November 12th 2023

Pioneers
My last two visits to the Royal Opera House’s Linbury Theatre have been such a contrast.  The previous one was a dance-theatre adaptation of a play I saw in the West End, by Royal Ballet Principal Alexander Campbell.  This visit was my second time seeing Ballet Black, for their mixed bill Pioneers.
I really think Ballet Black are absolutely wonderful.  Founded by Cassa Pancho in 2001, Ballet Black celebrates dancers of Black and Asian descent.  And more than that, they make me question each time I see them what I take for granted about ballet.  This can be the big or the small things: diversity in bodies and skin tones being the most obvious.  But also unexpected pairings of men and women rather than typical man + woman pas de deux.  Or even a dancer wearing glasses on the stage.  Doesn’t sound revolutionary, but my friend and I both noticed it.  Ballet Black encourage you think about why you take certain things for granted and perhaps examine some assumptions or unconscious biases.  As well as providing a wonderful evening of entertaining dance.  Long may it last.
So on to the evening’s programme.  Pioneers consists of two works, both co-commissioned by the Barbican.  The first, Then or Now, combines ballet, music and the poetry of Adrienne Rich.  The second, Nina: By Whatever Means is a celebration in dance of the life of Nina Simone.

Adrienne Rich And Nina Simone
The works are incredibly different, and thus show off Ballet Black’s range.  My pick of the evening (even though it’s the one I’ve seen before) was the first, Then or Now.  It has a lyrical beauty which is incredibly moving. Adrienne Rich was an American poet, essayist and feminist. After first following a traditional path in life, she found herself radicalised by motherhood and later her sexuality. But her poetry was politically engaged rather than purely personal, and she wrote a lot in particular about white feminism, intersectionality, and racism and homophobia.
In Then or Now, eight members of Ballet Black dance to a score which includes poems from Rich’s collection Dark Fields of the Republic. It’s exquisite. The dance sequences to individual poems refer back to some of the key themes in Rich’s work: love, war, community and individualism, among others. The set and lighting is as simple as it can be, the dancers appear to wear rehearsal outfits in muted, natural tones. It’s uplifting and powerful, and also a real ensemble work, with all dancers given time and space to show off their abilities.
Nina: By Whatever Means is a totally different kind of work. Choreographed by company dancer Mthuthuzeli November, it is a costumed, biopic sort of affair. We see Nina Simone as a child developing a passion for music, as a young woman making her way in the world, playing in clubs, surviving domestic violence, and finally in all her glory in an extended performance of Sinnerman taken from a live recording. The main issue I had was that I missed an awful lot of it: for a touring production playing in different venues, it’s perhaps not wise to have so much take place stage right and upstage right. This aside, Nina: By Whatever Means is a powerful work featuring a passionate central performance by Isabela Coracy.

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By Kathrina Farrugia-Kriel

November 12th 2023

Sold-out performances for Ballet Black’s Pioneers (16-19 November) at the Linbury Theatre (Royal Opera House) signalled the presence of rising stars: Mthuthuzeli November‘s choreography in Nina: By Whatever Means, senior artist Isabela Coracy for her portrayal of singer-songwriter Simone, and their celebration of global black histories. Created earlier this year, November’s Barbican co-commissioned work about Simone brings together creatives including the long-standing lighting designer David Plater (costumes), Jessica Cabassa for costumes, together with the renowned South African jazz composer Mandisi Dyantyis and the Zolani Youth Choir, based in November’s hometown of Ashton in the Western Cape (South Africa). November is also credited with composing parts of the score, a musical narrative of Simone’s first album Little Girl Blue (1958) and recordings from a live performance from 1965, Dyantyis’ jazz compositions, and a piano motif that travelled through the 40-minute ballet.

Typical of November’s growing body of work, the narrative in the ballet is driven by racial and social activism: Simone/Coracy enters the stage to announce that this will be her last performance. Rewinding time, the ballet truncates Simone’s interest in music: her early life and growing up in poverty and also the Methodist church in North Carolina, and leaving home to pursue her studies in music at Juilliard. The use of the piano playing by the dancers has a mixed effect: it worked for the older two ‘Ninas’ but November could have explored the idea of ‘playing the right keys’ as a metaphor for tonal shifts in the movements for the youngest Nina.

