Ghost Dances Study Notes

Rambert Education

Cover photo: Ghost Dances. Rambert Dance Company. Dancers (l to r): Christopher Powney, Paul Liburd, Jan de Schynkel Studio photoAnthony Crickmay (1999)

Ghost Dances

Choreography byChristopher Bruce

MusicSouth American Folk Music arranged byNicholas Mojsiejenko from recordings by Inti-IllimaniOjos Azules, Huajra, Dolencias, Papel de Plata,Mis Llamitas, Sicuriadas

Set design byChristopher Bruce

Costume designs byBelinda Scarlett

Lighting byNick Chelton

Running time approximately 30 minutesCast: 11 dancers (5 women and 6 men)

Ghost Dances was created for Ballet Rambert (as Rambert Dance Company was then known)and first performed on 3rd July 1981 at the Bristol Theatre Royal (Old Vic). It remained in the Company’s repertoire for four consecutive seasons and was revived byRambert on 24th June 1999 at the Theatre Royal, Norwich. It was nominated for the 1982 Societyof West End Theatre Awards as the Outstanding Achievement of the Year in Ballet. It has alsobeen performed by Nederlands Dans Theater, Australian Dance Theatre, Cullberg Ballet, ZurichBallet, Ballet Gulbenkian, Houston Ballet and Ballet du Grand Thèâtre de Genève.

Theme

Ghost Dances is a one-act dance work in which threeskeletal Ghost Dancers await a group of Dead who willre-enact moments from their lives before passing on.

I made this ballet for the innocent people ofSouth America, who from the time of the SpanishConquests have been continuously devastated bypolitical oppression. I would like to give mythanks to Joan Jara for all her help and to Inti-Illimani for the inspiration of their performances.CHRISTOPHER BRUCE (Programme note July 1981)

The Characters

The Ghost DancersThe Ghost Dancers (sometimes referred to as WhiteGhosts) are three skeleton-like men with skull masksand long, matted hair. They are present on stagethroughout the production from the moment the curtainrises to the point at which it falls, apparently awaitingtheir next consignment of the Dead. Interviewed for BBCRadio 4’s arts programme Kaleidoscope on 12thOctober 1981, Christopher Bruce described them ashaving ‘hung around for millions of years, and lying onrocks, like... animals. They’d become birds and lizardsas well as men. These are symbolic creatures who maybe said to be spirits, guardians of the rocky, barren ‘no-man’s land’ at the mouth of the cave where the work isset, oppressors, murderers, forces of dictatorship, ordeath itself.

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The DeadThe Dead are five women and three men who through-out the work experience contrasting forms of death. TheDead enter as a group upstage left soon after the musicbegins, all remain on stage during the work, and exittogether downstage right at the end. The precise rela-tionship between characters is open to individual inter-pretation by the viewer but as they arrive and departtogether, and are all present on stage from the point oftheir entry to that of their departure, there is a clearsense that they form a community. The clothes worn bythe Dead suggest a variety of social backgrounds. Brucedescribed this group as ‘on their way to Heaven or Hell’,wandering ‘from life to death. It is like their last remem-brances, their last statements, before they go veryproudly at the end, to death’(Kaleidoscope 12th October 1981)

The choreographer George Balanchine once noted thatthere are ‘no mother-in-laws in ballet’; that complexgenealogical relationships cannot be conveyed through

dance and that the audience is always free to interpretany relationships between the men and women in GhostDances as they like. A woman may be the mother, wife,lover, daughter or friend of a man. Nevertheless mostpeople have regarded the couple of the first duet asmore mature than those in the playful second duet. Boththe costumes and the nature of the choreography sug-gest characters without making any individuals overlyspecific. Interpretation by individual dancers will alsoaffect how a role is perceived.

Television and Video Recordingsof Ghost DancesGhost Dances was created to be performed on stageand its fullest impact is experienced when viewing a liveperformance. Nevertheless those studying the produc-tion will find it convenient to refer to the recorded ver-sions of the work. Discussion in these notes thereforefocuses on Rambert’s stage performances and thevideos by Ballet Rambert and Houston Ballet. (Only

Section 3 Dolencias. Rambert Dance Company. Dancers: Laurent Cavanna and Deirdre Chapman Studio photo: Anthony Crickmay (1999)

