Tchaikovsky overtures
Ballet in three parts (2022)
Music by Pyotr Il’yich Tchaikovsky (1840-1893)
Choreographed by Alexei Ratmansky
Bayerisches Staatsballett
Bayerisches Staatsorchester/Mikhail Agrest
rec. live, 2022, National Theatre, Munich, Germany
Bayerische Staatsoper Recordings BSOREC4001 Blu-ray [86]
As Hamlet never quite put it, To tell the story or not to tell the story: that is the question.
The three-part ballet Tchaikovsky overtures was created by choreographer Alexei Ratmansky in 2022. Significantly, although its three component parts are each given the title of a Shakespeare play, the ballet’s overall name takes, as it were, a step back by placing its emphasis firmly on the music that Hamlet, The tempest and Romeo and Juliet inspired Tchaikovsky to compose rather than on the detailed plots of the stage dramas themselves.
Indeed, when interviewed for the booklet that accompanies the release, Ratmansky himself doubles down on that point, describing the piece as “an exploration of the emotional plane of the Shakespearian world in Tchaikovsky’s music [my own emphasis]” rather than a danced depiction of the action of the plays. The scores, he adds, “do not ask for narrative. You don’t need to go literally through the story”. Expanding further on that point, he suggests that “ballet… can’t compete with literature or drama or cinema or anything else that tells stories better. What we are good at is capturing moods and certain emotions. And in the emotional field, we in ballet are even more sophisticated than in the world of literature or words. Because we can express the inexpressible.”
Indeed, the familiar narratives of, in turn, Hamlet, The tempest and Romeo and Juliet often appear only rather vaguely or tangentially related to what we see on Ratmansky’s stage. Any attempt to discern anything other than the broadest strands of the original stories is made even more difficult when the ballet is presented without any overt indication of who is actually who on stage, for the Shakespearean characters’ names are absent from both the disc’s final credits and its accompanying documentation – and I presume that the Munich theatre audience wasn’t provided with them either. Consequently, while it might be pretty clear, if only from their prominence in the action, that a particular dancer is assuming the role of the Danish prince or one of Verona’s star-crossed lovers, those of almost all the other dancers – assuming that they are supposed to have specific identities at all – remain unspecified. As a result, much of the actual Shakespearean storyline seems to be either only vaguely hinted at or else completely absent and I quickly gave up trying to work out who, if anyone, might be portraying Polonius or Mercutio or, indeed, whether Ratmansky had actually placed those and other characters on stage at all. Meanwhile, the fact that the predominant on-stage costumes in two of Tchaikovsky overtures’s three component parts are dully-coloured unitards may well be an effective means of focusing our attention on the athleticism of the dancers’ bodies but doesn’t offer any help in identifying who, if anyone, those dancers are actually supposed to be. Is a jaunty little coronet, a princely purple sash or something similar too much to ask for?
In light of that distinctively impressionistic approach that pitches itself somewhere between the extremes of entirely abstract ballet and conventional storytelling, those who prefer straightforward narratives, whether realistic or phantasmagorical, may well have already decided that Tchaikovsky overtures is not for them. Indeed, a friend with whom I watched this disc, a real ballet aficionado, found the piece quite unbearable. He had, I should add, no particular gripe with the ballet in itself as a dance creation, but found its unduly tenuous association with the plays that are its supposed inspiration a huge distraction. “Who is he supposed to be?” he constantly interjected as we watched, “And who’s that woman and what’s she doing over there?” His understandable befuddlement was only added to by the fact that the main focus on stage at both the very beginning and very end of the performance is given over to the completely unexplained presence of a dancer who’s seemingly overseeing the goings-on in the manner of some sort of disinterested observer from on high (my best guess is that maybe he’s intended to act as some sort of Greek chorus but I wouldn’t necessarily put money on it).
Nevertheless, I can think of at least four reasons why, even if your preference is for ballets based on strong and clearly delineated narratives, it’s worth giving with Tchaikovsky overtures a try.
In the first place, Tchaikovsky’s scores, even if they weren’t originally composed for the purpose, are simply ideal vehicles for dance. Their gorgeous melodies and rich harmonies offer choreographers almost endless opportunities to explore and exploit the expressive possibilities of the human form in motion and, over the years, many of them have been mined for suitable material. The fact that Hamlet, The tempest and Romeo and Juliet are quite episodic pieces, constantly changing in mood, is actually an advantage, for they thereby offer a choreographer the chance to create an engagingly diverse series of dance episodes that exploits the widest range of a professional company’s talents.
Secondly, while Ratmansky’s overall approach to the ballet – a case, as Lady Macbeth didn’t quite say, of “Out, damned plot!” – may prove disconcerting to some, his choreography certainly won’t be. Contemporary dance, usually set to today’s favoured styles of music and often reflecting the mood of the troubled and unpredictable times in which we live, is often rough, jagged and angular – or even, to some, just plain ugly. In keeping with its composer’s smoothly conceived melodies, however, the dance in Tchaikovsky overtures eschews anything in that style. There are, indeed, plenty of points, particularly in The tempest, where the echoes of 19th century classical ballet are especially apparent.
