With love from The Royal Ballet: postcard from Taipei
Here in Covent Garden, the ballet studios have been eerily quiet recently as the Royal Ballet dancers have been away on tour – to the semi-tropical climes of Taipei, capital of Taiwan.
We are delighted to get news from Jeanetta Laurence, The Royal Ballet’s Associate Director, who has penned a quick ‘postcard from Taipei’ to keep ballet fans up to date with the company’s adventures in Taiwan.
After long flights to Taipei via Hong Kong, and an extremely wet free day on arrival, the Company moved in to the National Chiang Kai-Shek Theatre for five sell-out performances. The audiences were hugely appreciative, particularly liking the variety of the mixed programme, Chroma, Rhapsody and DGV and the classicism of Giselle.
The Vice President and his wife came on the second night and thoroughly enjoyed the evening although the V.P. did admit to being rather pleased that he would still be home in time to watch Wimbledon! Among other VIP’s who attended were the Prime Minister and the Ministers for Culture and Economic Affairs and the Foreign Minister.
As ever the technical and performance support teams did a fantastic job and with the dancers and staff pulled out all the stops to give the Taiwanese audiences a glimpse of true Royal Ballet quality, something that was recognized by everyone we spoke to.