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the Houston Ballet recording is commercially available inBritain. See back cover.) Ghost Dances has been tele-vised in two versions. The earlier, danced by BalletRambert, was for Dance on 4 and first shown in a dou-ble bill with London Contemporary Dance Theatre inRobert North’s Troy Game on 15th June 1983. The sec-ond, performed by Houston Ballet, was first shown inBritain (together with Bruce’s Journey) on BBC2Summer Dance on 1st August 1993. The dancers in theRambert recording have a vibrant roughness while thosein the Houston recording are lighter, neater and morecontrolled, partly indicative of the performers’ heritage asa classical ballet company. The Rambert recording, withthe original cast, was filmed hurriedly on the stage of theold Sadler’s Wells during the afternoon of 24th March1982 in the middle of Ballet Rambert’s London season,without the supervision of Christopher Bruce. The open-ing sequence was treated with the multiple superimposi-tion of frames showing the passage of movement infrozen images. Wind and bird noises and echoes wereadded to the sound track for the Ghost Dancer’s dancesand the interludes between numbers which, in live per-formance, had been performed unaccompanied. (Windsounds have subsequently been added to the introducto-ry Ghost Dancers’ dance on stage.) The Houston record-ing was filmed in Denmark by Thomas Grimm over sev-eral days. Grimm and Bruce have happily collaboratedon the televising of much of Bruce’s choreography.Referring to the two recordings reveals many of thechanges introduced into the work over a period of timeand alerts the viewer to changes in emphasis in roles asthey are performed by different dancers.

Bruce and Human RightsIn Ghost Dances Bruce does have an agenda in additionto entertainment. As he said in the introduction to thework when it was first televised: ‘I want people to bemoved and feel something for these people. They maynot be able to do much, but public opinion in the endmeans something, and that is a way that I, as an artist,can do my bit for humanity’. Ghost Dances makes apowerful political statement. Although the SouthAmerican context of the work is clear from the musicand designs (see pp.5 - 8), the actual nationality of theDead is irrelevant. Bruce, typically, maintains the univer-sality of his subject, and it has much wider resonance.The Dead could represent Asian or European communi-ties as well as American. As he said in an interview inthe Houston Post (22nd May 1988), ‘Although it has aSouth American setting, it’s a universal story. You couldparallel it with Poland or Afghanistan: cruelty, lack ofhuman rights, people who suffer. So in a sense, it’s indi-rectly political, but it’s very much about humanity andjust about how people get caught up, suffer and die’. Inhis programme note Bruce mentions the repression ofthe native Americans since the European discovery ofthe New World in 1492 although these societies, particu-larly in Central and Andean America, had sufferedrepression for a far longer period. The Incas, who werethe dominant Andean civilization at the time of theSpanish conquest, were only the last of a succession oftribes to subjugate the natives of that area. Although thesocial message is important it is not emphasised at the

expense of theatricality, and the presentation is variedwith contrasting sections in which the Dead are seen re-enacting moments of happiness in their lives. ThatBruce put his point of view across successfully and the-atrically is confirmed by such descriptions as that in TheGuardian (20th March 1982) emphasising that GhostDances is ‘very moving in its sincerity and simplicity’.This is confirmed by the critic James Monahan’s obser-vation (repeated by Mary Clarke in The Dancing Times,August 1999) that Ghost Dances’ appeal ‘lay in itsabsolute truth’. Not all critics have praised the work.Alastair Macaulay (rarely an admirer of Bruce’s choreog-raphy), writing in The Dancing Times (December 1981),considered ‘the work houses a tactic of sledgehammersubtlety.....Perfectly hideous ghouls.... lurk about and,when the innocent South Americans appear, take turnsto creep up from behind and strike them lifeless.... I did-n’t count, but I’d say that each South American wastaken after this fashion at least twice’.

Ghost Dances Placed in the Context ofChristopher Bruce’s WorkGhost Dances was choreographed for Ballet Rambert inthe period when Bruce had recently stopped dancing asa full-time member of the Company and becomeAssociate Choreographer, allowing him more time tochoreograph and respond to requests for ballets fromother companies. Of the dancers Bruce chose to createthe roles in Ghost Dances all but one (Hugh Craig) hadalready danced in his choreography at Rambert,although for six it was the first time they had created arole for him. Similarly the team involved in the designwere artists Bruce was working with at that period (seep.6).

