Frederick Ashton: Triple Bill
Les Patineurs (2010) • Divertissements • Scenes de Ballet (2004)
Royal Opera House, London

Les Patineurs Meyerbeer
Conductor Paul Murphy
Laura Morera, Samantha Raine, Steven McRae, Sarah Lamb, Rupert Pennefather, Christina Arestis, Francesca Filpi, Ryoichi Hirano, Kenta Kura, Liam Scarlett, Andrej Uspenski

Scènes de ballet Stravinsky
Conductor Barry Wordsworth [R]
Miyako Yoshida, Ivan Putrov, Edward Watson, Lauren Cuthbertson

Divertissements
Conductor Barry Wordsworth
Tchaikovsky: Awakening Pas de deux (1968) Darcey Bussell & Jonathan Cope Massenet: Thaïs Pas de deux (1971) Mara Galeazzi & Thiago Soares
Paganini: Devil’s Holiday Variation (1939) Viacheslav Samodurov: Pas de deux (1939) Laura Morera & Ricardo Cervera
Brahms: Five Brahms Waltzes in the manner of Isadora Duncan (1975) Tamara Rojo
Strauss: Voices of Spring Pas de deux (1977) & Paganini/Tommasini: Devil’s Holiday Leanne Benjamin & Carlos Acosta

Opus Arte (BBC) OA 1064

An excellent compilation, which will please our "music" readers equally as ballet enthusiasts. Les Patineurs, to a strong score from Meyerbeer, has long been a perennial favourite, regularly revived. Ice skating on a wooden stage is imaginatively suggested.

The Ashton Divertissements (1939-1977), brought together on the DVD, make an entertaining sequence, with an over-the-top recreation of the excesses of Isadora Duncan, pioneer of bare-footed contemporary dance by Tamara Rojo (pictured above).

Stravinsky's score for Scènes de ballet (1944) is one of his lesser played neo-classical masterpieces, and is here at its intended best under Barry Wordsworth; the Ashton ballet for the full company is one of Ashton's most engrossing and durable; it needs to be watched at least twice.

Peter Grahame Woolf

- do take time to click and enjoy the 3 links !