Reviews

Rambert quadruple bill (tour – Brighton)

This quadruple bill by the Rambert dance company fuses old and new to bring a visual spectacular of costume, music and movement to its audiences.

These performances pull together four separate examples of Rambert’s classic modern dance routines – The Castaways, Dutiful Ducks, Sounddance and Rooster.

Rooster
Rooster
© HUGO GLENDINNING

The latter is choreographer Christopher Bruce’s celebration of the music of the Rolling Stones which is showing to audiences for the first time in 13 years.

The Castaways reminded me of West Side Story crossed with Lord of the Flies. It portrays the story of 12 individuals each with a weakness, a sin of sorts, appealing to a God above to set them free.

It epitomises the darker sides of the self in a beautiful and simple way with musical arrangements that compliment the flowing movements of the dancers as they do battle with their demons and fellow "strugglers".

Dutiful Ducks is a short, rather comical piece, leading us into the 17-minute long Sounddance which is a mesmerising ricochet of lifts, spins and swirls, all culminating in an illustration of life, its rhythm and the energy from human to human contact.

Lastly, Rooster uplifts us with its homage to the music of the ‘60s and ‘70s, in a Guys and Dolls fashion with eight songs by the Stones as the background to a courtship between male and female groups.

The famous London-based dance company filled seats in Brighton as it always does on tour. Immaculate routines full of passion and humou, tell individual stories with deep meaning and sexuality.

At times you forget you are watching people moving on a stage, as the orchestra’s highly skilled but haunting accompaniments conduct the artistic motions and articulations of Rambert’s lithe hypnotic dancers.

Rambert, founded by Polish-born Marie Rambert in 1926, has always been an established and highly reputed creative dance company, bringing together art and dance to tell everyday stories with meaning and spine-tingling inspiration.

Now with its own orchestra, the troupe combines visual beauty with musical inventiveness to capture audiences young and old (many of the audience at the performance I attended were dance students who watched enthusiastically).

Seeing a Rambert show at least once in your life is a must for dance and performance art lovers alike.

Rambert plays at the Theatre Royal, Brighton until 1 March as part of a national tour.