The church scene is short, punchy, and reminiscent of Ailey’s Rocka My Soul in the Bosom of Abraham (in the iconic Revelations). Indeed, the first part of the ballet appears to be more like a pastiche of moments and movements; it is also the ‘setting the scene’ part of the ballet which lacks the typical tones of November’s choreographic identity. Nevertheless, as the dancers move into the club scene (I suspect the Midtown Bar & Grill in Atlantic City), the mood and the rest of the ballet shifts into a different gear. The dancers in this scene include the next rising star of Ballet Black, Puerto Rican/American Helga Paris-Morales who plays the teenage Nina quite exquisitely in the fleeting moment of narrative. Simone/Coracy meets Don Ross (‘the husband’ played by senior artist Ebony Thomas). The relationship between Simone and Ross spotlights November’s effective and intricate understanding in shaping a duet which rapidly transitions into marriage and then estrangement in quick succession. Thomas’ versatility in moving through different characters in the ballet, like a number of other dancers do within the work, reminds audiences that established, small-to-mid-scale touring companies survive on the adaptability of their dancers.

Ballets should finish on a crescendo, not peter out, and November’s ballet does just that. The highlight of the final section danced to Simone’s interpretation of ‘Sinnerman’ (or ‘Sinner man’ as Ailey referred to it in his masterpiece) is just a masterclass in honing the narrative of the powerful leading lady (Caracy, as Simone, revels in her strength to make Black people heard) and the fluid, ghost-like dancers who pulse through the rhythms of the iconic African American traditional song interpreted by Simone in 1965. Of course, November’s ballet capitalises on ‘Sinnerman’, which Simone sung at the end of every performance in Greenwich Village. In the ballet, Coracy rallies the audience to join in the pursuit of civil rights.

November’s ballet reminds audiences of the global issues still prevalent around race. It’s a cue that racism should be starved of oxygen and that Black women like Simone, Coracy, and Paris-Morales, have a much-deserved seat at the table. As Simone reminded her audience in 1965 (November does well to remind us too, in 2023): “To me we are the most beautiful creatures in the whole world… Black people. I mean that in every sense”. And November knows how to carve out his message, as Simone once said, “by whatever means necessary”. Like Simone’s political use of music, November uses dance as a political message. Ballet Black, November and the dancers are themselves pioneers – they play the right notes to celebrate Black culture, and their audiences know, and appreciate, that!

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Ballet Black: Pioneers

By Robert Beale

Wed 1st Nov 2023

Ballet Black is a very special company – just nine dancers on stage, almost all of them working flat out through the whole of a demanding double bill, and technically at the highest level of classical dance.

They’re also capable of delivering in totally different styles, from purest ensemble movement to story-telling ballet, where acting ability is as important as dance ability. Their two programmes, celebrating their 21st season, demonstrates that to the full.

Everyone’s a soloist in a small group such as this, but they do have some outstanding performers – particularly Helga Paris-Morales and Isabela Coracy, who take leading roles in both pieces on this bill.

Will Tuckett of the Royal Ballet created the first, Then or Now, in 2020, and it was seen in a few theatres in the autumn of that year, but now it’s getting a second lease of life. It’s a high-minded work based on words from Dark Fields of the Republic by American modern poet and activist Adrienne Rich, with music from the solo violin of Daniel Pioro. I find poetry as an accompaniment to dance often a bit of a mental overload, as you’re trying to take in verbal and visual concepts at the same time. Tuckett’s choreography doesn’t seek to expound every word of the texts anyway, which are read clearly but sometimes in rather passionless style by recorded voices; they alternate with recorded improvisations by Pioro based on Biber’s Passacaglia of 1676, and when the words have fallen silent and the original Biber is heard alone, the work takes off as dance.

Tuckett is constantly inventive, moving his dancers through solos, pas de deux, ensembles and ever-changing patterns (often built around a simple group of chairs on the stage), but there are little episodes with a scenarios of their own, such as the grim recollections of Deportations, and the playful and very enjoyable Love (… sends it), whose comic irony could hardly be missed.

The second work of the evening is NINA: By Whatever Means, created by Ballet Black’s own dancer-choreographer Mthuthuzeli November, about the black singer Nina Simone. This is a narrative ballet in the tradition championed by Northern Ballet Theatre in the years when Christopher Gable led it, and those who remember it may notice that one of the outstanding NBT dancers of that era, Charlotte Broom, is now Ballet Black’s rehearsal director.

We see Simone (born Eunice Waymon) in her childhood and youth in North Carolina, learning her music in church, moving to playing piano in clubs in New York and finally making it – but enduring an abusive marriage relationship despite her fame, and also lending her powerful support to the Civil Rights movement.

Mthuthuzeli November skilfully uses three main music tracks to sustain the whole story – one with the voices of the Zolani Youth Choir from his native township in South Africa, plus those of Ballet Black’s dancers, in God be with you till we meet again; Nina Simone’s own version of Mood Indigo; and the last her O Sinnerman from a live recording.

