Come along to the Hive to see
'Two Old Instruments, a beautiful dance show, taking place at The Hive on
Saturday 7th February at 7.30pm. The show is produced by Ballet in
Small Spaces and all ages are welcome.
Ballet in Small Spaces presents
Two old instruments
Music: Carl Friedrich Abel
Viola da
gamba: Jonathan Rees
Dance: Susie Crow
Design: Ellen Nabarro
Dress made
by Roz Culling
1. Prelude
2. Andante – Minuet
3. Allegro – departing from Monsieur Rameau
4. Adagio – Portrait
5. Allegro – two pints of claret and Jane Poitier
6. Arpeggiata
7. Minuetto – almost a waltz
8. Allegro – La Guimard’s caprice
9. Allegro – Strong women
10. Adagio – just a little longer
11. Allegretto – la bonne compagnie
12. Allegro – country dance; Lambranzi’s jig
13. Tempo di minuet
Carl Friedrich Abel
(1723-1787) was one of the last virtuoso viol players before the instrument's
twentieth-century revival. Born in Köthen, Saxony, he was taught by J.S. Bach
in Leipzig's Thomasschule before moving to London, where he became close
friends with one of J.S. Bach's sons, Johann Christian Bach. They founded a
concert series in Soho Square, called the Bach-Abel concerts.
Abel would give
regular solo recitals on the viol, often improvising most or all of the
recital, not infrequently under the influence of a lot of alcohol. The music in
the so-called "Drexel manuscript", from which the music for Two old instruments is taken, is
essentially a set of written-out improvisations - formally very free in most
cases, with no clues in the manuscript as to a "correct" order for
the pieces to be played in, or indeed as to the mood of many of them.
If much of the music
of the baroque is to be understood as dance music or as the musical equivalent
of the classical art of rhetoric, then fifty years later we find these threads
in a much freer musical language, where rules have been abandoned in favour of
a more individualistic approach to musical expression which still maintains all
of the gestural quality of baroque music - crying out to be made visible in
dance.
Acknowledgements: Heartfelt thanks to Nicola Gaines Armitage for teaching us the minuet,
Moira Goff for expert advice, Caroline Salem at The Space Clarence Mews for
hosting work in progress in 2013, all our colleagues who gave feedback, Roger Tully
for use of his studio, Ana Barbour for the loan of her skirt – and especially to
all the BiSS Angels for their generosity in supporting this project …
Susie Crow: dance artist, choreographer, teacher. Danced with
Royal and Sadler’s Wells Royal Ballet becoming a soloist; now runs Ballet in
Small Spaces (BiSS) in Oxford. Twice a finalist in the Madrid
Choreographic Competition; ballets for SWRB, Dance Advance, National Youth
Dance and Ballet companies, Black Maria for Green Box Productions. Works
for BiSS include solos for Lisia Moala and Debbie Camp in 2008 and 2009; works
inspired by Dante for Cambridge and Oxford 2009-10; Inside Out and Commedia
2011. On-going collaborations with musicians, dancers and visual artists include improvisation
work and cross-art research projects DEC Drawing Dance and Ancient Dance in
Modern Dancers, and with Jennifer Jackson on Dancing the Invisible – Late Work. She holds an MA in Dance
Studies, runs the popular blog Oxford Dance Writers, and is undertaking
research into the ballet class for a PhD at Roehampton University.
Jonathan Rees: Bristol
born cellist and gamba player with leading UK period performance ensembles,
including recent appearances as principal cellist and gamba soloist with the
Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment and La Nuova Musica. Solo performances in the Leeds International
chamber music series, Lichfield Festival, Bristol’s Colston Hall, BBC Proms
composer portrait of Colin Matthews and Birmingham Opera Company’s 2012
performance of Stockhausen’s “Mittwoch aus Licht.” Chamber musician at
Cheltenham, Lake District, York and Trondheim Music Festivals; has played as
principal cellist with the Manchester Camerata, and with the LSO, London
Sinfonietta and Aurora orchestra. He is enthusiastically involved with music
outreach work with children and adults of all ages. Before post-graduate
studies with Mats Lidstrom and Jonathan Manson at the Royal Academy of Music,
Jonathan gained a first class degree in German and French from Cambridge
University where he is currently employed as a researcher into
seventeenth-century French street song and also teaches baroque cello.
Ellen Nabarro: Oxford based theatre designer.
Graduated from Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama 2008 with
Principal’s Award. Shows include Hay Fever, UK premiere of High
School Musical 2, Merrily We Roll Along etc. Resident Designer
for The Musical Theatre Academy; designed Inside Out and Commedia
for BiSS in 2011. Assistant designer for Bunny Christie currently working on Blurred
Lines at National Theatre. Associate Designer on Donmar production of
Julius Caesar in New York.
Ballet in Small
Spaces (BiSS) makes and
presents ballet based work for small and unconventional spaces in response to
its local environment. As well as refining an understanding of ballet’s
form and expression, it aims to reach out to a wider audience, tapping into
local enthusiasm for dance through performances, classes and projects, and
drawing in dancers at all stages of development from young students to mature
professionals. Since emerging in Oxford from Arts Council funded research
in 2004, BiSS has devised and presented projects for a range of settings
including Stravinsky
in Miniature at the Holywell Music Room
(2004), Dance and Music Showcase for
St. Edward’s Arts Programme (2005); Long
Hot Summer for performances in Dancin’ Oxford, OxDox Documentary Film
Festival and London (2007), two editions of The
Solos Project at Burton Taylor Studio (2008-9), Dante in the Chapel in Cambridge and Mansfield College Oxford
(2010), and double bill of Inside Out
and Commedia which toured Oxfordshire
venues in 2011.
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