It was the music which provided the production’s mostnovel element. Ghost Dances is set to a selection offolk music in a specific style. This is a device that Brucewas developing in 1981 when he also used a selectionof songs by Gustav Holst for Dancing Day and by BillieHoliday for Holiday Sketches. (Both began as studentproductions choreographed by the Ballet RambertAcademy and London Contemporary Dance Schoolrespectively, and both have subsequently been takeninto the repertoire of professional companies). Brucesaid in the interview accompanying the first showing ofGhost Dances on British television that before construct-ing the dance he had to find a way of using the folkmusic. He found it haunting but the songs, “in them-selves didn’t constitute a ballet”(see p.15). Bruce is nowcompletely at home using a group of songs but in chore-ographing to them he has to find a single purpose togive unity to the production. He subsequently used Irishand American songs for Sergeant Early’s Dream (1984);songs by the Rolling Stones for Rooster (1991); and byBob Dylan for Moonshine (1993). In all these produc-tions the structure is necessarily episodic. An individualdance is created to each song or piece of music andeach section can stand alone for a complete work (somehave been used in this way for gala performances). Butby placing several songs and dances together theimpact of the whole ballet is much stronger than that ofany isolated number. Linking devices and repeated

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motifs provide a choreographic unity for the completeballet.

In certain other works the words of the songs have initi-ated some of the movements. In Ghost Dances, howev-er, the words of the two songs, Dolencias (a complaintreflecting sorrowful pain) and Papel de Plata (SilverPaper) simply encapsulate the mood of the dances. Thetheme of the music for Mis Llamitas (My little Lama),which describes the walk of the llama, provides a move-ment motif in the fifth section.

Movement in Bruce’s choreography serves a purposebeyond existence for its own sake. Even when specificstories are not being told it creates a mood. In addition,by the time Bruce choreographed Ghost Dances it wasalready established that he was a politically aware cho-reographer. As early as 1972 he had created ‘for thesewho die as cattle...’ which revealed his feelings on thefutility of war (the title taken from the poem by FirstWorld War poet, Wilfred Owen, was added to the workafter the choreography was complete). But most of hismore obviously humanitarian creations were choreo-graphed later than Ghost Dances. Ghost Dances hasbeen linked with two other Bruce ballets, Silence is theEnd of our Song (1983) created for television anddanced by the Royal Danish Ballet, and Swansong(1987) originally choreographed for London FestivalBallet. Silence is the End of our Song was, like GhostDances, inspired by the poetry and music of artists ofthe New Chilean Folk Song Movement (see p. 16). Thetitle itself comes from one of Victor Jara’s works:

......How hard it is to singWhen I must sing of horrorHorror which I am living, horror which I am dyingI see myself among so much and so many moments

of infirmityIn which silence and screams are the end of my song....

The choreography in Silence repeats and developssome of the folk dance patterns of Ghost Dances.Although the dance itself is performed in a more abstractfashion each song is linked with documentary film as theworks of the songs are translated for the viewer, tyingthe dance very closely to events in Chile in the 1960’sand 1970’s. Swansong is more universal in itsapproach. It concerns the interrogation of a victim andthere is no doubt that Bruce’s knowledge of the torturesuffered by Chilean dissidents influenced his production.

The Music

Christopher Bruce’s starting point for Ghost Dances wasthe haunting and ebullient music of the Chilean group,Inti-Illimani, to which he was introduced in 1979. Theoriginal source of the music for Ghost Dances was therecording of Canto de Pueblos Andinos by Inti-Illimanifrom which he carefully selected six numbers, two songsand four other folk tunes.

From the start of the production’s creation it was decidedthat the music accompanying the dance should beplayed live. As it was only available as a recording ithad to be transcribed by Ballet Rambert’s MusicDirector, Nicholas Mojsiejenko (who at the time of thepremiere was working under the stage name of NicholasCarr). He originally heard it on a mono (single track)cassette player, making it impossible, for example, tohear that two sikus (sets of panpipes) are used to com-plete a scale. He also had to acquire knowledge of thetraditional AmerIndian instruments played on theAltiplano (the high plain of the Andes, ranging from6,000 to 12,000 feet in altitude, mainly in Bolivia andPeru). In 1981 the instruments had to be obtained viacontacts in Paris and Cologne and the talented musi-cians of the Mercury Ensemble (the musicians who thenaccompanied Rambert’s performances) had to learn

Left: Section 3 Dolencias. Ballet Rambert. Dancers: Frances Carty and Paul Melis Studio photo: Nobby Clark (1981)Right: Section 1 Opening. Cullberg Ballet. Dancers: Yvan Auzely, Jaceck Solecki, Mats Ek Photo: Lesly Leslie-Spinks (1983)

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to play them and sing in Spanish. The musicians wereparticularly successful and, on the strength of playing forGhost Dances and selling their privately-made cassettesof the score after performances, they went on to formthe popular group Incantation.