That particular observation brings me to the third reason why anyone who is usually reluctant to engage with contemporary productions may well appreciate this piece. It is the inclusion of its central element, The tempest, which turns out to be the most traditionally conceived and presented of the Tchaikovsky overtures triptych. I suspect that Ratmansky may have realised that, given that The tempest is the least known of the three plays, he could not necessarily assume an audience’s automatic familiarity with the story. He has consequently kept its narrative – or at least, given time constraints, the story’s bare bones – clearer and more focused than is the case in either Hamlet or Romeo and Juliet. If that was his intention, it has been executed quite successfully. Other aspects of The tempest are also more traditional. There are, for instance, several moments where Ratmansky’s choreography is very reminiscent of Petipa’s in style. As if to emphasise that link, instead of those anonymous and bland unitards thedancers sport some attractively designed costumes – and the women even wear tutus.
The fourth reason to watch this production is, quite simply, the sheer quality that those dancers bring to it. Bayerisches Staatsballett has managed to attract some particularly interesting young talents into its ranks in the past few years. Balletomanes who follow the international competition circuit for up-and-coming talent will certainly recognise, in the Tchaikovsky overtures cast, two recent winners of the annual Prix de Lausanne’s top prize. Shale Wagman scooped it in 2018, while 2021’s winner, António Casalinho, has since gone on to take Dance Europe’s 2024 Dancer of the Year award. Wagman portrays the aforementioned Chorus-like figure who bookends the ballet. Meanwhile, the well-cast Casalinho delivers a striking performance as (I assume!) The tempest’s airy spirit Ariel. Admirers who, up until now, have been able to see both dancers only in brief YouTube extracts (including their prizewinning Lausanne performances and, in Casalinho’s case, even his successful appearance as a mere 14-year-old on the Got talent Portugal TV show) will be delighted to see both of them in a more substantial production. The rest of the Munich company – who, thanks to the aforementioned absence of documentation, I regretfully cannot name individually – dance at a very high standard too and are certainly not put to shame when performing alongside them.
Tchaikovsky overtures has been well filmed and my Blu-ray copy delivered first-class picture and sound. It is a shame, however, that the opportunity wasn’t taken to add to viewers’ enjoyment by filming a few extras. It would certainly have been enlightening to have heard from Mr Ratmansky himself or to have found out a little more about the Bayerisches Staatsballett company. Nevertheless, this is an important release that balletomanes will no doubt want to see.
Rob Maynard
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Cast and production staff
Hamlet
Shale Wagman; Maria Baranova; Julian MacKay; Jeanette Kakareka; Rafael Vedra; Prisca Zeisel; Matteo Dilaghi; Madison Young; Jinhao Zhang; Margarita Grechanaia; Vladislav Kozlov; Bianca Teixeira; Osiel Gouneo; Madeleine Dowdney; Laura Orsi; Marta Navarrete; Villalba; Stefano Maggiolo; Sava Milojević; Yago Gonzaga; Giovanni Tombacco; Andrea Marino; Florian Ulrich Sollfrank; Philip Hedges; Nikita Kirbitov
The tempest
Jinhao Zhang; António Casalinho; Yonah Acosta; Madison Young; Ariel Merkuri; Andrea Marino; Giovanni Tombacco; Nikita Kirbitov; Noah Hak; Florian Ulrich Sollfrank; Carollina Bastos; Maria Chiara Bono; Madeleine Dowdney; Margarita Fernandes; Dani Gibson; Emma Knowlson; Eline Larrory; Mariia Malinina; Polina Medvedeva; Elisa Mestres; Marta Navarrete Villalba; Laura Orsi; Phoebe Schembri; Valeriia Sklotskaia; Bianca Teixeira; Anastasiia Uzhanskaia; Isabella Wagar; Margaret Whyte
Romeo and Juliet
Shale Wagman; Maria Baranova; Margarita Grechanaia; Jeanette Karkareka; Julian MacKay; Vladislav Kozlov; Rafael Vedra; Konstantin Ivkin; Florian Ulrich Sollfrank; Robin Strona; Margaret Whyte; Elisa Mestres; Phoebe Schembri; Polina Bualova; Chelsea Thronson; Rhiannon Fairless; Nikita Kirbitov; Vladislav Dolgikh; Matteo Dilaghi
Elmira Karakhanova (soprano)
Aleksey Kursanov (tenor)
Choreographer: Alexei Ratmansky
Set and costume designer: Jean-Marc Puissant
Lighting designer: James F. Ingalls
Video director: Olivier Simonnet
Technical details
Filmed in HD / NTSC 16:9
Sound format: PCM stereo and DTS-HD MA 5.1
Region code: A, B, C
