Dance Sampled
If you’ve ever been dance-curious but not taken the leap, now is the time to hot-foot it down to Sadler’s Wells, where they’ve very kindly designed the Sampled festival especially for you.
The two-week dance smorgasbord offers bite-size chunks of ballet, contemporary, hip hop, flamenco and more, created by some of the world’s leading practitioners and served up, according to Artistic Director Alistair Spalding, with the aim to “change the feel and atmosphere of Sadler’s Wells for two weeks” and “make an open invitation to those who may not have tasted what we have to offer here before.” Before attending Saturday’s opening night, I’d have told them not to worry too much on that first count. Sadler’s Wells is one of those special venues that is exciting just to walk into: the glass-walled foyer always full of pre-show buzz and the audience reliably one of the most eclectic and diverse – and come on, let’s admit it, damned attractive - in London. I just love bringing people to Sadler’s Wells for the first time, their expectation of being intimidated confounded by how infectiously up for it dance audiences are.
Superficial perhaps, when we should be concentrating on the work onstage? Maybe, but dance can be difficult to get the uninitiated to take a chance on. “I don’t know anything about dance” is a common response that doesn’t seem to have an equivalent when a visit to the theatre or a gallery is suggested. Once in, they’re hooked, but getting them there, as the second aim acknowledges, can be a challenge.
So full marks to Sadler’s Wells for this initiative - the atmosphere was in fact more electric than ever at the weekend, thanks to the extra events that were laid on for a newbie audience. Pre-show talks, dance-related film screenings and post-show classes popped up all over the building, as did Tim Casson’s micro-dance event The Dance We Made which gives passers-by the chance to choreograph a professional dancer. The programme notes give us insight into how participants first got into dance – as well as a handy A-Z, where perhaps the most useful insight to the uninitiated comes under N for Narrative: “In answer to the common question, ‘What’s it about?’ sometimes the answer is not to worry about meaning and just enjoy the show.”
But of course it’s what’s on stage that counts above all and the weekend’s contemporary programme included three pieces “Made at Sadler’s Wells” to showcase work created at the nation’s dance house: Russell Maliphant’s “Afterlight” (above image) – an Olivier-award winning, beautiful, glittering jewel of a solo piece in which, despite being rooted to the stage, dancer Thomasin Gulgec appears to fall through the air and roll amongst the clouds; “Faun” by Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui – with its compelling half-human, half-animal courtship dance a contemporary reworking of one Nijinsky’s famous ballet “L’apres-midi d’un faune”; and Undance by Wayne McGregor | Random Dance, a larger scale piece in which the cast of ten is multiplied by appearing simultaneously onstage and onscreen in an Eadweard-Muybridge like experiment in motion.
Remaining highlights include this weekend’s more varied bill provided by Jasmin Vardimom guest-choreographing for the national Youth Dance Company; Stuttgart Ballet; Sadler’s Wells New Wave Associate Alexander Whitley; Tango World Champions Facundo de la Cruz and Paola Sanz; and two favourites from the Breakin’ Convention annual festival of hip hop Storyboard P and Vagabondz Crew.
Sadler’s Sampled continues to 7th July.
Posted by Mark.