At the start of the 1980’s ‘world music’ was not the phe-nomenon it has since become for Western audiences.Shortly after the premiere of Ghost Dances a three-partseries on the natural history of the Andes, The Flight ofthe Condor, with a soundtrack by Inti-Illimani was trans-mitted on BBC 2, adding to the interest in Andean folkmusic. Only Rambert and Houston Ballet (andGulbenkian only when performing in London) havedanced to live music. (Other companies perform to theoriginal Inti-Illimani recordings. Rambert has also usedthese when performing the 1999 revival overseas.)

The instruments played in Ghost Dances, in addition toclassical guitar, bass guitar and side drum, are:

Bombo a drum made traditionally of llama skinstretched over a hollow tree trunk and used in NorthChile. It makes a deep booming sound;Charango a small guitar or primitive lute, its sound-boxtraditionally made from the shell of an armadillo. Its con-struction is a rare hybrid artefact, blending pre-Columbian South American musical instrument proto-types with the construction and tuning principles of theEuropean lute imported by sixteenth century conquista-dors;Guitarrone a large Mexican guitar;Quena (kena, quena-quena or kena-kena) an end-blown Indian flute (held like a recorder) made of bone,wood or bamboo with a simple U-shaped mouthpiecewhich makes a breathy sound;Sikus panpipes with a double row of bamboo pipesused by the native people of the Altiplano. To completea scale you need two sets (as they cover alternatenotes), played by different musicians. Some pipes areup to 24 inches in length;Tiple a steel strung guitar with twelve strings tuned tofour notes, originating from Columbia.

Ghost Dances now begins with wind effects which fadeout once the music begins. Ojos Azules begins very qui-etly as if coming from a distance. It is played on thesikus, charango, bombo and side drum. In the Huajrathe classical Spanish guitar has a solo introduction andthen accompanies the charango, and the wind instru-ment is the quena. The first vocal number, sung solo, isDolencias. This waltz-like number is played on thequena with the guitarrone picking out the bass lineaccompanied by the tiple. It is followed by the secondsong, Papel de Plata, sung by the musicians, initiallysolo and then by the group, firstly in unison and subse-quently with both the first and second verses being sungat the same time. The song is accompanied by guitarand charango. Mis Llamitas is introduced with a guitarsolo echoed by charango. As its name suggests theSicuriadas (or Sikuriadas) is a traditional dance tuneplayed on the sikus repeated gradually faster and faster.When the tune is played high and fast one musician

plays a sort of penny whistle, the whole accompanied bypercussion. Ghost Dances ends with a repeat of OjosAzules.

The Design

Three designers, Christopher Bruce, Belinda Scarlettand Nick Chelton, were involved in creating the visualaspects of Ghost Dances. Christopher Bruce originallyinvited Pamela Marre (with whom he had worked onseveral ballets) to design the complete work but she wasunable to undertake the production. Bruce himselfundertook the setting, asking the set designer JohnCampbell to base it on a photograph of an Andean view.When Ghost Dances was revived for Rambert in 1999he asked Campbell to repeat the same image in a slight-ly less realistic manner.

Bruce asked Belinda Scarlett to design the costumes.He had met Scarlett when she had made costumes forseveral of his works including Night with the WaningMoon (1979) and Preludes and Song (1980) to PamelaMarre’s designs and then, earlier in 1981, she designedthe costumes for Cliff Keuter’s Figures of Wind andRoom to Dance. Scarlett and Marre had been contem-poraries on the post-graduate theatre design course atthe Slade School of Art, Scarlett having previously stud-ied textiles at Camberwell School of Art.

Before beginning work Scarlett watched the productionin rehearsal, gaining an insight into the characters andtheir performance requirements. Bruce also showed hera book including South American Indian masks whichinspired her designs for the Ghost Dancers. Scarlett is ahands-on costume designer, actually making all the origi-nal costumes herself. Pamela Marre re-made the GhostDancers’ costumes to Scarlett’s designs for Rambert in1983.

The Ghost Dancers’ skull-masks were originally made byKate Owen but in 1983 they were made by MarkWheeler, becoming more detailed in the remodelling andpainting (and more comfortable to wear).

