TOPIC OF THE WEEK

The Bournonvilles and Cuban ballet styles
shake hands in Havana and Copenhagen
by Damián Donéstevez

The Bournonvilles school has definitively arrived in Cuba in the hands of Royal Danish Ballet Artistic Director, Frank Andersen. Andersen recently visited Havana to supervise the staging of a traditional Danish piece with the Cuban Ballet Company. At the same time, the Cuban version of Don Quixote will be traveling to Copenhagen soon to be staged by the Royal Danish Ballet. During his stay on the island, I caught up with Andersen, who exclusively told us about his projects in Havana and the European capital:

- It seems that some kind of an exchange has started between the Royal Danish Ballet and the Cuban National Ballet Company. I understand you are staging or supervising the rehearsals of a Bournonvilles piece. Can you elaborate, please?

"Well, I think that everything has to do with the curiosity which is for me a very important word in my daily work, and I think that you have a huge responsibility being a director toward the audience, of course, toward the young children you are taking into the company and, naturally, toward all the dancers in your company. I think is very important to keep searching for new ways of developing the company, and I think one of the ways is to learn from others; it is my strong feeling that the Royal Danish Ballet and the dancers there can learn a lot from de Cuban company and the Cuban dancers and the Cuban style and, of course, from Alicia.

"I've had several discussions with Alicia over the last year concerning this kind of project that you have called an exchange, that we would like very much to legalize, so let's say that yes, we are having an exchange starting it with two productions that we are going to exchange, and that is the Don Quixote, the Cuban Ballet's version of Don Quixote which will be performed by Danish dancers in Copenhagen, at the Royal Theater in Denmark, with the premier on the 20th of January 2008. At the same time, we are here in Cuba now, and rehearsing, and preparing to stage Napoli, Act 3, which is our Bournonvilles' most famous ballet, from Denmark, it was made in1842. It is the trademark of the Royal Danish Ballet, and now we are giving that away to the Cuban Ballet and its dancers.

"I think this is a beginning, yes, of a cultural exchange agreement between the two countries and the two companies, and I don't see where this exchange actually stops. I think it's only the fantasy that can put the borders for that. I would like to see your dancers being part of the exchange. Viengsay Valdés and Romel Frómeta have already been to Copenhagen in May, and performed with the Royal Danish Ballet, for a gala performance, and I see no problem that very soon we will have Danish dancers here in Cuba. We had them already for the Festival last year, and the same goes for professors, for teachers, and I think we could also hope that this exchange could be broadened also to welcome for the workshops, for the tailors, for the carpenters, and everything to do with theater. Maybe we can do that."

- What can you tell me about Napoli, Auguste Bournonvilles and the way Cuban dancers are doing with this Bournonvilles style, now that you have been supervising the rehearsals of this piece?

"I must say I've been very happy to work with the Cuban dancers during this period. They have all had the openness and curiosity that maybe you don't find in all companies all over the world, but I must admit you definitely find it here. And it's been a sheer pleasure to work with each and every one of them. They are so open and so ready to learn, so eager to do things right, to accomplish the steps and the style, and I think we are going to have a wonderful production when we stage Napoli, Act 3."

- Well, so it seems that it's going to be a joined production of the two companies?

"I think that, at the beginning, we should try to do it with the Cuban dancers, which is the issue, which is the idea, but I see no reason for why we cannot import a few dancers at a certain time to participate along with the Cuban friends."

- And what about the differences of technique? You know that Bournonvilles is different and, in a way, Cuban dancers are not used to it.

"I see that as a force, a strength, because we are different, yes, we are different in technique, we are different in style, but that is what makes it so interesting, that you in that way you can learn from each other. My son is here along with me and he is taking classes with the company and, of course, the style is different, but he said: 'I've just had two classes and I've just learned so much being there and everybody is so enormously friendly', he is saying, so he is already looking forward to come back.

