Traditional steps, places, and and people – Ballet as Folk Dance
Abstract:
“Re-imagining ballet vocabulary to tell stories is not a new concept, however, in 2019, “The Sisters of Elva Hill” which premiered at Cambridge Folk Festival was termed a ‘folk ballet’. The choreography explored the phrasing, footwork and floor patterns of some English Morris and Rapper Dance forms and adapted elements to inform the balletic language. Emerging from that initial performance project the company Ballet Folk has since established a theatrical form positioning multi-faceted folk artists, dancers and musicians in outdoor performance spaces to create contemporary adaptations of folk tales from across the British Isles.
Centering the works “The Tears of Jenny Greenteeth” (2022) and “The Swan of Salen” (2023) as case studies, this paper offers an opportunity to demonstrate the similarities found in traditional ballet and English folk dance vocabulary. Within each work the usual barriers for ballet’s accessibility as an art form have been dismantled, thus the analysis provides a rationale as to why new audiences/communities, having experienced each work, have subsequently engaged with the repertoire and the balletic form, in non-traditional settings.”