Kim Brandstrup
Ballet works by Kim Brandstrup
Ballet
From early on in his career, Kim Brandstrup's musical and visual sensibilities as well as his instinctive sense for storytelling led to commissions from leading ballet companies. He has created a number of short and full length ballets, all taking advantage of the physical potential of the classical technique, drawing on the dancers’ virtuosity and inherent musicality, as well as their ability to inhabit fictional characters in a narrative landscape.
Kim Brandstrup works with some of the foremost ballet dancers of his generation, including Leanne Benjamin, Alina Cojocaru, Zenaida Yanowsky, Tamara Rojo, Carlos Acosta, Johan Kobborg, Irek Mukhamedov and Edward Watson. Close collaboration and sensitivity to each dancer's individuality have led to performances of physical power and dramatic focus, in pieces where subtle intimacy and emotional presence pervade.
Kim Brandstrup’s work has been commissioned by The Royal Ballet, Covent Garden; the Royal Danish Ballet; Les Grands Ballets Canadiens; and English National Ballet, among others.
Ballet Projects
Minotaur
Ustinov Studio / Theatre Royal Bath
Ustinov Studio/Theatre Royal, Bath, 15 August 2022
Kim Brandstrup’s ravishing new work puts Ariadne centre stage - Minotaur, commissioned by Deborah Warner as part of her enterprising new regime at the tiny Ustinov space, has the quality of a dream, each successive scene offering pictures of haunting encounters that feel at once surreal and real.
It is incredibly beautiful and serene, with superb dancing from all concerned.
The Guardian *****
Between the Rooms
LA Opera
13 May 2022
'Between the Room's is a haunting film featuring commissioned music by composer Anna Clyne. The film, which is directed and choreographed by Kim Brandstrup, features two internationally celebrated dancers: Alina Cojocaru, who has performed as a principal dancer with the Hamburg Ballet, London's Royal Ballet and English National Ballet, and Matthew Ball, a principal dancer with London's Royal Ballet.
Verweile doch..
Saarbrucken Staatstheater Ballet
Saarbrucken Staatstheater, October 27, 2018
The story of The Dybbuk, the classic Yiddish folk take, has compelled Kim Brandstrup for many years - not least because of its striking resemblance to the story of Giselle. Verweile doch.., his new version for Germany’s Saarbrucken Staatstheater Ballet is set to Leonard Bernstein’s haunting score. Brandstrup will use a group of 18 company dancers, supported by a corps of ‘extras’ of all ages
Internationally renowned conceptual artist Christian Boltanski and leading lighting designer Jean Kalman will collaborate to create an original installation for the the Staatstheater’s immense stage to frame Brandstrup’s choreography.
In Absentia
Nathalia Osipova/Sadler's Wells
Sadler's Wells Theatre, London, 22 October 2018
Solo for David Hallberg to Bach's Chaconne commissioned by Nathalia Osipova for her SadlerWells season Pure Dance.
'The piece I found most compelling was the Hallberg solo, In Absentia by Kim Brandstrup. In what appears to be a dark and lonely apartment, Hallberg stares moodily at a TV screen – the sole source of light, his famous classical silhouette thrown into sharp relief on the back wall – before embarking on a pensive solo to Bach’s Chaconne for violin. There is something about Bach’s music for solo violin or cello that seems to imbue movements with a sense of grand and eternal spaciousness. Brandstrup’s swirling choreography benefitted from this, and it worked well on Hallberg’s long lines and gracious movement quality.' Bachtrack.Com
Life is a Dream
Rambert Dance Company
Sadler's Wells Theatre, London, 23 May 2018
Life Is a Dream is far closer to poetry than drama… Brandstrup’s choreography... is always finely composed and the dancing itself is richly inflected. Flurries of action catch the surges, spikes and trails of Witold Lutosławski’s restless score (played live – a real treat), and the sinewy spirals, tilts and feints make the dancers feel as evasive as the shadows they cast. Brandstrup also makes a virtue of restraint. Stillness and absence are as integral as action and presence, and he can make small gestures such as curling up, holding still or turning away feel large with implication.
