Scottish Ballet

From a glowing installation by a Glasgow award winning artist to the erotically charged passions of a fiery tango, Scottish Ballet presents its first triple bill season under the Artistic Directorship of Christopher Hampson.

"Run For It" - Choreography Martin Lawrance / Music John Adams

"5 Tangos" - Choreography Hans van Manen / Music Astor Piazzolla

"Workwithinwork" - Choreography William Forsythe / Music Luciano Berio

Fresh from its world premiere as part of the Cultural Olympiad this summer, Martin Lawrance’s Run For It is a high energy work inspired by the power of Olympic athletes. This dynamic piece is set to the propulsive rhythms of John Adams’ Son of Chamber Symphony and features a striking sculptural installation created by Turner Prize-winning artist Martin Boyce.

”I worked with the dancers on movement-base phrases that represent the discus, the pole vault to see how we could translate this into dance terms,” comments choreographer Martin Lawrance, a former dancer and choreographer at the Richard Alston Dance Company. “The piece starts and ends with a real fast tracked energy but there is also a beautiful slow movement in the middle. I wanted to show the resistance and determination; the muscularity of an athlete.”

Designer Martin Boyce first worked with Scottish Ballet in a session of choreographic workshops exploring the relationship between dance and visual art. It was at this time he began to consider the creation of his canopy of fractured light that would go on to feature in his award winning piece Beyond the Repetition of High Windows, Intersecting flight Paths and Opinions (A Silent Storm is Painted on Air). This is the first time Boyce has created work especially for a theatrical environment.

Classical discipline meets playfulness in William Forsythe’s Workwithinwork, a study of the possibilities of motion.

As an American working internationally for the last thirty years, William Forsythe is recognised as one of the world’s foremost choreographers. His work is celebrated for pushing the concepts of ballet into a dynamic 21st-century art form.

Forsythe’s Workwithinwork begins in the clear, textured air of an open stage, surrounded by the haunting breaths of Berio’s Duetti for two violins. Winding with a gorgeous, intricate grace through a series of jewel-like scenes, the dancers create an evolving, baroque body of time, which branches out in ever-increasing complexity as the piece moves, delicate, rolling toward its breathless end.

“We’ve been taught that there’s never a right or wrong, but what feels best in your body,” explains Scottish Ballet Principal Dancer Claire Robertson on the Forsythe learning process. “You have to dig deep, there are little bits you can fiddle with to make feel natural to you, and that’s fantastically challenging in so many ways. You find out how the body can move differently, how to experiment with your own movements and where they initiate from.”

Drawing the evening to a fiery close is Hans van Manen’s 5 Tangos; a sizzling work that combines classical ballet with the passion and dramatic flourishes of the tango.

Van Manen, veteran of Dutch National Ballet is renowned for his elegant works each laced with their own erotic charge. Created originally for Het Nationale Ballet, 5 Tangos is a new addition to Scottish Ballet’s repertoire and features music by Astor Piazzolla; and Argentine tango composer celebrated for revolutionising traditional tango by introducing the sensual sounds of jazz and classical music.

This is the first time 5 Tangos will have been performed in Aberdeen.