Choreographer Wayne McGregor has a reputation for making dance that is hugely impressive but sometimes on the cold side. His experiments in AI, for example: totally fascinating for the mind, arguably less engaging for the soul. But the triple bill Alchemies – two existing works and one world premiere – is a warm counterpoint to that view, featuring some of McGregor’s most human dance.
McGregor has been resident choreographer at the Royal Ballet for 20 years. It was a controversial appointment to some, since he came from contemporary dance, not ballet. His influence has changed the company, expanded its outlook, pushed dancers to be more versatile – and it is noticeable that while the contortions of his early works could look awkward on the classically trained dancers, the new generation take it all in their stride. But the dancers must have influenced him too, with their incredible physical facility, but also their lyricism and their instinct as communicators (even in abstract works like these).
Certain dancers clearly thrive in McGregor’s creative process, such as Melissa Hamilton, whose petite frame snaps into any position McGregor can imagine with a brilliantly don’t-mess-with-me attitude. And Joseph Sissens, who opens this triple bill with a solo of protean intelligence. The tone of the first piece, Untitled, 2023, is set by the designs of the Cuban artist Carmen Herrera: a single stretched green triangle slicing the white backdrop, and a white geometric sculpture. It is beautifully stark minimalism which is echoed in the choreography and gives sense to every sharp, thrusting limb, focusing attention on the clarity of line. In contrast to this spacious, wide-open setting comes an orchestral score by Icelandic composer Anna Thorvaldsdottir, shifting textures from claustrophobia to ominous swell to sudden majesty. Towards the end there is more than a hint of Merce Cunningham in the movement (those green/white contrast costumes are reminiscent of Cunningham’s Beach Birds), but also feline curve and stretch, and a richly expressive final solo from Calvin Richardson.
If that seemed expressive, then watch 2018’s Yugen. Everything about Yugen is gorgeous, except the costumes (shapeless, square-necked, Christmassy red). The music, Leonard Bernstein’s Chichester Psalms, is glorious: the religious reverence and the jazzy lilt, the timbre of the voices like bells. It’s music you submit to, and an unusually melodic and conventional score for McGregor (the piece was a commission for Bernstein’s centenary) but he leans into it, making dance that breathes like a singer. Edmund de Waal designed the sets: towering frames that give some of the lotfy awe of a cathedral without any of the religious paraphernalia. And the dancing will make you swoon, especially the sensitivity of young first artist Marco Masciari, and his pas de deux with Emile Gooding. Definite ones to watch.
The night’s premiere, Quantum Souls, belongs to more experienced principals, especially the company’s most soulful dancer, William Bracewell. The score by Bushra El-Turk, Ka, from 2022, uses a huge bank of drums, gongs, marimba and more on stage, played live (some of it improvised) by Chinese percussionist Beibei Wang. The absorbing choreography has a real sense of exploration, alert and organic, dancers coming up against each other in multitudinous ways. You never know what’s coming next. When the bright banana-yellow stage shifts to a starry night sky (design is credited to McGregor, with longtime lighting whizz Lucy Carter), the dancers skitter like the kind of creatures whose hearts beat 10 times faster than ours. Wang’s vital presence keeps everything alive, moment to moment, and when she escapes her instruments to move between the performers, it’s as if she’s had the dancers under her spell the whole time.