London closes a Nutcracker
NewsWe hear the Royal Birmingham Ballet have been sent home by the Royal Albert Hall.
Nutcracker attendances are thin in the Omnicron slowdown and the losses are mounting.
The hall is contemplating a January shutdown.
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BRB or Birmingham Royal Ballet.
It’s Birmingham Royal Ballet (not Royal Birmingham Ballet).
This London run of performances was due to start on 28 December, so no one has been “sent home” and there have, quite understandably, been zero attendances, thin or otherwise!
It’s Omicron (not Omnicron).
“Both organisations have a duty to protect their staff and audiences, and so we have made this decision now in order to avoid further disruption and uncertainty.”
The BRB’s The Nutcracker performances at RAH have been postponed until December 2022.
Buy, hodl, and DRS
“It’s Birmingham Royal Ballet (not Royal Birmingham Ballet).”
It’s the People’s Front of Judea.
This may explain why Kaufmann pulled out of his planned concert there. I thought the reasons he gave in The Guardian interview a week or two ago were childish. The true reason is his concert probably didn’t sell well, and as he had to pay the German orchestra as well, travel and accommodations included, it wasn’t worth. Aside note, I have never heard of an opera singer traveling with orchestra for a concert. They may travel with a pianist but not with an entire orchestra, the costs are prohibitive. When they use orchestra in concerts, it’s always a local orchestra. Now I wonder whose gig was the Christmas concert, Kaufmann’s or the orchestra’s?
The performances are postponed until next year and tickets will be held over. The performances were very well sold so audiences were not‘thinning’. Let us hope the RAH survives this crisis and, likewise, the ballet company.
The situation is a muddle.
RAH: “It is with heavy hearts that we have decided to postpone Birmingham Royal Ballet’s performances of The Nutcracker, which had been scheduled at the Royal Albert Hall from 28-31 December 2021.”
Carlos Acosta, Director of Birmingham Royal Ballet: “The whole company had been so looking forward to performing this amazing production, but it just feels like too big a risk while Omicron cases are rising so steeply.”
Who is canceling whom? And why is Omicron such a risk to Nutcracker audiences, but not for other shows at RAH? There are other shows in December, uncanceled as yet.
What concerts are going ahead???
Is the internet working selectively in your home? You can write comments with triple question marks on slippedisc but can’t look for yourself on the RAH’s website? Though by now it might be too late, they don’t keep past shows. Christmas concerts ended Dec 24. When I looked last (same day as you, BTW, on the 23rd) there were two shows. Last week there were three shows, one ending on Sat or Sun. One of the two shows still there on 23th was called “Carols at the RAH.” I don’t remember the others, but for inquisitive people who absolutely need to know, there’s always the Wayback machine…
Perhaps because ballerinas can’t socially distance and orchestras can?
Have you ever had a look at an orchestra in the pit? The musicians are like canned sardines in there.