The work catches the imagination and the dancers tell the story brilliantly. Isabela Coracy becomes Simone with passion and charisma, and there is eloquent movement in all the solo roles. By the conclusion they had the Lowry audience on their feet with delight.

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Ballet Black: Pioneers

By Mahak Khan

Wed 1st Nov 2023

Now in their 21st year, Cassa Pancho’s Ballet Black presented award-winning choreographers, Will Tuckett and Mthuthuzeli November in a double bill of new and original work in Ballet Black: Pioneers at The Lowry.

Will Tuckett’s Then Or Now, created in 2020, blends classical ballet, music and the poetry of Adrienne Rich to ask the question: in times like these, where do we each belong?

Ballet Black: Pioneers

The first half of the show was called Then and Now.

It was choreographed by William Tuckett.

During the first half, each dancer got to recite a poem by Adrienne Rich.

It followed a range of events during World War Two and explored their impact on people and society through the eyes of individuals.

There were only chairs as props as the dancers sat down before they joined the performance.

Despite heavy storytelling, the dance was light and elegant and held a purpose.

Themes and meaning throughout this section appeared hard to see or connect but even to the untrained eye the skill of the performers shone through.

Using poems for the first half of the dance gave the dance perspective.

They all moved along to the words rather than the music and I found it very fascinating.

It was something I hadn’t seen before and I found to like it very much.

Nina: By Whatever Means

The second dance was called “Nina: By Whatever Means”. It is choreographed by Mthuthuzeli November.

Nina is played by Isabela Coracy, who smashes it out of the park.

It follows the life of Nina Simone as she navigates through her life and career.

It starts with an appearance of Nina at a jazz festival and then we go back in time from the beginning where we see her go from Unice Waymon to Nina Simone.

Amazing Costume Changes

There were many costume changes for this one and they had more props.

This added to the performance as they were very much dancing.

The piano played a very prominent part in this section as Nina Simone was a jazz singer and pianist (Who played Nina Simone), encapsulating the energy of Nina Simone.

When we started getting to the end of the performance, she carried on giving plenty of energy and got the audience clapping along.

It felt like her performance was as if we were watching just her in her element.

Black Ballet: Pioneers is a different take on ballet and it brings words to life through movement and dance.

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Ballet Black: Pioneers

By Jaimie Nackan

October 5th 2023

A single dancer on centre stage is accompanied first by silence, then by an isolated violin; as she begins her slow, lyrical spins and graceful extensions, she is watched by two audiences, one comprised of her fellow dancers seated in a circle around her. A voice rings out, relaying the first words of poetry that act as part of the score.

This begins choreographer William Tuckett’s piece Then or Now, the first in Pioneers. The double bill marks a North American debut for Cassa Pancho’s Ballet Black, a U.K. dance company committed to showcasing Black and Asian dancers.
Throughout Then or Now, Tuckett plays with synchronicity. The powerful words and poems of Adrienne Rich are combined with Daniel Pioro’s solo violin to create an evocative soundtrack —  the pieces falling in and out of a shared rhythm. The dancers’ movements also play with this duality; at times their movements become sharp, lining up with the cadence of the words and other times they play with abstraction, moving away from the words, towards either silence or music. They sway from moving as an ensemble to dancing to their own beat, one after the other. Rich’s words declare, “Sending love is harmless… Sending love is carefree,” as the dancers joyously open their chests to one another.

In a final quiet yet striking moment, a dancer previously alone at centre stage takes a seat amongst the others; she looks to the left, then to the right, then bows her face into her hands, joining the group in stillness.

Then or Now demands to be seen again. Despite the simplicity of the piece, there is somehow too much to take in all at once; we are forced to pick and choose where our attention goes — one moment the poetry is overwhelming, in others the dancers captivate with inspirational lunges and jumps or the haunting sounds of the violin take centre stage.

As the piece ends a shift takes place; the mood lightens as the voice of Nina Simone begins to serenade us during intermission, preparing a path into the second act. This shift is also reflected in the lighting design: bright blue, purple and red dominate the stage.

From the first moments of Nina: By Whatever Means, we are  drawn into Simone’s world.  Isabela Coracy portrays her with aching vulnerability and spellbinding passion, guiding us through Simone’s life by exploring her love of music, relationships and social justice activism. The piece opens with Coracy as Simone onstage at her last jazz festival appearance, inviting us into her life: “We will start at the beginning,” she says.

That beginning is at her piano where she learns to play music. The instrument is a focal point in the piece, it never leaves the stage. Coracy’s Simone transforms and shines in front of an audience, her confidence radiating through her music and movements. She easily shifts into what each moment requires, from the jive of the jazz bar with stomps, claps and hip shakes, to the power of a raised fist and a hand to heart during a march for freedom.

Mthuthuzeli November’s choreography is turbulent yet grounded in each emotion. In one particularly harrowing scene depicting a fight between Simone and her husband, portrayed by Ebony Thomas, he strips it back to simple movements: Coracy and Thomas move from tenderness to anger, spinning through their hurt in a frenzy.

Nina: By Whatever Means concludes with a frenetic sequence set to Simone’s heart-racing song, Sinnerman. Coracy commands the stage, inducing us to join in creating the pace with fast clapping. Cloaked figures run around her in a whirlwind of movement building the energy into a crescendo, giving us a final glimpse into Simone’s life and impact.
Both works create a distinct feeling in the theatre, each playing with a unique combination of music and words, forming intricate scores. Coracy is a standout with her unforgettable embodiment of Simone.

This North American debut from Cassa Pancho’s Ballet Black is a strong introduction to the company’s repertoire, making for an engaging evening of dance and emotion.

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By Emilia Voudouris, Sesayarts Magazine, 2023

October 3rd 2023

Cassa Pancho first encountered dance at the young age of two, when she walked into her first ballet class. It was love at first step. Encouraged by her school, she would try other dance styles such as tap (she hated the noise), musical theater and jazz. But she always knew what she liked, and her captivation was ballet.

Pancho is the founder of Ballet Black, a Neo-classical, British-based ballet company and dance school promoting inclusivity for Black and Asian dancers. Ballet Black’s classes are turning the once-staid world of ballet into a welcoming space – both on and off-stage – for everyone in the community. Ballet Black prioritizes bringing ballet to a more culturally diverse audience, a goal they are working towards by sharing their work overseas. The company has just arrived in Canada and will make its North American debut at the National Arts Centre in Ottawa, and then appear at Fall for Dance North in Toronto. The choreographies presented will include Then Or Now by William Tuckett, and Nina: By Whatever Means by Mthuthuzeli November. Attending one of these Ballet Black shows will be an opportunity to challenge preconceived notions of ballet and reimagine what dance can look like.

Growing up

Music was an integral part of Pancho’s upbringing, inside and outside of the classroom. With a British mum and a Trinidadian father, their family flat was always bustling with a diverse mix of sounds and tastes. Michael Jackson, Jimi Hendrix, Glen Miller, and Vivaldi were never far. The family’s Caribbean roots were represented with abundant Calypso and Soca. And the UK made itself known with The Beatles. From an early age, this melange of musical cultures would inspire and enrich her. Her familial, musical and cultural connection to these different worlds allowed her to become a bridge between cultures and to celebrate the beauty in each.

But her mixed upbringing also posed challenges for young Cassa. First, it was a dawning awareness of difference: she would eat West Indian curry for dinner when her friends ate pizza and chips. But at eight years old, that sense of difference metastasized when someone spat on her on the street. “I was really confused, and didn’t know what it meant at the time”, she explains, but this brush with racism would not be an isolated incident.

Because she is mixed and light-skinned, her ballet teachers would verbalize racist rules – about what black people could and could not do – in her presence: “They spoke freely because they thought there was no presence in the room that was reflective of who they were talking about.”

Starting with a question

Her studies in dance at Durham University required Pancho to write a final dissertation, but she could not bear to write again about the usual topics, such as exercise or nutrition. She instead chose to write “All Things Black and Beautiful”, an analysis and appreciation of Black women in ballet. Her goal was to interview Black ballet dancers in the UK, in order to study their experiences in British ballet. There was just one problem: she could not find any who were working in the UK. The few who had trained there in the 1970s had been told that they would not find work, and so had left to pursue careers in the US.

This is when Pancho reframed her dissertation’s central question to “WHY aren’t there any black women in ballet?” When she sat down with women who were still training or working professionally in contemporary dance and listened to their stories, the answer was distressingly simple. Almost every one of them had been the only Black person at their studio, and they had been actively discouraged from becoming ballet dancers.

Lack of representation is one of the most fundamental barriers to aspiration – so once again, Pancho got to thinking. What if a company were run by a mixed-race woman? What if the instructors leading the class were Black? What would that do to the power structure in the room? With these questions as her foundation, Pancho opened a small, Black-led class of six dancers – and found the dynamic was instantly changed. Seeing was believing: with role models who looked like them, these young Black dancers felt like they belonged and were supported. As a result, they stretched, grew and aspired to more.

