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Dance Magazine, Sept, 1996 by Marian Horosko

The twenty-fourth Prix de Lausanne, held January 23 to 28, attracted 131 candidates, from twenty-nine countries, including forty-four men. Demonstrating the Prix's second year of accepting young dancers from Eastern Europe, the first part of the contest was held in Moscow with the support of the Rudolf Nureyev Foundation, which is based in Zurich. The candidates, ranging in age from fifteen to eighteen, were judged by Christine Camillo, Deutsche Oper Berlin; Marianne Kruuse, director, John Neumeier Ballet Centre, Hamburg; Ekaterina Maximova, Bolshoi Ballet; Merle Park, director, Royal Ballet School; Konstanze Vernon, director, Bayerisches Stattsballet, Munich; Frank Andersen, director, Royal Swedish Ballet; Jean-Charles Gil, Ballets de Monte Carlo; Tetsuya Kumakawa, Royal Ballet; Heinz Spoerli, director, Zurich Ballet, the jury's president; Victor Ullate, director, Center for Dance Victor Ullate, Madrid; and Eric Vu-An, director, Ballet du Grand Theatre, Bordeaux.

The contestants are judged on physical appearance, technique, movement quality, adaptability to a different style (in the modern dance classes), musicality, stage presence that shows enjoyment in performing, and the ability to please an audience and hold their attention. The final tally of votes is averaged by three computers and includes comments by the jury.

The event consists of elimination classes in classical and modern dance before the required performance of a classical and a contemporary variation. Prix teachers Dyane Gray-Cullert, Jan Nuyts, and Giselle Roberge make every effort to make the young dancers comfortable by warm concern and clear directions (usually in a number of languages). They also compose the enchainements--a required test of quick study.

Although in the past Americans have won scholarships and cash awards, compared to the Japanese (twenty-two registered this year), Australians, and, recently, dancers from Spain, our young entrants seem to have had less performing experience and appear uncomfortable and unfamiliar with modern dance or any freestyle movement.

Detroit-born modern dance teacher Gray Cullert says, "It's hard to make judgments when you may have European dancers who have had five years of Graham technique, and youngsters from Russia who don't know what you're talking about when you say modern or contemporary dance. My job is to make everything I give in class very clear and uncomplicated. The entrants have to reveal a willingness to move in a different way. I joke, speak two words in anything from Finnish to Japanese, give them space to observe and assimilate the movements, and repeat a combination often enough for them to find themselves in it. Freedom of movement is up to them, and no matter where they come from, they either like to move or are afraid, hesitant, or resistant to a different style. That won't do in today's job market."

Ballet teacher Nuyts, a ten-year veteran of the Prix, comments on the large number of male contestants from Eastern countries: "There is a history and support for young males in dance in those countries, and they begin a program at an early age. What is wonderful to see is that ballet technique has a standard whether the dancer comes from far or near, but the spirit in the interpretations of that technique and the individual qualities each dancer brings from his environment and personal experience are fascinating to see."

Because some of the many male dancers were only fifteen years old, it doesn't seem quite fair to judge them in the same way as seventeen- and eighteen-year-olds, despite the jury's taking their age into account. One talented fifteen-year-old Russian remarked to the jury that the entrechat six given in a combination was a step he had not yet been taught on his level in his school, but that he would try to do it. He succeeded. Spoerli noted the trend toward younger contestants as well: "They seem to be in a hurry to compete and go somewhere else to study. There is sometimes a tendency to avoid a step-by-step progression in learning, and the slow development of each step is sacrificed for a superficial execution of a step without an organic base. What looks like a double tour isn't one in reality, because it lacks all the elements that must be learned to perform a perfect, beautiful, and consistent double tour."

VARIATIONS

While no professional musician would consider changing a note or phrase in the score of a Beethoven or Chopin work, the dance world blithely makes adaptations, corruptions, and easier versions of classical variations. The Prix has required entrants to select a slower or faster musical version, but has not been able to arrive at a decision to require a standard version of a classical variation. Program notes admit that a version is "based upon" this or that version. Although Benesh notation, for instance, has documented various company versions of standard repertoire, it has clearly stated the source. There is no reason why so many versions and tempos of the well-documented Tschaikovsky Pas de Deux female variation should have appeared at this Prix. Although ballets cannot be trademarked, each time a Balanchine work is performed outside New York City Ballet, it is accompanied by a program note indicating that it is being presented by arrangement with the George Balanchine Trust and has been "produced in accordance with the standards established and provided by the trust." Although there are versions of the variation adapted by Balanchine for various ballerinas, the variation should not be so different as to be unrecognizable as performed by the contestants.