Sanjoy Roy, The Guardian
Shaken Mirror "Rystet Spejl"
The Royal Danish Ballet
The Royal Danish Theatre, København, 28th May 2016
''It is an enchanting, beautiful and evocative intersection between dance, text and music choreographer Kim Brandstrup has created in his new and very original staged work''
Vibele Wern, Berlingske Tidende
*****
Transfigured Night
Rambert Dance Company
Sadlers Wells Theatre, 3 November 2015
"Brandstrup romps away with full honours. His Transfigured Night is a haunting, emotionally piercing masterpiece, one of the finest that this outstanding choreographer has ever made, the reward of maturity".
Ismene Brown, The Spectator
JEUX
New York City Ballet
David H Koch Theater, Lincoln Center, NYC, Thursday, October 8 2015
'If you could imagine a Bergman film turned into a ballet, or a story ballet that does not have to choose between being literal and being musical, or a ballet that brings you inside the mind of a confused, lost young woman, Brandstrup’s Jeux would be it.'
Wendy Perron
DanceMagazine
Leda and the Swan
Royal Ballet
Royal Opera House, Covent Garden , 5 September 2014
"Kim Brandstrup’s masterly Leda and The Swan, which mingles Yeats’s poetry (read by Fiona Shaw) has the texture and heft of proper film-making. Zenaida Yanowsky and Tommy Franzen are transfixing."
-Sarah Compton,
The Telegraph
Rhapsody
The Danish Dance Theatre
Rhapsody - The Danish Dance Theatre creates a moving picture of todays lonelyness, dreams and desires. The use of music as sources are in common for both works. A free, floading and contrast rhapsody about beeing a human being. The danse performance “Rhapsody” is like a symphonic poem, where dancing and classic operas describe the price of passion. As modern human beings we search for perfection. We want to be respected, liked and desired – beautiful and active persons with succes in all facets of life.
Genesis
Crystal Ballet
Film Release, 2013
Crystal Ballet’s Genesis is a new work split into four movements danced by four amazing couples and choreographed by two leading choreographers. The first movement Spring represents the start of life and the initial interactions between two young lovers. This has been choreographed by the award winning Kim Brandstrup and is danced by the ballet stars Sarah Lamb and Steven McRae.
Ceremony of Innocence
"Kim Brandstrup’s new Ceremony of Innocence is the highlight of the Aldeburgh Festival’s danced celebration of composer Benjamin Britten. Set to theVariations on a Theme by Frank Bridge, it echoes the ambiguities of Britten’s operas in fresh, musical dance, with strong video design by Leo Warner."
Metamorphosis: Titian2012 - Machina
Royal Opera House
Royal Opera House, July 2012
Kim Brandstrup and Wayne McGregor's choreography is at once miraculously sensual and, intermittently, mechanical. Carlos Acosta is at his sensational best, conveying ecstasy and sorrow, dancing with a galvanising Edward Watson against a background of fog, and alone with the machine as it turns against him. Nico Muhly's music is a beautiful mixture of trance and foreboding.
Invitus Invitam
The three giants of 20th-century dance overshadow most, but not Kim Brandstrup, the Danish choreographer whose new piece for The Royal Ballet held its own in a mixed bill that featured canonical work by all three of the mighty trio." ****
Evening Standard
Eidolon 1 & 2
Royal Danish Ballet Den Kongelige Ballet
Operaen, May 2010
" Eidolon is a playful, aesthetic and poetic series of beautiful images solidly rooted in a contemporary physical language"
Ann Jonsson, Danstidningen
Goldberg
ROH2
Royal Opera House, September 2009
“an ingeniously organised, frequently humorous, gently enigmatic and wholly luminous hour and a quarter – a mini-masterpiece, in short.”
Jenny Gilbert, Independent on Sunday *****
Bird as Prophet
Alina Cojocaru
Queen Elizabeth Hall, May 2008
" - a solo specially made for Cojocaru by Kim Brandstrup, Bird as Prophet, set to wistful Schumann piano music, caught the very essence of this ballerina's quail-boned delicacy, as well as her heart-stopping spirituality. Bird as prophet? This birdwoman aims for the sky."
