Despite its proclaimed diversity, the dramaturgy of the National Theatre ballet company has some invariables that mark the repertoire on a long time basis. With considerable intervals, the Prague ballet company presented three programmes assembling the works of top American choreographers under the cover title Americana. The free cycle titled Czech Ballet Symphony II can be seen as a sort of ‘domestic pendant’. These programmes are linked by Czech choreographers working with Czech music. With Czech Ballet Symphony II, the National Theatre participated in the celebrations of the Year of Czech Music. By the way, the autumn premiere of Návraty domů in Ostrava’s National Moravian-Silesian Theatre had the same motivation. The productions resemble in many ways: three composers (Bedřich Smetana, Bohuslav Martinů and Leoš Janáček in Ostrava; Bohuslav Martinů, Antonín Dvořák and Jan Jirásek in Prague) and three choreographers representing three different generations (Pavel Šmok, Jiří Kylián and Nataša Novotná in Ostrava; Jiři Kylián, Petr Zuska and Viktor Konvalinka in Prague). The names of the artists themselves imply that we have to do with “the best of” Czech ballet choreography. Judging by the Prague premiere, what is the state of Czech choreography then?
The programme opens with Field Mass. Bohuslav Martinů composed this musical piece to Jiří Mucha’s text in the fall of 1939, so at the very edge of the war, when his homeland, in which he did not live, was being crippled by the Nazi Germany. Jiří Kylián turned the Field Mass into a dance piece in 1980. At that time he was also living far from the oppressed country and he carried in himself a strong experience from the August 1968 occupation. The intensity of the personal experience and the relationship to the distant home imprinted themselves in the musical and choreographic style of the Field Mass. The world premiere of Kylián’s work stemmed from a painful creative process and even the general rehearsal was a debacle.
However, on the premiere the Field Mass demonstrated its power, the company danced like one, with deep immersion into the content of the piece. The content – that is what matters above all in the Field Mass. Obviously, Kylián created a beautiful dance composition in which twelve men fill the stage in original and fluid formations; a choreography, in which a dozen soldiers dance their prayer in brief tempo. But all this forms just a frame for the humanistic message of the piece, the intimate fear of every single soldier in battle - fear of the future mixed with the whole troop determination to fight for a higher cause. All these aspects make Kylian’s Field Mass an extremely difficult choreography to dance, as proved during the Prague premiere.
The National Theatre ballet company broke its teeth on this twenty-four year old piece. On the first as well as on the second premiere many things did not work. The timing did not correspond with the crucial musical accents, unison passages were breaking down, some dancers even struggled with the steps. Some company members lacked the most essential thing – the ability to express the ethos of the piece. Well executed steps are not enough in the Field Mass, it is necessary to feel the theme with your entire body. But where should we look for the causes? Possibly in the insufficient work of the assistants, lack of concentration and time during the rehearsals, risky three cast preparations that made some dancers learn several parts in such a demanding choreography. But what if the causes are more general? Does it not tell something about the experience of young dancers who are not confronted with the important event in their country’s history, who just live in a sort of pragmatic timeless place without any ideals uniting the society? And is Martinů’s, or let us say Kylián’s, message extremely topical, just looking eastwards of our boundaries?
Although there were brighter moments within the premiere of the Field Mass, e.g. Ondřej Vinklát’s bravura solo part, it was one of the worst performances of the National Theatre ballet company in the last years. Besides, the first ever performance of this piece in the National Theatre twenty-one years ago did not end up well either. Then, Jiří Kylián had it removed from the repertoire.
The second “movement” of the Czech Ballet Symphony II was a piece by Viktor Konvalinka, a talented dancer and choreographer, who has already created several shorter and mostly humorous works for the DekkaDancers dance company. He set his choreography Guru to the vocal composition by a contemporary artist Jan Jirásek, known namely for his much awarded film music. Guru is a mature work building on colourful dance vocabulary, intelligible dramaturgy and director’s sense for working with space and the choir installed behind the dancers and in some passages participating in the actions on stage. Using few props (a table convertible to a door, and small chairs) and Daniel Tesař’s good light design, Konvalinka tackled the topics of gurus as authorities trying to bring some order into the unbalanced society. Guru appears dressed in white underwear, step by step he puts on a close-fitting suit and thus assumes the role of society’s “manager”. For some time, the society abandons its habits symbolised by almost animalistic gestures. Whether the society matures in the end, or gets civilised under guru’s influence, is not clear because people return to the animal-like movements but simultaneously strip to the underwear. Is the cycle of metamorphosis closing? Can people become new gurus? Konvalinka’s choreography seems to suit the dancers better than Field Mass. Within both casts, the men in principle roles led the dance – the brief-in-movement and charismatic Francesco Scarpato and Kryštof Šimek.
