Cranko's rare swans in Prague

It does not appear bizarre if one of the best-known titles in pointe performance, while observing the canonical 19th century aesthetic profiles, includes numerous choreographic versions. Various readings over time have reshaped and rethought the iconic story of Odette, Odile and Siegfried, although not all editions have found equal diffusion and permanence on the billboards of the major opera and ballet theatres.

One of the rarest versions is undoubtedly the one that John Cranko signed in 1963 for the Stuttgart Ballet and that today the National Theatre in Prague is re-proposing thanks to the iron will of the Director of the Czech National Ballet Filip Barankiewicz to return to some of the cornerstones of the creativity of the well-known South African choreographer. A "Lake", that of Cranko, which for Barankiewicz in addition to being "full of incisive emotional impulses and requiring the dancers to open their souls" offers the opportunity to discover the specificities of one of the most peculiar editions of Tchaikovsky's ballet.

What traits define the identity of these rare swans? To prepare his lacustrine vision, John Cranko, faithful to the historical and multiple interpolations and distortions undergone by the score, draws a musical framework that, among the various modifications, does not include the waltz and the pas de trois of the first act, replacing them with the unusual pas de six and also redefining some segments of the fourth act. A musical conception, his, that sustains a choreographic thought that is not entirely free of the canonical 19th-century edition - in particular for the untouchable second act - but concedes space to some unprecedented dramatic developments. If the elaboration of the well-known events of the third act and the arrival of the black swan does not appear very daring, praiseworthy are the characters that, on the contrary, dwell particularly in the last sections of the ballet when Odette and Siegfried plumb an unusual and restless purity that testifies to the abysmal depths of the two characters. A dramaturgical value, this one, made even more compelling thanks to the unhinging of certain profiles of the academic choreographic language, which in the very last strokes seems to dialogue with some of the most peculiar and best-known designs of John Cranko's choreographic experiments. For the corps de ballet, the variations and the queues, the version admits of no worry, each choreographic play is adorned with such rapid technical feats and pitfalls as to make this version irresistible and distinctive thanks to the first-rate execution guaranteed by Haruka Iguchi and Paul Irmatov and embellished by the brand new staging by Martin Černý and Josef Jelínek.

Not to be missed, therefore, is this work, which will return to the stage, again in Prague, next April, but, before Christmas, the Italian balletmen will flock to Turin: the Prague company will stage John Cranko's version of 'Romeo and Juliet' for ten performances at the Teatro Regio.

Swan Lake