Sadler’s Wells, London
February 7, 2022
A confession. I am not familiar with the music of Leonard Cohen and was only even vaguely aware of two of the numbers that accompany Ballet Jazz Montréal’s Dance Me. But perhaps that’s not a bad thing. It means I don’t bring my own baggage in the way of preconceived ideas about meaning or what the choreography should look like to any of the fourteen songs that accompany this homage and celebration of the man and his music.
The show is a cleverly constructed portrait of the man and his music: a collage of songs, his morose voice and words. Setting a whole evening work to a series of short songs, and having three choreographers almost inevitably makes the work patchy, despite the efforts of dramaturg Eric Jean at pulling it all together.
Cohen, who supported the creation of the ballet but who passed away in 2016 while it was still being made, had a pretty downbeat view of the world. Unsurprisingly, his music echoes that. His songs dig into the rawness of life. The choreography, by Andonis Foniadakis, Annabelle Lopez Ochoa and Ihsan Rustem is more varied and only occasionally truly illuminates Cohen’s art, the sheer power of which invariably seems to win out.
Photo Rolando Paolo Guerzoni
There’s little jarring between the numbers thanks to carefully choreographed connections. Through it all comes and goes the often shadowy figure of Yosmell Calderon Mejias in trademark raincoat and fedora, representing the iconic singer-songwriter. Added to that are video designs by HUB Studio, which are generally impressive.
The choreography tends to the conceptual; more about ideas than narrative, even within individual numbers. The songs roll past. Duets glide effortlessly into ensemble numbers. The dancers are all fabulous.
As ever seems to be the case, Dance Me is generally at its best in its simpler moments, those times when the stage is given over to an extended solo or duet. They also happen to be the times when the connection between dance and lyrics is at its strongest.
Rustem gets closest to those lyrics as he creates theatrical poetry. His ‘Dance Me to the End of Love’, which sees Andrew Mikhaiel dance short but passionate duets with six women and another man who run at him in turn, the latter seemingly the most deeply felt of all, is an early stand out.
Photo Rolando Paolo Guerzoni
The undoubted highlight of the show is Rustem’s choreography for ‘Suzanne’, however. The title of the song refers to Suzanne Verdal, the attractive, free-spirited wife of an artist Cohen knew in Montreal during the early 1960s. The quite exquisite duet picks up on the romantic longings of the song, which, we are told, is sprinkled with truths, as probably is the dance. Calderon Mejias wheels and winds Tuti Cedeno around his body. She sits and stands on his thigh, kneels on his back, rolls up onto his shoulder, never touching ground. Utterly delicious, it speaks deeply of care and support, of love and being loved.
Rustem produces the most innovative ensemble piece too. ‘Tower of Song’ is about the songwriter’s craft, a sort of outpouring against the music industry in which Cohen suggests he was imprisoned for life. The choreographer turns the mood on its head, however. Humour becomes the watchword for a few minutes as the whole cast interact playfully with video projections and typewriters.
Foniadakis’ choreography has much more of a celebratory feel. It is certainly energetic. Busy barely does it justice. The dancers surge on, rolling and skimming across the floor with ease. It’s easy to get swept up in it all. But while those group sections have tons of drive, they tend to be a bit fevered. The fast-moving complex dance looks fabulous in the moment and is certainly entertaining, but they do also start to look rather alike and merge into one. With time it all just becomes a blur and impossible to recall in any detail.
A very complex dance for the quartet of Austin Lichty, Gustavo Barros, Mikhaiel and Cedeno, and in ‘Boogie Street’ stands out. But Foniadakis’ contributions so often feel divorced from their accompaniment. Dance should never slavishly follow lyrics, but some connection is nice. The use of metal poles in later numbers, presumably supposed to be instruments of combat, is also probably an idea too far and feels very out of place.
Photo Rolando Paolo Guerzoni
Definitely not a good idea was having two dancers sing; unusual but not unheard of. Hannah Kate Galbraith’s rendition of ‘Hallelujah’ at least hinted at the love, sadness and remorse of the lyrics (it was also the only song that stuck in my head afterwards) but Astrid Dangeard’s of ‘So Long, Marianne’ was rather devoid of feeling.
Lopez Ochoa’s one contribution, ‘Seemed’, a duet for Calderon Mejias and Shanna Irwin is more flowingly lyrical, but with a bit of a jazzy edge.
It ends as I suppose it was bound to: reverentially with the company gathered, they and the audience watching a huge projection of Cohen, as he recites the words to the poem ‘A Thousand Kisses Deep’.
Dance Me is one of those works that you can just sit back and let wash over you. It is unashamedly popularist, undoubtedly entertaining. It will appeal greatly to a lot of people including the non-regular dance-goer, and my guess is that there were a lot of Leonard Cohen music fans rather than dance fans in the audience. But only in parts (almost all by Rustem) does the choreography even start to get close to matching his music and his reflective words about what it is to be human. They win almost every time.
Dance Me, presented by Ballets Jazz Montréal & Robomagic live, is at Sadler’s Wells, London until February 11, 2023. For tickets, visit premier.ticketek.co.uk (they are not available via the Sadler’s Wells website).