Completing Czech Ballet Symphony is Petr Zuska’s new choreography to Dvořák’s Stabat Mater (part one). The oratory was created during the very sorrowful time of Dvořák’s life when he lost, one by one, his three children. The theme of mother grieving at her dead child became the central line of Zuska’s piece. It does not allude necessarily to Virgin Mary’s mourn over Jesus Christ, though the dominant scenographic symbol of a black cross-shaped opening with white beams branching out (very impressive visual design by Jan Dušek) implies so. In Zuska’s conception, it is a lamentation of a group of mothers trying to cry out all their pain. Female dancers with their hair down to reinforce the movement dynamism run often across the stage, they wring their hands and mourn lavishly. Many times they return into the few basic formations determined by light schemes (namely the light path leading from the black cross on the backdrop to the centre of the portal and some light circles placed all over the stage). This time, Zuska’s dance vocabulary is economic, but the dramaturgic structure seems rather unimpressive. The opening scene, when the female dancers emerge from the darkness of the black cross-shaped leak, makes the strongest impression. They are grief-stricken, back each other up, they chime in their chagrin. But later all we can see is a never-ending fast-paced sequence of movements and emotions of the chorus and of the solo dancer crudely exposed. There is no diminuendo, spiritual immersion, intimacy or pause that would accentuate the theme of child loss. As if in this respect Zuska was not in accordance with Dvořák. Zuska’s Stabat Mater fails to keep the audiences focused on the actions on stage as the music itself attracts their attention. In the final scene, the female dancers take off parts of their costumes and remain topless - their bare breasts might evoke the connection between a mother and her dead child. But I cannot make myself believe that ballerinas’ alabaster torsos correspond with mothers lamenting theatrically over the loss of their children.
The corps de ballet seemed homogenous, the company is after all familiar with Zuska’s movement vocabulary. The audiences are moved by the theme of child loss mainly thanks to Klára Jelínková’s excellent solo part in the second cast production.
Although Czech Ballet Symphony II is a mixed bill, it gives an impression of compactness. The individual choreographies are linked by spiritual energy of vocal choir compositions and of the themes they deal with. We can see many parallels among the pieces – all of them were created for similarly sized companies with one distinctive solo role. While in Field Mass the dominating feature is a man-warrior, in Stabat Mater it is a woman and maternity that are emphasized. Guru is then a probe into the shapeless social melange, in which the male world confronts the female one. All the choreographies culminate in “undressing” scenes. In Field Mass, naked chests face lethal shots, in Stabat Mater bare breasts symbolize the feeding of a dead baby, in Guru the underwear might signify a new beginning. Some similarities can also be traced in the choreographic techniques, especially in Kylian’s and Zuska’s works - e.g. in how they divide the chorus into smaller groups or how they separate individuals from an initially compact group and “scatter” them all over the stage.
The strength of Czech Ballet Symphony II lies in the music. All the three parts are accompanied by the well-prepared National Theatre orchestra conducted by David Švec. The effect of the compositions is reinforced by inventive placement of the choir (in Stabat Mater the singers stand in the boxes so the spectators sitting in the stalls may have the impression of being ‘in the centre of everything’). Superb and very humane was Ivan Kusnjer’s bariton part in the Field Mass and equally strong were the solos in Stabat Mater sung by Marie Kobielska, or Jitka Burgetová, Jana Sýkorová and Veronika Hajnová, Miloš Horák or Zdeněk Plech and Jaroslav Březina.
In terms of music, Czech Ballet Symphony II contributed with dignity to the Year of Czech Music. In terms of dance, feelings of awkwardness prevailed.
Written from the first and second premieres on 17 and 18 April, 2014, in the National Theatre, Prague.
Czech Ballet Symphony IIField Mass
Choreography: Jiří Kylián
Stage design: Jiří Kylián
Costumes: Jiří Kylián and Petra Lebdušková
Light design: Kees Tjebbes
Conductor: David Švec and Václav Zahradník Guru
Choreography: Viktor Konvalinka
Stage design: Jan Dušek
Costumes: Petra Lebdušková Stabat Mater
Choreography: Petr Zuska
Stage design: Jan Dušek
Costumes: Petra Lebdušková
Light design: Petr Zuska
Conductor: David Švec and Václav Zahradník
Assistant of choreography: Veronika Iblová and Alexej Afanassiev Translation: Tereza Cigánková
Josef Bartos
Thank you for your thoughts. One got stuck in my mind – that passion makes us different from AI. Just yesterday I read…I am a dance critic. I am a member of an endangered species