"I think that's what it's all about, that our art is crossing any border, there are no limits, there are no weapons, we can go in everywhere, because we all speak the same language and there may be some differences but we all understand each other. We are friends, everyone wants to learn from each other and I think that's the basic about this."

- Concerning the Cuban version of Don Quixote, what have you thought about?

"Over the last 25 years in Denmark we've had two versions: The first one was staged in 1983 by Yuri Grigorovich, at that time director of the Bolshoi Ballet, and in 1988 we got the Rudolf Nureyev version and now, ten years after, I think it's already time that we get the Cuban version which I really like.

- And why do you like it?

"Well, I think it has a flamboyant, it has a life that is very much to my temper, and I think to the temper of all of us. He was very fascinated by the south and southern countries and I see a lot of, maybe not a lot of Cuba, but a lot of definitively south in that version, and there is a lot of good dancing. And Danish dancers are not particularly having the most perfect bravura technique and that will be a very, very strong challenge for them and they are ready for it, and they know it's coming, so they are preparing themselves.

"It's going to be a hard task to do all the tricks which we don't use in our every day class because that's more the enchantment of Bournonvilles, with the small batteries and the fast feet work and you have the big jumps and the bravura style and I think that's what we can learn a lot from this version, and from the Cuban teachers that will come to Denmark.

- What can the Cuban dancers learn from you, from the Danish Royal ballet, from the Danish dancers?

"I don't think that's just one thing we can learn, I think it's many things. I think that, first of all, the Cubans have a lot of force, strength in their dancing, and I think that our point of view will give them some softness, that they have, but maybe they are not using that much because it's most of the time a matter of jumping high and in Bournonvilles it's a matter jumping high but you shouldn't look like it is difficult and I think that ease, that ease will be something that I hope we can contribute to dancers here.

"We are seeing that already in Napoli, we have being working with the dancers now for a couple of weeks and we see it, and they can, I know they can. I've seen it, so I really think that it is going to be exciting to follow this development."

- Do you know when the Cuban Ballet is going to stage Napoli?

"We are talking about October but it's not settled yet. And if it doesn't become October, it's also OK, we'll do it at a later time, but definitely it will be soon."

- The Cuban National Ballet School also wants some kind of an exchange with the Royal Danish Ballet too, you know, in terms of teachers, the Bournonvilles style, too. Do you think that's possible?"

"That's a very interesting issue, because when you have the young dancers, I think they are very open to learn anything and to have a course of two or three weeks with basic Bournonvilles technique, style, as well as maybe teaching some of the characters, character dancing from Bournonvilles Ballets, I think that's something they could benefit from tremendously, just the same as they could benefit from a course in the French style, the Russian style. We have to admit that there are not many styles left, because the Italian style is completely gone and the Swedish style is not really existing, English style I'm not so sure about, of course there is a French style, Copenhagen, Bournonvilles style and, of course, Russian style, the Vaganova, I think that's something you can learn a lot of it from."

- Anything else you would like to add?

"I'm very happy to see how the school is working here. I have the greatest admiration for the school's principal, Cherry, the work she's doing. It is a really, really hard work with so many students, 280 students, and how she runs a school like that on a daily basis. I'm very impressed and I have invited her to Copenhagen, naturally, also as part of this exchange, and I think that it would be good for her to come and see how we work.

"Denmark is a very small country. I think not many Cubans know that, but Denmark is much smaller that Cuba. We only have five million people in all of Denmark, I think it's almost 12 million in Cuba. We have one million in Copenhagen, the capital, which is supposed to be a big city, I think there are more than two million in Havana. So, in that sense, we are a small country but still we have the third oldest ballet company in the world dating back to 1748, after the Paris Opera and the Kirov Ballet from Saint Petersburg. And somehow we keep producing dancers, especially men, but also women that have world class, so something must be right in Denmark with our system and again I think that's something we would like to share with the world and with Cherry and the Cuban Ballet School, too."
 

http://www.radiohc.cu/ingles/cultura/cultura.htm