In good company
The Ladbroke Grove-based London Children’s Ballet
Above: Photography by Peter Teigen
In 1994, when Lucille Briance’s eldest daughter Zoe was 11 years old, her daughter’s love of ballet spilled out into all their lives, ultimately impacting upon them all. A former magazine editor in her native America and a writer/editor for once she’d moved to London permanently, Lucille found herself in a new and unfamiliar role – as founder and artistic director of her own creation – the London Children’s Ballet, a not-for-profit charity, benefiting children of all backgrounds who simply love to dance.
“I knew nothing about ballet then, but Zoe adored it and as time went by she showed a far deeper interest in it than just wanting to wear a tutu,” says Lucille, sat in the company’s small offices in Ladbroke Grove.
“She was a very strong dancer, the best in her class, so when I started doing superficial research into what she could do to dance more seriously, the opportunities seemed very narrow at age 11,” she continues. “I thought, why isn’t there a company she can audition for and still remain in her mainstream school?”
It was a question that would lead Lucille to the Royal Opera House and a meeting with the Royal Ballet’s Educational Officer, Daryl Jaffray. “I asked her, how difficult could it be to set up such a company? Couldn’t you just hire a choreographer, find a studio and put up some notices? Then basically, that’s what I did.” Lucille’s infectious enthusiasm and can-do attitude impressed Jaffray who gave it her full support and offered to help find a choreographer.
The rest followed fairly easily. Lucille put word out of an audition date for this brand new company, a charitable endeavour that would be, and still is, completely free to all. “At that first audition we had about 150 children for 25 places. A coach-load even came down from Bury St Edmonds in school tracksuits, along with any number of kids from around the corner in T-shirts and shorts and bare feet, and others who’d never danced before.”
Twelve years on, the company is a mainstay in the community, giving opportunity to children who’d never otherwise get the chance, encouraging them, helping them grow and at the same time, reaching out further to an audience who cannot themselves reach the theatres. As well as the company’s annual major production, held each year at the Peacock Theatre in central London, there is a small touring company that takes dancers out to perform at hospitals, special needs schools and community centres for disabled people.
Girls aged nine to 14 years and boys aged eight to 16 audition for a place in the company. Those who successfully make it commit to rehearsing every Sunday from January through to May, with a period of five or six full days over Easter. The staff are professionals, with particular support and encouragement given to new composers recommended by world-class experts in the industry. The works are original narrative compositions (with stories adapted by Lucille herself) and tickets (around 8,000 for eight shows) sell out almost at once.
This year, the company is working on a new rendition of The Secret Garden with Artem Vassiliev composing the score and Christine Sundt choreographing. It’s a life-changing experience for those involved, performed to an incredibly high standard with professional costumes and set design, too.
In all, there’s plenty of heart in this venture. As a mother of four, Lucille has incredible empathy with the children who get rejected. She calls these rejections, “non-selects”, and all are invited back to take part in masterclasses to teach them learn what went wrong and try to rectify it. From this grew a summer school, held in July and taught at St Paul’s School, which generously doesn’t charge for the space. Some 400 kids are invited, 100 come along and out of those, 16-18 are selected to join the outreach touring company. All this, and that’s not forgetting the boys-only classes held on alternate Sundays from January to April, taken by Royal Ballet dancer James Wilkie. It provides an opportunity for boys to dance with other boys and get personal instruction of the highest quality.
“As the standard got higher, we also started to save places for kids who’d had very little opportunity to dance. It’s extraordinary to see how fast these dancers catch up with the others. It’s very rewarding,” says Lucille. Not that ballet is an easy path to follow of course. There’s much disappointment along the way, although it can provide plenty of joy and be a wonderful release for children, opening doors not just into the dance world, but into many other areas of life.
Zoe Briance may have given up on her dance ambitions at age 15 in floods of tears, but she didn’t do too badly out of it. “She’s a very clever girl, “says Lucille. “She got a degree from Oxford University and made the rowing team there. She said she owed that to the LCB, because when a choreographer tells you to do something, they don’t mean ‘approximately’ put your feet here or there, you do it ‘exactly’ and you learn how to follow instructions. She became a hugely successful rower.”
At vocational schools such as the Royal Ballet, it takes much more than just being able to dance and it’s this that is most painful for many hopefuls. “The schools look at your joints, your turnout and straightaway at the shape of your foot – if you have a flat foot and no arch, you’re not going to be able to make a beautiful line and point your foot at the end. I’ve come to learn and be more realistic, and I suppose humble, about the process. You can’t make as beautiful an Arabesque line if you have knock-knees and an enormous bottom, with the best will in the world, the audience is not to going to think it’s as beautiful as a person with long slender legs and who happens to have the gift of a beautiful turnout.”
Kids love dancing with the LCB and many do in fact go onto professional companies, performing arts schools and vocational schools like the Royal Ballet. A 14-year-old Henry Perkins who danced the lead in this summer’s Scarlet Pimpernel, made all the newspapers when he was accepted into the Bolshoi Ballet, only the second boy ever to get in.
Despite the success, it’s a struggle to keep the company going each year. Resources are limited, but with the aid of a strong committee, it keeps on. Fundraising is tough all round, and they desperately need some kind of covenant with ongoing support and premises of their own to expand into. “Children who enter the LCB grow beyond their wildest dreams, their parents appreciate it, and that’s what I’m hoping sponsors and funders will see,” says Lucille, passionate as ever in her endeavour to further young hearts’ dreams.
DVDs of all the company’s main performances are on sale through the website for £17.50 inc p&p at www.londonchildrensballet.com or by calling the office on 020 8969 1555. The Secret Garden is being performed at The Peacock Theatre 17-20 May 2007. For information on auditions and other programmes, contact the office or see the website.