The occasion was the 10th anniversary celebration of Ivan Putrov\u2019s Men in Motion<\/em>, his homage to the importance and evolution of the male dancer. Its continued success relies on Putrov\u2019s ability to invite both dancers and choreographers who we do not often see in the UK to perform alongside some of our most highly regarded artists based in Britain. What he gave us was twenty different pieces from a huge range of choreographic languages, old and new.<\/p>\n His own contribution was in Frederick Ashton\u2019s Dance of the Blessed Spirits<\/em>, looking in remarkably good shape, given his semi-retired status. It\u2019s clear he is still very popular as a dancer and as an impresario.<\/p>\n It opened with the Royal Ballet\u2019s Luca Acri and Fumi Kaneko (the token female dancer of the evening) dancing the pas de deux from Le Spectre de la rose<\/em>. After a serious delay opening front of house, then a further fifteen minutes once we were seated, it was a relief that the curtain went up at all. Both are accomplished dancers and gave perfectly credible performances but they were very present day interpretations.<\/p>\n There followed many different accounts of solos and duets which were all of interest at the time and superbly danced, yet somehow the lines became blurred quite quickly and it was difficult to distinguish each choreographic voice. BRB\u2019s Jack Easton created a lovely but not necessarily striking solo, Fremd<\/em>, for himself. Stuttgart\u2019s Matteo Miccini, a dancer of remarkable talent, danced two solos, Edward Clug\u2019s SSSS\u2026<\/em> and Marco Goeke\u2019s \u00c4ffi<\/em>. Both of them suited him well but felt like overkill by the end of the second one. The Royal Ballet\u2019s Vadim Muntagirov showed once again his sublime elegance in the Prince\u2019s solo from the end of Act I, Swan Lake<\/em> and in Alexey Miroshnichenko\u2019s Adagio<\/em>.\u00a0 No one seems able to touch him when it comes to purity of line and classicism. The first real surprise came in Hans van Manen\u2019s witty solo from 5 Tangos<\/em> and the introduction to UK audiences of Koyo Yakamoto from Dutch National Ballet. Not only does he possess an enviably smooth technique but he has a strong connection with the audience, a charming and winning smile.\u00a0 Later, he and his colleagues Isaac Mueller and Guillermo Torrijos, gave an engaging and warm performance of Milena Sidorova\u2019s Bloom<\/em>.<\/p>\n Dmitry Zagrebin, currently with Royal Swedish Ballet, gave firecracker performances in the Gopak from Taras Bulba<\/em>, the Mazurka from Suite en Blanc<\/em> and in the last performance of the evening, Lacrymosa<\/em> by Edward Stierle. The latter had the advantage of having exquisite voices singing in the box closest to the stage: Belinda Evans, Vanessa Heine, Stephen Kennedy and Peter Wilde-Willcock. Ballet Black\u2019s Jos\u00e9 Alves danced two very contrasting solos and was equally good in both. Eightfold: Love<\/em> by Peter Leung was the more lyrical of the two and it was fascinating to see Bronislava Nijinska\u2019s Le Train Bleu<\/em> (1924) performed alongside so much contemporary choreography and still hold its own.<\/p>\n The Royal Ballet\u2019s Matthew Ball had a trio of excerpts. A startling and powerful performance as the Swan in Matthew Ball\u2019s Swan Lake<\/em>, pas de deux from Act II (Acri was his captivated Prince). I was not as taken with the solo from Christopher Bruce\u2019s Swansong<\/em> – perhaps my concentration (near the end of the show) was beginning to fade by then.\u00a0 However, his duet with Joseph Sissens, Christopher Wheeldon\u2019s Us<\/em> was a sublime rendition from both.<\/p>\n The end of the first half and the start of the second, saw a couple of stand out performances bring delight to the Coliseum audience. Both were choreographed by the inimitable, imaginative, theatrical and unforgettably quirky Arthur Pita, and both pieces smacked of charisma before one even began to analyse the attributes of the individual artists. As it happens, the two dancers revealed new dynamics to their talents. Soloist Leo Dixon (RB) danced Volver Volver<\/em> (originally created for Edward Watson), a piece that examined the secret vulnerabilities of a superhero (Spiderman). With his chiselled good looks and clean technique, a wicked sense of humour emerged combined with an uncanny ability to turn the humour into pathos. A star turn! Watson, coming out of retirement, was the protagonist in A Sheila Dance<\/em> to Mozart\u2019s Piano Concerto No. 21 in C Major. Dressed in a sequinned swimsuit, high heels and a fag hanging out of his mouth, it was simply delectable to watch him strut his stuff and prove he will be eternally watchable, in no matter what guise. Bravo Ivan Putrov – for providing us with an evening of treats.<\/p>\n Deborah Weiss<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" 10th Anniversary Gala in\u00a0London Coliseum Photos \u00a9 Elliott Franks The occasion was the 10th anniversary celebration of Ivan Putrov\u2019s Men in Motion, his homage to the importance and evolution of the male dancer. Its continued success relies on Putrov\u2019s ability to invite both dancers and choreographers who we do not often see in the UK […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":55394,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[72],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-55375","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-performance"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danceforyou-magazine.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55375","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danceforyou-magazine.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danceforyou-magazine.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danceforyou-magazine.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danceforyou-magazine.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55375"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.danceforyou-magazine.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55375\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":55385,"href":"https:\/\/www.danceforyou-magazine.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55375\/revisions\/55385"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danceforyou-magazine.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/55394"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danceforyou-magazine.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55375"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danceforyou-magazine.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55375"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danceforyou-magazine.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55375"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.danceforyou-magazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/Ivan-Putrov-in-Dance-of-the-Blessed-Spirits-Men-in-Motion-\u00a9-Elliott-Franks-6.jpg\")
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