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Why Dance Matters
Cathy Marston: storytelling through dance
Season 1, Ep. 3
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The choreographer Cathy Marston has a rare gift for telling stories in dance. Now a major player in leading ballet companies (including The Royal Ballet, San Francisco Ballet, American Ballet Theatre) that until recently were a boys’ own club, her starting point is often literature or history – in ballets about Jane Eyre or Lolita, Queen Victoria or Jacqueline du Pré. One chapter in the Oxford Handbook of Contemporary Ballet (which is released with a special online launch hosted by the Royal Academy of Dance) peeks inside Cathy’s rehearsal room: Why Dance Matters also asks her how she creates eloquent stories through dance.
Cathy Marston is an award-winning choreographer and artistic director. She spent two years at the Royal Ballet School, before launching a successful international career. She was Associate Artist of the Royal Opera House and director of Bern Ballett. In major creations for The Royal Ballet, San Francisco Ballet, Northern Ballet and Danish Royal Ballet, she lends new perspectives to old narratives: in Jane Eyre, Lolita, Lady Chatterley’s Lover, or the historically-inspired The Cellist, Victoria and Witch-hunt. She won the South Bank Sky Arts Award for Victoria (Northern Ballet), the UK National Dance Award for The Suit (Ballet Black) and in 2020 the prize for Excellence in International Dance from the International Institute for Dance and Theatre.
Find out more about the launch for the Oxford Handbook of Contemporary Ballet, co-edited by RAD’s Head of Research Dr Kathrina Farrugia-Kriel: https://bit.ly/3wTKvNN
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Cathy Marston’s website http://www.cathymarston.com/
Cathy has co-founded Companie La Ronde, a new Swiss, independent company producing dance-led, theatrical works. https://www.cielaronde.com/
Oxford Handbook of Contemporary Ballet https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-oxford-handbook-of-contemporary-ballet-9780190871499
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