Ismene
Brown is blown away by Nina Ananiashvili's performance of Raymonda with the Bolshoi
at the Coliseum
YOU live, you love, you learn a few secrets if you
are lucky - and if you are not, but you happen to have been at Nina Ananiashvili's
performance with the Bolshoi on Wednesday, you catch up on everything you have missed.
Even though ballet is an art of deception, it may
seem far - fetched to suggest that Raymonda could have become a vessel for anything so
profound. Even its admirers call this 100-year-old classic witless...
Plot: in Provence, Raymonda, the niece of the
Countess of Doris, loves Jean de Brienne, a noble knight. He goes to the Crusades, she
dreams of him and a nasty Saracen. The nasty Saracen turns up in real life, and tries to
abduct her. Jean returns, kills him, and marries Raymonda. (Shades of Oklahoma!, I always
think.)
Even given the sumptuous music of Glazunov, you can
see the problem: there is no drama...
That the very same ballet turned from the ridiculous
to the sublime... was due to the spellbinding Ananiashvili, who seemed to cast a glow over
everyone...
The petite, brunette Ananiashvili, now in her mid -
thirties, has a miraculous sense of music, and a face that shows every thought; all this,
plus a technique that displays the glory of Russian classical tradition at its most
brilliant and delicate.
She has an uncanny way of playing her arms and upper
body above her legs as creatively as a great Chopin pianist might waft a melody over the
bass. She was both a matchless ballerina and the girl in the story, living through her
private joys and hopes, and discovering that love is fragile and immensely precious.
Petipa knew how to choreograph the fullness of love: his dream sequence and the wedding
finale are as exalting as ballet gets.
Ananiashvili was handsomely partnered by Sergei
Filin as Jean, and Dmitri Belogolovtsev (last week's striking Spartacus) nearly stole his
scenes as the vile Abderakham. The Bolshoi orchestra was fine (lovely violin solos); the
costumes are rich and elegant, but need firmer scenery behind them and more exciting
lighting. She dances Don Quixote next week. Enough said.
