The exchange with Japan, looking back on the summer

The joint lesson of 24 July

Students from both schools shared a class: the barre, the corrections, centre work, in one studio and in two languages. The teachers of both houses worked side by side, each with their own way of putting things.

A shared class settles a great many questions without anyone having to ask them. The children see at once what is done the same way elsewhere, and what is done differently. They watch, they copy, they ask. By the end of the barre there were no longer two groups.

The partner school is PP and Co Alfa Ballet Works, in Tokyo. The bond between the two houses has been lived this way for several years now: shared lessons, intensives, performances given together.

The performance of 31 July

On 31 July, the exchange performance brought everyone on stage, from the youngest to the oldest students, in front of families from both countries. The programme included scenes from The Nutcracker: the party and the grandfather clock, the soldier, then the snow.

Before that came the dressing rooms. The make-up, the headpieces, the costumes lined up on their rail, and the older students getting the little ones ready, because that is how it goes. A good part of what a child keeps from a performance happens there, in the hour before it starts.

A story that comes from far back

This tie with Japan did not come about by chance. Victoria’s mother, Zhanna Muradyan, was Senior Ballet Teacher at the Tokyo Ballet for six years, and trained dancers there who became soloists with leading companies. The exchange carries that story on, one generation later.

It rests on people, not on a contract, and it continues from one year to the next for as long as the children get something from it.

The earlier editions are in the Japan gallery, and the family story behind the bond is told on the heritage page.