of Acosta Danza so we now have a source that will feed the company in the future.

“This will keep up our vision and the direction of the company – a company which tackles the Cuban essence. Every choreographer that I have worked with, I ask them to find inspiration from the island and from its music and people so we can create work which is different from every other contemporary dance company.”

Much of that Cuban essence is evident in Evolution which features Christopher Bruce’s Rooster, Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui’s Faun, Pontus Lidberg’s Paysage, Soudain la nuit and Maria Rovira’s Impronta.

Set to hits by the Rolling Stones including Little Red Rooster, Paint it Black, Ruby Tuesday and Sympathy for the Devil, Rooster pokes gentle fun at cocksure males as they hit the town on the hunt for women. Created in 1991, it has been staged worldwide – and it’s a piece close to Carlos’ heart as he first performed it in the 1990s when he was a dancer with Houston Ballet. In the upcoming tour, Carlos returns to the stage as part of the cast.

“Rooster is a big crowd-pleaser and it’s great for me to be with the dancers, building our dream of this company together,” he says. “Sometimes a director is far removed from the dancers, just saying ‘go here, go there, do this, do that’ but it is something special when you put the director on the stage with the dancers. We are all breathing the same artistry and we look at each other’s eyes and pick up each other’s energy. They appreciate that I’m one of them, not just someone who tells them what to do!

“For me, every minute that I’m on stage counts as it’s not the usual thing for me any more. Before I was doing 100 shows a year and I would know that when one show was over there would be another one the next week but now that’s not the case. When I’m on stage I feel alive and now I know it could be the last time so I make sure I really enjoy it as much as I can.”

Maria Rovira, who created Impronta, has worked with Carlos and Acosta Danza on a number of projects and choreographed the recent film ‘Yuli’ based on Carlos’ life and autobiography ‘No Way Home’.

“Maria has a strong relationship with Cuba, she used to choreograph for the National Ballet of Cuba,” Carlos explains. “When I put the company together, I tried to look for choreographers who already had a connection to Cuba so I commissioned her to create her first work for Acosta Danza.

“Then there was an opportunity for a dance festival in Barcelona when she worked with the company and created Impronta. When there was the opportunity of the movie, she was the right person for that. So we have had this connection for a long time.

“Impronta was created for one of the dancers, Zeleidy Crespo, who is incredible. It’s Afro-Caribbean-based and very focussed on the individual performer. It’s a great addition to the show.”

Lidberg’s Paysage, Soudain, la nuit takes music by Cuban composer Leo Brouwer as the start point but that music is then re-worked by Swedish composer Stefan Levin. The set features an art installation by Cuban artist Elizabet Cerviño. For Carlos, this is a melding of different cultures to create something new and exciting.

“This piece has great atmosphere. You can see the subtlety of Cuban culture but from a European perspective which is very lovely,” he explains.

Cherkaoui’s Faun is inspired by the classic ballet L’Après-midi d’un faune and is set to Debussy’s original score with additional music by award-winning composer and producer Nitin Sawhney.

Again Carlos was keen to put the Acosta Danza stamp onto the piece. “Faun is a classic which is familiar to UK audiences but this time it is being danced by our dancers who have extraordinary bodies. To me, the piece becomes something else entirely with those dancers.”

This March and April Evolution travels to Southampton, Cardiff, Inverness, Bradford, Brighton, Canterbury, Salford, Plymouth, Newcastle and Nottingham after its premiere last autumn. The tour is presented by Dance Consortium, a group of 20 large-scale UK venues who work together to promote international dance. For Carlos, it is the ideal partnership.

“Working with Dance Consortium is an incredible opportunity for the company to go all over the country with this programme. Hopefully this is the beginning of a strong partnership so we can share our dance with regions across the UK. This tour takes us to a lot of venues we’ve not been before and we are really looking forward to it

“It’s great to bring top quality international dance to people’s doorstep so they don’t have to travel to Paris or other cities to see what is going on. Dance Consortium is a fantastic organisation for doing this – the more people understand other country’s cultures the more they understand the people of those countries. The arts help us to be more compassionate and tolerant of other peoples.”

In January Carlos became director of Birmingham Royal Ballet, a role he will combine with continuing to run Acosta Danza. Awarded the CBE in 2014, Carlos has for many years been based in both the UK and Cuba.

“Britain is like home to me,” he says. “The good thing about the British people is that they embrace difference. If you are different they see that as a good thing. They know talent when they see it and they really appreciate it, no matter where it comes from.

“I love the fact that a Cuban company can come here and the British welcome them like they are their own. It’s incredible when the audience stand up at the end of a performance and they are shouting and cheering. There has been so much love for us and we feed on that so we are looking forward to coming back and giving even more”.

Acosta Danza Evolution Spring 2020 tour is at The Lowry, Salford Quays on 24 and 25 March 2020. Visit danceconsortium.com for full tour details.

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