Balbir Singh Dance Company in Trespass. Photo: Stephen Berkeley
What happens when you see contemporary dance collide with traditional North Indian Kathak dance? Balbir Singhs Dance Company was set up to explore the very answer to that question – teaching six trained contemporary dancers in the ancient art of Kathak in just nine months. He avoids words like ‘fusion’ and ‘merging’ of dance styles –instead choosing ‘synthesis’ and ‘collision’. What this dance will look like on stage drew in a packed-out audience on Thursday night’s performance of his latest works – TRESPASS at The Patrick Centre, Birmingham – following the success of his début PLAY OF PERCENTAGES.
The opening scene of the dance is full of promise. Accompanied on stage by tabla, guitar, keys and wind instruments, the five astute dancers glide in slow motion towards the front of the stage introducing us to this very unique style which is full of intrigue. But once the novelty of the choreography has taken hold, Balbir Singh fails to propel intricate movements to the next level of producing an engaging performance.
The movement itself is part of the inhabitation. Elements from each dance style appear hand-picked – the flat hands, wide pliés, and butterfly wrist curls of Kathak combined with loose heads, high releases, and parallel devlopés from contemporary ballet. Balbir’s refusal to truly blend the styles comes at the price of each step appearing overly structured and jigsawed together. It is even possible to mark out different areas of the body moving in accordance with each style. Contemporary legs and back; Kathak hands, feet and arms.
At times the choreography is powerful and arresting – danced exquisitely by Stephanie Elstob and Hian Ruth Voon. But the slow progression of the dance along with its studied repetition can make precise lines appear restrictive and the whole choreography overbearing. With unimaginative costumes and lighting, there is little else to tempt the audience.
Trespass, we are told, is about dancers and musicians encroaching on each other’s space – but there is no contact between dancers or engagement with the musicians. At one moment a dancer flashes a cheeky eye to Shahbaz Hussain on tabla, giving us a snippet of how more expression could transform the dance. Indeed, Balbir’s preoccupation with the mathematics of the lines and gestures seems to have stripped the dance of any expression at all. The poker-faced dancers don’t give anything away. While the music might suggest threat, passion or pain – their faces remain bright and blank.
It is Balbir’s original piece, Play of Percentages, which demonstrates his ability to inject variation and vivacity into his choreography – with dancers breaking out of the rigid structures of the first piece – travelling and spinning across the floor. The tabla and guitar work well with the movements here and Elstob’s solo is gripping. This piece shows what the company could do if the two styles were let loose on stage. It was a shame the younger people in the audience were put off by the first half as not to return for this fresher, livelier piece.
I enjoyed parts of this performance but on the whole found it to be rather flat and, as this reviewer says, restricted.
Bringing dance styles together is always a challenging task, and in this case it didn’t really work for me. It takes a lot longer than nine months to become proficient at Kathak, and the style that the dancers had been taught did not sit comfortably on their very Contemporary bodies. Evidently Balbir Singh was not trying to create Kathak dancers, but many of the details and grace that Kathak, used well, can bring to enliven Contemporary dance were missing. Forme these include precise articulation of the hands, wrists and fingers (far too many flat hands and ‘scooping’ last night), subtly curved limbs (many hyper-extended arms in last night’s work), and very importantly life and engagement in the face (each dancer was self-consciously in their own world and did not display the awareness and delight in their movements, each other, the music, and the audience that one expects in kathak).
Mind you, the music was lovely, and I especially enjoyed the guitar and tabla working together.
As a new RFO, this is probably a company to keep an eye on, and I hope the Contemporary/Kathak relationship becomes more organic and less forced as Balbir Singh’s work progresses.
Thanks for your comments insomniac – very perceptive and informative.
You are right, though, that the company is definitely one to watch and I hope to see the shoots of promise which were visible in this double-bill grow into something bigger, more powerful, and entertaining in his next work.
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