Jenny Gilbert, Independent on Sunday
Rushes - fragments of a lost story
The Royal Ballet
The Royal Opera House, 23 April 2008
“One of the richest and most dramatic new ballets seen on the stage of the Royal Opera House for a good long time. A sensual, fluid creation.”
Sarah Crompton, Daily Telegraph
The Seven Deadly Sins
Greek National Opera
Olympia Theatre, Athens , 25 November 2007
The narrative is thrust forward at a cinematic pace akin to a documentary or a newsreel - at times even a cartoon short.
Ghosts – five studies in musical phrasing
Den Kongelige Ballet | The Royal Danish Ballet
Operaen, Copenhagen, 20 April 2007
“The greatest revelation of the evening was Ghosts by Kim Brandstrup... Brandstrup’s seductive choreography carves its own niche between narrative and absrtraction, as does Steven Scotts lighting design. The dancers are dancing in the light, and the audience are transported straight to heaven.”
Anne Middelboe Christensen, Information A
The Fall of the House of Usher
Bregenz Festival
Bregenz Festspielhaus , August 7 2006
“A unique and bewitching experiment…Lloyd and Brandstrup work seamlessly with a superb cast of singers and dancers”
Rupert Christiansen, The Daily Telegraph
Pulcinella
Birmingham Royal Ballet
Birmingham Hippodrome, 3 May 2006
“Brandstrup’s shows a master storyteller’s touch in his characterisations and the way he shows the relationship between Parker and Ambra Vallo’s superb Pimpinella. Highlight of the piece is undoubtedly a duet between the two, both acrobatic with lots of inventive lifting, and tender and lyrical. "
David Mead, Criticaldance.com
Two Footnotes to Ashton
Royal Ballet
Linbury Theatre, Royal Opera House, London , June 16 2005
“Kim Brandstrup’s playful pas de deux (danced to a Gluck aria) was the unrivalled hit of the evening….It was an instant classic, the kind of work you want to see again immediately. Whatever happened to encores?”
Louise Levene, The Sunday Telegraph
Queen of Spades
Les Grandes Ballets Canadiennes
Theatre Maisonneuve of Place des Arts, Montreal, October 2001
“A royal flush!" "The Queen of Spades: The choreographer has played his cards very well by artfully blending modernity and classicism." "... the clarity of action, the delicacy of movement, the lovely music, and, most of all, the understated aestheticism leave you breathless throughout the ballet."
- Linda Boutin, Voir,
Place of Stone
Norwegian Ballet
Den Norske Opera, Oslo, March 2001
“Place of Stone, set in the dramatic/erotic universe of Tennesee Williams, is a rare and unique experience of dance theatre. Intensely dramatic, wonderfully danced, it challenges the audiences with lasting effect – see for yourself”
Annette Mürer, Dagbladet 25 March 2001
Sleeping Beauty
Royal New Zealand Ballet
St James Theatre,
Wellington,New Zealand, May 1998
This beautiful new production is traditional at heart, pays homage to Petipa at all the right moments and is packed full of brilliant dancing, it is one of the company’s finest acheivements."
Rod Bliss , Sunday Star Times
Amor og Psyche
Royal Danish Ballet
Det Kongelige Teater, Copenhagen, May 1997
"The format is indisputable , with his first great full-length ballet, Kim Brandstrup demonstrated his ability to handle the big dramatic structure . With a cinematic drive in the editing and a swell of emotion in the form"
- Monna Dithmer, Politiken
Mysterier
The Royal Danish Ballet
The Royal Theatre , Copenhagen, 12 October 1994
"Like a magician he transforms the stage into a magnetic forcefield . His 'Mysterier' creates a cool atmosphere of anticipation . This is modern ballet with a classical sensability - a condensed dance drama created for the Royal's dancers per excellence. God save Brandstrup"
Monna Dithmer, Politiken
White Nights
English National Ballet
London Coliseum, July 1992
“I find the resultant work allusive, haunting. Brandstrup’s ability to fix emotion with gesture is wonderfully exact; his choreographic language is fluent, clear and true.”
Clement Crisp, Financial Times
