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Latest Blogs
Officially Open
We've done it! We have now well and truly officially opened our new home. Following 3 evenings of celebrations last week we held our Open Day on Saturday and we were truly overwhelmed by the response we received. More than 2250 people took the opportunity to look around our new home, watch a performance or class demonstration, try out a dance class, view our costume and photography exhibition and rub shoulders with our fabulous dancers. The feedback we've had has been excellent, thank...
Open Day update
view timetable We're looking forward to seeing you at our Open Day on Saturday. The Open Day has almost completely sold out and we are expecting a large number of visitors on the day. To help you make the most of your visit to Northern Ballet and Phoenix Dance Theatre we'd like to give you the following information: If you have pre-booked We would appreciate it if you could arrive at least 10 minutes early for the performance and/or class you are booked into and please bear with us, it...
Grand Opening Photo Blog
Last night Northern Ballet and Phoenix Dance Theatre celebrated the Grand Opening of our new home by Northern Ballet's Patron HRH the Earl of Wessex. Guests were treated to a champagne reception, performances by both companies, Northern Ballet Academy and a group of young people from a Northern Ballet Learning course. They also had the opportunity to watch students training in each of our studios. Here are a few pictures of the event and the spectacular fireworks which rounded off a very...
A preview to the Grand opening of our new building
So we are here, the big grand opening of Northern Ballet and Phoenix’ new building in Quarry Hill, and boy do we have a great week planned ahead for you all. With a Royal visit from our patron, Prince Edward, the Earl of Wessex on Tuesday 18th January where the red ribbon will finally be cut on our beautiful new building, and a performance from the Company, the Northern Ballet Academy and Phoenix, you’ll be in for a right treat. This performance will be replayed for more special guests on...
Madame Butterfly - A Japanese story straight from Beijing
As promised here are the Madame Butterfly photos of our tour to Beijing. We started our tour with 3 performances of Romeo & Juliet. Toby Batley performed Romeo and Hannah Bateman performed Juliet on the opening night at the Opera House in Beijing and both were absolutely outstanding. Other dancers performing were Victoria Sibson (nurse), Hiranao Takahashi (Mercutio), Ashley Dixon (Benvolio) and Yi Song (Tybalt). The Opera House is without doubt the biggest stage I have ever had the pleasure...
Swan Lake & The Nutcracker: Two classics through a lens
Hello and welcome to my latest blog. This time I have a collection from two of our recent ballets, Swan Lake, which we performed in Bradford, Woking and Aylesbury; and The Nutcracker which we performed in Nottingham, Sheffield, Norwich, Manchester and Leeds. Though an injury to my knee prevented me from doing all of the Nutcracker performances, I was able to pick up my camera a little more and get some shots from the side of stage. This was a great chance to get some more emotional shots and...
Final Day in Beijing
Our time in Beijing seems to have flown by and we are at the final performance day already. Class wasn’t until 1.15 so still plenty of time for even more shopping. For some it is the thrill of the bargaining as much as what they are actually buying. Our overseas tours this year (Hong Kong, Bangkok and Beijing) have all been sponsored by Marketing Leeds and they were joined in Beijing by Welcome to Yorkshire as co-sponsors. A fun hour was had putting together the gift bags that the sponsors’...
Opening night of Madame Butterfly
The day crew arrived to find local staff asleep around the set having worked into the small hours changing over to Madame Butterfly. All went reasonably well although it has been a major change to accommodate both productions into the same lighting rig and some elements of the Madame Butterfly set have been relocated. We were impressed with the marketing material at the box office of the NCPA. This view of the Opera House gives an idea of the scale of the venue - 2398 seats in total....
Final Performance of Romeo & Juliet
A slightly later start today meant there was time for the Company to visit a few sights or do a little shopping before class. The Forbidden City and Summer Palace were popular destinations as well as the Silk Market where incredible bargains are said to be had! The NCPA is situated just off Tiananmen Square so we have had great views of the Great Hall of the People and the Forbidden City on our doorstep. Hironao Takahashi taught class today to give David Nixon a slight break from taking all the...
Second Performance of Romeo & Juliet
Today, class was a little later but with more work to do to prepare a further cast of Romeo and Juliet plus two new casts for Madame Butterfly, the company were busy all day. This has been the busiest year in recent history for the Company with regards to the numbers of productions we have had in repertoire. Normally we would have five or six in any year but with the three overseas tours in 2010/11 it has been necessary to add Christmas Carol and Madame Butterfly that were not part of the UK...