The SetA single set is used for the production. This, and theconstant presence of the three Ghost Dancers, gives aunity to the work. The sombre set was designed for aproscenium arch stage and consists of a skilfully paintedbackcloth suggesting an arid landscape with clear sky,which appears to be the view from the mouth of a cave.The dark mouth of the cave (suggesting an entry to theUnderworld) looks over a barren rocky plain to mountainpeaks on the horizon. Viewers have perceived the loca-tion in different terms. For the critic, John Percival, ‘thedistinguished decor was a stony landscape like the val-ley of the shadow of death, where even the rocks looklike skulls or coffins’. Other viewers, perhaps basing theirimpressions on simply watching the video which empha-sises the green wash of light over the scene, havedescribed it as suggesting a lake in the middle distancewhich could be interpreted as the Styx (the river of theancient Greek Underworld). On the stage are seven

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eyeholes. This places an emphasis on the empty sock-ets while enabling the dancers to see clearly throughtheir masks. Jaws are slightly open revealing a fewremaining teeth. The straggly, flowing hair is made fromplumber’s tow dyed black.

The DeadThe dishevelled appearance of the Dead suggests ordi-nary people who have been through trauma. The ideabehind their costumes was that they should embody asense of transition, hence they are half complete andhalf in a state of disintegration - ragged and torn. Theygive the impression of being everyday clothes but arecleverly constructed to incorporate gussets under thearms and hidden pleats in bodices to allow the freedomof movement a dancer requires. These clothes, suits orshirts and trousers for the men, calf-length dresses orskirts, blouses and shawls for the women, suggest thepeople portrayed come from the full spectrum of SouthAmerican society; from city-dwellers, possibly ofEuropean origin, to native Andeans.

One man (who dances Dolencias duet) wears a grey suitand open-neck white shirt, another (who performs theMis Llamitas duet) grey/blue trousers, a white shirt andloose colourful tie which becomes an integral part of thechoreography. (The original tie incorporated samples ofall the fabrics used in the costumes for the Dead!) Threewomen wear dresses. The most mature is in red, theyoungest (usually with loose-flowing hair) is in white, andthe third is in a turquoise and brown georgette, patternedwith butterflies and partly lined with turquoise to catchthe light. These dresses are subtly textured, withappliqué layers around the areas of transition betweensolid and transparent, to enhance their ragged beauty.The woman in the red dress also has a black and whiteplaid shawl, worn over her head as she enters andwrapped around her shoulders as she watches theaction, but which is discarded when she dances. Thenative people are one man and two women. The

(originally just three) rock like structures at the back andsides of the stage. These provide changes of levels forthe Ghost Dancers and places for the Ghost Dancersand Dead observing the action to sit or recline. Becausethe setting was based on a photograph it has a surpris-ing realism for an essentially symbolic production. Thisrealism, broken down to suit the production, is alsofound in the costumes for the Dead.

The CostumesThe costumes are best referred to in three groups. TheGhost Dancers’ costumes are clearly very different fromthose of their victims but those for the Dead can be sub-divided into those which suggest two racial groups -native South Americans and people of European origin.This enhances the impression that the dead come froma variety of backgrounds and have been bought togetherby the universal experience of death.

The Ghost DancersThe Ghost Dancers, represented as figures of death, aredehumanised skeletal creatures in skull-masks with mat-ted hair, their near-naked bodies painted with water-based make-up to outline the muscle groups andemphasise bone structure. Apart from their masks andbody paint, the Ghost Dancers’ costumes consist ofblack bands of loose rags and feathers round theirwaists, upper arms, wrists and just below their knees.The materials on these ‘skirts’ and bands show a widevariety of textures in a range of blacks. They includeplumber’s tow (coarse and broken hemp), strips ofleather, various fabrics, unravelled dressing-gown cordand turkey and cockerel feathers, with their spinesremoved, and stitched to ribbons.

The skull-masks cover the full face. They were inspiredby photographs of Bolivian masks with hair and feathersattached. The Ghost Dancers’ masks are modelled,painted and textured to suggest the last shred of fleshmight be still attached. They have large dark, hollow

Costume designs for Ghost Dances by Belinda Scarlett

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man could represent a peasant boy, just returned fromthe fields, in calf-length breeches and a loose tunic. Thetwo dark-haired women have plaits hanging down theirbacks (wigs are worn if necessary). Both wear skirtsmade of wool crepe very fully gathered into the waist.One wears a green skirt with a blue button-up blousewhile the other has a red skirt and white short sleeveblouse. They both have loosely attached wraps oforange and blue respectively.