No quick fixes

The goal was clear: to get more Black dancers onto professional stages. But this required starting at the beginning: by giving Black children strong role models and training from the age of three. “Nowadays, we can name Carlos Acosta and Misty Copeland, two very famous black ballet dancers, but when Ballet Black started you couldn’t name a dancer who’d made it big in ballet who was Black.”

It was also important for children and families to see career paths in ballet outside of the stage – for instance, in the worlds of choreography and production. Pancho knew well the time commitment and the emotional and financial investment required to support a child’s pursuit of any craft at an elite level: “You can’t just have a willing child. You need a willing family.” And that willingness increases as the range of possible rewards for pursuing dance widens. It also increases when prospective dancers and family members become part of the audience. “The whole thing is about demystifying what ballet means” – which means diversifying who wants to go and see ballet.

Of course, truly inclusive and welcoming environments require more than mere words and intentions. They are built on actions and experiences. Iconic ballet attire has always been pointe shoes and tights, which for the longest time were limited in colour and size. For this reason, in 2017 Pancho collaborated with Freed of London, a world leader in Handcrafted Dance Shoes, to create two new colours of brown pointe shoes and tights. Tangible objects – especially objects of clothing – are important. And this collaboration has meant that “if you’re a young black girl you can go to a ballet shop and see there’s stuff in your skin colour. So you know – without us preaching it to you – that ballet is for you. There’s a space for you in ballet.”

Money matters

The loving support of friends and family kept Pancho motivated, but back in 2001, she had no funding to back her project. She was not a famous dancer or brilliant choreographer: she was a fresh-out-of-school student with no reputation to trade on. But for Pancho, obstacles are lessons. When she encounters a new challenge, she learns how to navigate it.

So in the beginning, Pancho was not focused on a transformative vision and long-term plans. Rather, she asked herself the next question, then figured out how to answer it: “How do I get that class started? And then how do I come back and do it again? It was very small increments of progression.” Through steady steps, Ballet Black grew into today’s company of ten dancers and school of 200 children.

As the company has evolved, what has never dimmed is Pancho’s consciousness of the role of money in a budding dancer’s career. This is why Ballet Black does not offer internships. There is no expectation for people to work for free. Instead, Pancho wants to foster an environment where people can learn, work, and make a living. “Some people come from backgrounds where they have family cash to support an internship,” she says, “and there’s nothing wrong with that. It just means it’s the same people who get the jobs every time. And it’s been like that in ballet as well – something only wealthy caucasian elites can do.”

Ballet Black

“Until Ballet Black, we didn’t have anything like Dance Theater of Harlem”, says Pancho, referring to the American Ballet company founded by Arthur Mitchell and Karel Shook. “We had small contemporary and African dance groups, but we didn’t have anything in classical ballet.” In the UK, ballet usually starts in a church hall and community spaces: “You don’t go to a big fancy studio. You start with an old, out-of-tune piano and a chair for a barre”. Though ballet starts out as an everybody-can-take-part activity, it tends not to remain that way.

One of the biggest struggles in building up Ballet Black has been the denials of racism from both the Black and white communities: “A lot of people say there is no racism, and you just have to be the best now…. And yes, you may be as good as someone else, but there are other barriers that you hope you won’t have to navigate.” Ballet Black was a major irritant to the ballet establishment in its early days, and “it took about a decade to shake off that tag of just being a young girl who is a bit uppity and doesn’t know her place.”

Pancho’s prowess in asking the right questions, building new answers, and advocating on behalf of those answers has enabled Ballet Black to become the force it is now. “The rigour of ballet technique is still there, but the fact that people involved are from different backgrounds, and that the company is called ‘Ballet Black’ forces people to ask why . . . There’s a shift there. And it really bothers a lot of people.” The bottom line is simple: “a lot of people don’t like that we exist. But I just want to open it up for everybody, you know?” For this reason, it is essential that those who join Ballet Black understand the very real barriers imposed by racism. While some dancers in the company may not feel personally affected, other dancers can attest to the ways racism has made their lives more difficult: “What I don’t want is anyone in the company denying that experience that other people may have had… You don’t have to be a spokesperson for anti-racism, but you need to believe in the goal of the company.”

Inspiration and outreach

Rather than presenting the thousandth remake of Swan Lake, Ballet Black has pioneered the creation of new, relevant works and choreographies that reflect the world today. In doing so, it has become an integral element of the British ballet scene. Pancho’s work has inspired other ballet companies to celebrate the diverse roots and potential of dance and self-expression.

And right now, she and the company “are all very excited to come to Canada. Most of us haven’t been before.” The performances Ballet Black has prepared for their North American debut will be held on October 3rd and 4th at the National Arts Centre in Ottawa and on October 6th and 7th at Meridian Hall in Toronto. The performances combine classical ballet, poetry, and activism to explore the notion of home and belonging. 

