Watch here.
The lectures are free. Please email Professor Sue Jones, Director of DANSOX,and Marcus Bell, DANSOX Co-ordinator, to book your place and with any enquiries. Everyone is welcome to join in free. However, we do rely on the generous support of our patrons to sustain our programme. Donations to DANSOX are welcome. Thank you all for supporting DANSOX during this difficult time.
Dame Monica Mason (Royal Ballet; Honorary Fellow, St Hilda's; Patron, DANSOX) and Jane Pritchard (Curator of Dance, V&A) present 'The Sleeping Princess and The Sleeping Beauty'.
Because of the current COVID-19 situation this event will now be ONLINE. Contact Susan Jones and Marcus Bell to make sure you receive the link personally. Those who have been in touch already will be sent the link. Regrettably the dinner has been cancelled. The lectures are free but there will be an opportunity to support DANSOX - and to join Dame Monica and Jane in raising a glass to toast to this year's programme.
Audiences familiar with Charles Perrault's fairy-tale, or with Disney's classic animation, will not want to miss these sparkling lectures on the history of dance's universally famous narrative.
Dame Monica Mason and Jane Pritchard will give two illustrated presentations to celebrate the centenary (1921-2021) of performances in Britain of the iconic Tchaikovsky ballet. As dance archivist of the V&A and internationally renowned historian of dance, Jane will reveal the history of the great Russian classic. She will focus on the first performance in London (1921) of The Sleeping Princess, which followed the nineteenth-century choreography of Marius Petipa, sets by Leon Bakst. Danced by the famous Diaghilev Ballets Russes, this was a lavish production that nearly bankrupted the great impresario. Dame Monica will discuss subsequent productions of The Sleeping Beauty, which again followed the original music and choreography, and became the signature work of the Royal Ballet, establishing the national company as one based on classical traditions. Dame Monica's involvement in the work over her long career with the Royal Ballet as Principal Dancer and Director will include her experiences of coaching today's dancers and give us insight into her own stunning interpretation of the role of the 'outsider' - the wicked fairy, Carabosse.
Dance Scholarship Oxford (DANSOX) provides a major forum for dance scholarship in Europe, promoting dialogue between prominent academic disciplines and the worlds of dance theory and practice. DANSOX inaugurates an international exchange of interdisciplinary dance-related research with a major programme investigating a wide range of enquiries into all forms of dance. These events explore the ways in which the role of choreographic practice reveals its essential contribution to innovations across academic fields, theatre and performance.