In Bruce’s choreography full skirts are often used toextend movement and in this production the numerousloose trailing elements in the costumes add to the feel-ing of disintegration.

The two men in trousers wear lace-up dance shoes butall the other dancers have bare feet. Originally themake-up for the Dead was stylised, emphasising theireyes. Where necessary it was used to emphasise aracial mix and some of the Dead, such as the Dolenciascouple, looked notably wan. Given Bruce’s desire for hischaracters to be universal, the use of stylised make-uphas been discontinued.

The LightingOnce the Dead have entered, the lighting is the onechanging feature of the production. The design is byNick Chelton, with whom Bruce had first collaborated onhis productions in 1980 for Kent Opera and who hadalready lit Bruce’s Preludes and Song for Rambert. Hesubsequently lit Bruce’s Berlin Requiem (1982) forRambert. The lighting serves to enhance the action,drawing the audience’s attention to specific details of thenarratives. Except for the sudden changes at momentsof dramatic deaths, the viewer is not necessarily awareof the alterations, or how their viewing of the work isbeing manipulated by light as the changes are slow,occurring over 10 to 20 seconds, rather than suddenly.The overall impression is of a shadowy place. As eachnumber is performed the stage becomes brighter whilethe linking sections, in which the Ghost Dancers aremost active, are gloomier with a green wash over thebackcloth, adding to the eeriness of the work.

The Ghost Dancers’ opening and closing sections arelargely side-lit which enhances the sculptural effect oftheir bodies. A green light suggestive of melodramaemphasises the deaths at the end of the first groupdance, the Huajra, while cold blue overhead light focus-es on the deaths at the ends of the duets. The onlydeath not emphasised by lighting effects is the undra-matic, almost gentle, removal of the young peasant boyat the end of the Papel de Plata quintet.

The Dance

Overall StructureAs with a number of Bruce’s productions (SergeantEarly’s Dream is another example) Ghost Dances takesa cyclical form with the ending echoing, and to someextent repeating, the opening of the work. It begins andends with the three Ghost Dancers facing and staring

intently into the upstage left wing, just as in SergeantEarly’s Dream the lone woman gazes out to sea by theflagpole. In both works this device could serve to sug-gest that the intervening action is simply a memory ofthe past, or emphasise the continuity of life and the rep-etition of events. In Ghost Dances there are repeatedsuggestions that what we are watching are scenes fromthe past; like flashbacks in films.

Ghost Dances, although formally structured and madeup of a series of individual numbers, has a very strongclimax in the sixth section, the Sicuriadas, whichinvolves all the Dead and is the most defiant and heroicin tone. Structurally Ghost Dances is a palindrome madeup of seven sections which work the same forward orbackwards. The three Ghost Dancers are seen onstageas the curtain rises; the Dead enter. This leads into thefirst group dance, followed by the first duet, a centralquintet, the second duet and the second group dance.The Dead then leave the stage and the three GhostDancers are left alone.

Each of the dances by the Dead falls into two parts, re-enactment of life and the re-enactment of death whenone or more of the Ghost Dancers intrudes to massacre,or take, an individual or group. Even after the brief entryof the Dead to Ojos Azules the dancers react as theGhost Dancers walk through their ranks for the first time.When originally created the Dead and Ghost Dancerssimply mingled and found places to sit without the Deadreacting to the presence of the Ghost Dancers.Exceptionally the Ghost Dancers do not appear in theSicuriadas but wait until the start of the repeat of theOjos Azules to cut down all the Dead. Thus the appear-ance of defying death is in fact only a brief postpone-ment. Just as each dance has its individual character, sothe deaths take different forms, violent and chilling orquiet and hardly noticed. Thus there is real variety withina very formal structure.

During the course of the production the Dead literallypass diagonally across the stage. This symbolicallyfocuses on the fact that they are in transition; on a jour-ney or going through the process of passing from life todeath.

The Choreographic LanguageThe movement vocabulary for Ghost Dances is basedon folk and social dance, combined with the vocabularyderived from Bruce’s own training in classical ballet andGraham-based modern dance and his experience as adancer working in a variety of styles. In particular itshould be noted that Bruce is a member of the secondgeneration of choreographers which married classicalballet to contemporary, or modern, dance. