Carmen get it: Red-hot Canadian export set to deliver
Carmen, the fiery Gypsy temptress who pushes the men in her life to the explosive limits, has always fascinated artists of many generations. She inspired Georges Bizet's most popular opera and triggered Roland Petit's 1949 production, which was specially choreographed for his beloved wife and favorite ballerina Zizi Jeanmarie.
In 2003, the Canadian choreographer Jean Grand-Maitre created his own Carmen for Alberta Ballet. The production of romance, seduction and uncontrollable passion has become the most in-demand show of the company.
Alberta Ballet's General Director Michele Stanners says Carmen has always met with appreciative audiences. "It's the vibrancy of the whole production that people love," says Stanners.
The one-hour-long ballet made waves in China when Grand-Maitre took the company to perform at the First Beijing International Dance Festival in 2003. Nicole Caron as the temptress Carmen dominated the stage. When she and Kelley McKinlay, who played her naive lover, danced, the sparks flew. The show's success earned Alberta Ballet another invitation to return with the production the very next year.
"Alberta Ballet's Carmen is a portrayal of magical, captivating dance that exalts sensuality and an alluring sexual energy. It is an emotionally vivid and dramatic ballet that echoes the percussive, strikingly memorable score," says Li Yu, general manager of Tianqiao Theater, the presenter of Alberta Ballet's 2004 China tour.
He was so impressed by Carmen when it was performed in Beijing in 2004 that he invited the company to return again for the third time.
Twenty-eight dancers and 18 support staff toured Shanghai and four cities in East China's Zhejiang Province in September, and will wrap up the tour in Beijing with a performance at the Centenary Hall of Peking University on September 21 and two performances at Tianqiao Theater on September 25 and 26.
"In last three years, Alberta Ballet continues to grow its reputation world-wide," says 44-year-old Grand-Maitre. "Our dancers develop their skills and enhance their knowledge of the world's infinite cultures greatly by touring."
China, according to Grand-Maitre, has become the premier touring market for some of the world's best-know ballet companies and he is proud Alberta Ballet is among them.
Born in Hull, Quebec, Grand-Maitre began his dance training at York University in Toronto and later danced with Ballet British Columbia and Theater Ballet of Canada. He was, by his own admission, never a great dancer. His real ambition was to choreograph. "I was more curious about the process of how you put steps together than in interpreting them," he says.
In 2002, Grand-Maitre assumed the artistic leadership of Alberta Ballet, which began as a small, amateur ensemble founded in Edmonton in 1966 and completed a successful merger with Calgary City Ballet in 1990.
Under his direction, Alberta Ballet has enjoyed considerable success both artistically and financially. Dance critic Michael Crabb recently wrote in New York City's prestigious Dance Magazine: "Rapidly emerging as the Canadian troupe to watch, the originality of its programming combined with the passionate commitment of its dancing has earned Alberta Ballet a strong following at home and growing attention abroad."
Grand-Maitre wants to shape Alberta Ballet as a contemporary ensemble with an innovative repertoire and dancers who are powerful communicators.
"I do not intend to let them hide in their technique," he says. "I want them to be dancing on the edge. That is what makes our art exciting."
His ballets are highly theatrical. He seeks dancers with strong dramatic potential. He collaborates with his favorite designers to create environments that amplify the choreography's poetic or emotional intent. His approach is very much that of a theater director and he's not afraid to mix things up.
Grand-Maitre's Carmen takes Russian composer Rodion Shehedrin's astringent re-scoring of Bizet's original and combines it with excerpts from the actual opera, sung live.
To warm-up the audience for Carmen, for this China tour, Grand-Maitre chose George Balanchine's Who Cares? - a light-hearted, jazzy concoction that uses 16 George Gershwin tunes to put the dancers through their paces. There is everything here audiences want to see - leaps and lifts, twirls and spins.
(China Daily 09/18/2007 page19)
