Summarize this content to 2000 words in 6 paragraphs in Arabic Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.It’s an ill wind . . . The Royal Ballet’s triple bill of masterpieces by George Balanchine was menaced by a spate of injuries among the scheduled principals and soloists but the emergency casting resulted in some thrilling debut performances at Covent Garden last weekend.The evening’s centrepiece was 1929’s Prodigal Son, not seen at the Royal Opera House for more than 20 years. The 40-minute narrative was the last ballet commissioned by Serge Diaghilev, with a score by Prokofiev and backcloths by expressionist painter Georges Rouault.Sometimes dismissed as a museum piece, the work comes alive in the right hands. The current revival was staged by soon-to-retire Patricia Neary of the Balanchine Trust and was splendidly danced. The nine bald drinking companions (first cousins to the magician’s wacky entourage in Fokine’s Firebird) were having the time of their lives, leaping and capering with demented energy.Cesar Corrales was Friday’s angry, energetic Prodigal but Natalia Osipova was cruelly miscast as the Siren. This deadpan dominatrix, the embodiment of the “riotous living” of the parable, needs long legs and a weapons-grade technique: switchblade battements and sulky little pelvic tilts that subvert the classical line. Fumi Kaneko was sin incarnate on Saturday evening and Leo Dixon, late replacement for Steven McRae, was a splendid Prodigal. The Bristol-born first soloist made easy work of the virtuoso leaps and spins and his heroic physique (abdomen like a plaited loaf) made sense of the painterly tableaux. The final image, curled up in his father’s forgiving embrace, was extremely moving: “He was lost and is found.”Balanchine seldom made narrative work but his plotless ballets echo the emotional colours of his chosen scores. Serenade was created for his fledgling School of American Ballet in 1934 and was tailored to the strengths and limitations of his (mostly female) students. Random accidents in rehearsal — a sudden stumble, a late arrival — were cleverly repurposed to conjure drama and mystery.Just as Tchaikovsky’s Serenade for Strings plays with the C major scale, so Balanchine explores the potential of the basic classroom vocabulary: the do-re-mi of dance. The curtain rises on a phalanx of women in long tulle skirts and 34 satin feet simultaneously click into first position, ready to swarm into big, legible floor patterns with almost Ziegfeldian panache. Lauren Cuthbertson (Friday) and Marianela Nuñez (Saturday) were compelling in the ballerina role.Symphony in C, a 36-tutu extravaganza to a score by the 17-year-old Georges Bizet, made the perfect finale: a joyous response to the score and a never-ending cascade of invention.The four movements require four top-flight ballerinas — a tall order even when there are no injuries to contend with. Neither of last weekend’s casts was perfect and the corps and soloists sometimes lacked the snap and crackle that Balanchine demands but there were some outstanding individual performances.Friday’s opening allegro vivo was led by Fumi Kaneko with crystalline footwork and instinctive musicality. Melissa Hamilton, pulled from the subs bench, gave a grandly melancholic second movement on Saturday evening, partnered by a princely Ryoichi Hirano. Leo Dixon soared through the fourth movement, his second debut of the night, still high on the applause for his first.★★★★☆In rep to April 8, rbo.org.uk
