Monday 2 – Tuesday 3 March
RICHARD ALSTON DANCE COMPANY
FINAL EDITION
The celebrated Richard Alston Dance Company commemorate 25 years of incredible ballet as they return to Cambridge for their final tour before closing the company in March 2020.
In 2019 Richard Alston announced that his company would close in 2020 due to Arts Council England funding cuts, which former chief dance critic for the New York Times Alastair Macaulay described as “unequivocally the grimmest news for British dance this century”. Final Edition celebrates their 25 years and Alston’s 50 years as a choreographer with both old classics and new pieces.
Final Edition includes Alston’s new piece Shine On, performed to the song cycle On This Island by Britten and Auden. Voices and Light Footsteps is inspired by Claudio Monteverdi’s Madrigals and Sinfonias, and A Far Cry is choreographed by Martin Lawrance to Edward Elgar’s Introduction and Allegro. The show ends with Brahms Hungarian, the popular piano pieces by Jason Ridgway.
Richard Alston began choreography in 1968 as a student at the newly formed London Contemporary Dance School. From 1980-1992 Alston was Artistic Director of Ballet Rambert and in 1994 formed his own company Richard Alston Dance Company, based at The Place in London. Alston’s commissions for other ballet companies include Ballet Black, New York Theatre Ballet and Holland Dance Festival.