Ultimately, Ballet Black is on a mission: “post-Brexit and post-COVID, this is the start of Ballet Black taking this work, this ethos, and these ideas further than the UK, to other places around the world.” And she feels strongly that this outreach through the Ballet Black experience is “all very positive. There’s nothing negative. Although we do talk about racism and things like that, if you see the actual show – however you feel about race, or where you are in the spectrum of believing – the show itself is a very inspiring and uplifting thing.”

With open eyes and open heart, Cassa Pancho has relaxed the rigidity of the ballet world. Through the work of Ballet Black, she has asked – and answered – tough questions one by one. She has used discipline, strength and flexibility to understand – and to solve – representational and monetary challenges. And she has applied the essence of dance to create a diverse and dynamic community that bridges the gaps between church halls and professional dance studios, and individual aspiration and the larger dance ecosystem. 

Her lifelong work is a celebration of her love of dance and a testament to her gift of nurturing and strengthening community. Ballet Black has bloomed not only as a successful company, but as a powerful force driving change in the world of dance. 

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Ballet Black: Pioneers

By Beth Blakemore
1st July 2023

Following the success of their 20th anniversary season, Ballet Black have once again returned to Scotland with their new show, Pioneers. As the title suggests, this latest double bill is an homage to two trailblazing artists and activists, and unsurprisingly proves to be just as memorable as the two women who inspired it.

The first pioneer is feminist poet Adrienne Rich, whose poems lay the foundations for Act I’s piece, Then or Now. In this spoken-word performance, the company’s moves are led by poems selected from Rich’s collection Dark Fields of the Republic (1991-1995). Accompanying Rich’s words is a pre-recorded solo violin performance by Daniel Pioro titled Then or Now (after one of Rich’s poems), which offer improvised variations of a theme by seventeenth-century composer, Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber.

With the Festival Theatre’s stage sparsely populated by white chairs and a few standing stage lights, all eyes are on Ballet Black’s dancers – particularly Helga Paris-Morales, who opens and closes the piece. Moving to the rhythm of Rich’s recited verse and Pioro’s violin, the dancers effortlessly transition from solo to group dances, weaving around one another. The power and precision of the dancers is simply exquisite, with Paris-Morales’ facial expressions in particular conveying the weight of some of Rich’s more pertinent and heavier themes.

Admittedly, there is some disconnect between the poetry and performance. Despite having three performers read Rich’s work (Hafsah Bashir, Natasha Gordon, and Michael Shaeffer), there is little space left between them, and the poems slowly begin to merge into one another. This leads Rich’s “spoken score”, which varies in its imagery and tone, to be slightly jarring at times, detracting focus from the performers onstage. As a result, the more striking moments come towards the end of the piece, when the dancers are left dancing solely to Pioro’s beautifully fragile and tender accompaniment.

While Act I may not have the same edge as previous Ballet Black performances, Act II serves as a reminder of the extraordinary work this company is capable of curating. NINA: By Whatever Means is inspired by the life and work of singer and activist Nina Simone. Exploring Simone’s private and professional life, the piece tracks Simone’s trajectory from child church pianist to household name, while also offering us a brief glimpse of her turbulent relationship.

Playing the role of Simone is Senior Artist Isabela Coracy, whose commanding presence emulates Simone and captivates the audience from the outset. Her duet with Alexander Fadayiro is a gut-wrenching but sensitively choreographed depiction of the domestic violence Simone endured during her second marriage. Confined to a small, suffocating space demarcated by the set, the pair effectively convey the suffocating tension felt within their marital home.

While the piece may be a somewhat incomplete and disjointed narrative of Simone’s life, the payoff comes in the final number. What starts off as a nod to the injustice and terror fought against by the civil rights movement – with the hooded ensemble walking on and off the stage with various protest signs – culminates in a breath-taking group performance of Simone’s Sinnerman with Coracy at the centre. It’s in this thrilling conclusion that choreographer Mthuthuzeli November’s own pioneering talent shines through, with many audience members instantly on their feet as soon as the music stops.

Indeed, while this double bill may pay homage to key figures of the past, it is important to recognise Ballet Black as pioneers in their own right. For once again, they triumph in showcasing how boundless ballet can be.

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By Vivien Devlin
30th June 2023

The Trinidadian-British dancer, Cassa Pancho founded Ballet Black in 2001 with the aim to create a platform for young, aspiring Black and Asian performers. Pioneers is a double bill of new and original works celebrating the life and legacy of two American artistes, the poet, Adrienne Rich and singer/song writer, Nina Simone.

Then Or Now blends the cool, classic choreography by Will Tucket with a soundtrack of poems by Adrienne Rich and ‘Variations on a theme’ by Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber’s “Passacaglia” for solo violin.

Rich explores such themes as sexual identity, feminism, social injustice and war reflecting on the joy of love and nature as well as a visionary anger at a changing world.

The score echoes the lyrical rhythm of the spoken words as the ensemble of eight dancers perform in soft shadow and with slow pace, their varied solos and duets responding to the emotional mood of the poetry.

‘In those years, people will say, we lost track, Of the meaning of we, of you, we found ourselves reduced to I.’

Remembrance and loss is captured in elegantly classical steps, all elongated arms and fingers in perfect arabesque poses. In a series of pas de deux, the women are lifted, swung around, upside down with swift acrobatic sweeping motion, highlighting the physical masculinity and dominance of the male dancers in contrast to the weaker sex.

The narrative is rich in atmospheric imagery, describing a woodland, stars and moonlight in the night sky, the flourishing growth and decay in nature.

‘Wild pink lilies erupting, tasseled stalks of corn
in the Mexican gardens, corn and roses.
Shortening days, strawberry fields in ferment
with tossed-aside, bruised fruit.’

Eloquently performed by Daniel Pioro, the sombre resonance of the violin strings, shifts from slow melodic sequences to strident chords evoking the passing of time, life and death. A memorable scene features delicately graceful balletic steps en pointe by a trio of girls, as they flit and flutter, swoop and soar like birds through the air.

Other notable ballets inspired by writers, Woolf Works ( Virginia Woolf) and Shutters Shut (Gertrude Stein), do not rely on the text to be audible, but allow the dancers to dramatise literary themes. In Then or Now, three actors read the poems in a rather dull, monotonal voice which often distracts from the exquisite movement and interrupts the ebb and flow of the soulful music. The definition of ballet, after all, expresses a story without language.

Nina Simone was fiercely ambitious, determined to find success as a classical pianist despite being a woman of colour. Nina: By Whatever Means by Mthuthuzeli November, the South African dancer and choreographer, is described as a love letter to the musician and civil rights activist. 2023 is the twentieth anniversary of her death.

Nina was ‘young, gifted and black’ (the title of her 1960s protest song) and taught to play the piano as a child specialising in classical music. As a dance drama, we see Eunice Waymon, a young girl sitting at the keyboard centre stage, before her life story is rapidly re-enacted: from gospel singing in Church, she was introduced to jazz clubs where she found work as a singer and pianist. Eunice transforms into Nina with a sensual, introspective and powerful performance by Isabela Coracy.

With energetic rhythm, synchronised, syncopated foot-tapping routines illustrate the colourful cultural music scene in Philadelphia and New York. With a minimalist stage set to depict her apartment, we witness the volatile, cruel behaviour of her husband Andrew in an intimate duet of threatening confrontation.

Nina becomes involved in civil rights movement and placards are paraded in a demonstration to fight for black people to live without fear or segregation in an equal society.

To a recording of Sinnerman, (Nina’s reimagining of a Scottish folk song), Isabela Coracy stands proudly at the microphone in a glamorous, white silk gown. But then a haunting group of grey shrouded, hooded figures like silent monks pirouette around her, perhaps the demons infiltrating her mind, as she appears lost in a fog of deep despair.

November has certainly devised this ballet with passion and commitment to tell Nina’s story but unfortunately chooses to concentrate on the dark days of her mental breakdown with exaggerated, often unsubtle theatricality.

Through her unique fusion of gospel/blues/jazz/folk music and song, paired with slick, sassy choreography, this could have been a glorious celebration and tribute to the legacy of the High Priestess of Soul.

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By W J Quinn
30th June 2023

Ballet Black, now in their 22nd year, finally bring their 2020 creation Then or Now to the Festival Theatre stage after Coronavirus put pay to that year’s touring plans. Choreographed by the renowned William Tuckett, it’s quite the jigsaw. The soundtrack, centred upon von Biber’s ‘Passacalagia for solo violin’ (1676) flows from the violin of Daniel Pioro, encouraged to include his own improvisations. The spoken word intertwined with these, draws from the work of Adrienne Rich (1929 – 2012), performed by a three strong cast. These elements are woven into a single recorded track, leaving the 8 strong troupe to execute Tucker’s demanding, and cunningly woven intentions, with no margin of error.

Dominated by Rich’s love-powered, though unsentimental poetry, the action resembles a meeting, the dancers first arranged in chairs around the stage. Whether congregation or support group, the piece evolves with each poem, evoking conversation, philosophy, and the transmissibility of love. The pointe technique is particularly exceptional, as is the nigh-silence with which the talented group traverse the stages.

Solo’s evolve through duet into full cast choreographies, the whole performance a knot being tied and untied, straying between literal interpretation to abstract with organic ease. The readings are effortlessly elegant, the music simple, but not simplistic, Pioro finding something muscularly modern in the centuries’ old Sonatas.

Ultimately recorded music, however excellent, as Pioro’s is, can never be reactive, and only reacted to. On one hand it creates a thrilling tight-rope which the performers walk with style. However I do lament the loss of conversation between musician and dancer. Which is not to say Then or Now isn’t a thoughtful, and accomplished piece. Indeed this is elegant sophistication in peerless action.

The second in Ballet Black’s touring programme is genre-transcending Mtuthuzeli November’s NINA: By Whatever Means, an explicit love letter to jazz icon and civil rights champion, Nina Simone. Best described as a montage of scenes from the great musician’s childhood and into her adulthood, the piece is dominated by a magnetic Isabela Coracy in the central role. Indeed were she any less powerful or eye-demanding, the piece might well fall a little flat.

In contrast to the precise technique centred in the first ‘act’, NINA’s choreography exists in service to a distinct, and not at all abstract narrative. The result is an impassioned, energetic march through Simone’s prime, which if a little stop/go to begin with, matures into a roaring recreation of one woman’s stand against a structurally racist status quo.

It’s these final sequences, beginning with a searing depiction of civil unrest, and racially motivated violence, and culminating with a triumphal lip-sync to ‘Sinnerman’ that NINA: By Whatever Means, truly catches fire. There’s a terrifying sharpness to spinning tumbling conflict, followed by an undeniably stadium rock sensibility to the closing moments.

The post The Quinntessential Review, 30th June 2023 appeared first on Cassa Pancho's Ballet Black.

Ballet Black: Pioneers

By Stephanie Green
30th June 2023

Pioneers: Ballet Black is an inspired pairing of dance pieces, both in terms of subject matter and in their exploratory choreography. Then or Now choreographed by William Tuckett celebrates Adrienne Rich the Modernist poet and Nina: By Whatever Means by Mthuthuzeli November celebrates Nina Simone, jazz singer, songwriter and pianist, both iconic Feminist figures who broke the mould of their art forms, forging new expressions of rawness and honesty and were both also concerned with Civil Rights, justice and equality.

Then or Now is exquisite, a sophisticated, elegant interweaving of three different strands – violin, spoken voice overs of Rich’s poetry from Dark Fields of the Republic and abstract dance all of which follow their own paths but are united by rhythm. There is an improvisatory feel to all three and in fact that is how they were each created. The recorded improvised violin composed and played by Daniel Pioro plays on notes taken from Biber’s Passacaglia (1676), the dance moves, superbly fluid classical choreography blended with contemporary expressivity does not merely imitate the subject matter of the poetry but was improvised around the music. There is no mere imitation of the subject matter except in one section where sending love was mimed – a segue which maybe cheapened the piece but added variety. Simple lighting and practice costumes mirror the ascetic feel. Overall the piece becomes mesmeric and creates a meditative space to contemplate the poetry, for instance, that we now are too concerned with the ‘I’ – personal poetry and forget the importance of ‘we’ which connects with community in these times of the ‘dark bird of history.’

In contrast, Mthuthuzeli November’s Nina: By Whatever Means is Afro-ballet fusion, a narrative piece with both poignancy and punch, overtly activist. Sadly in these times of racial prejudice, the message is still relevant. Isabela Coracy’s aggressive stare at the audience as she stands front of stage by a microphone on her first appearance in a silver dress and turban as Simone is unforgettable, followed by her superb dancing. It is not just a list of Simone’s greatest hits (which would have gone down a treat, of course) but deals with her difficult life, the music composed by November and Mandisi Dyantyis using only Simone’s Mood Indigo and Sinnerman. Following Simone’s early piano lessons as a child (a section which is slow and goes on far too long), it moves through lively gospel (recorded voices of the Zolani Youth Choir) and a brilliant jazz club scene, scope for colourful costumes and funky moves, with Simone crouching over the piano. Later scenes of civil disturbance, shown by the ensemble in scary shroud-like robes running in circles holding placards about ‘Segregation’ and ‘Alabama Brutality’. The most visceral section was the raw anger of the abusive relationship with Simone’s husband. The show builds to a crescendo of pounding bare feet, with the bent backs of African dance to Sinnerman ending on a positive note of joy and power.

Founded by Cassa Pancho, Ballet Black is now in its 21st year and going strong.

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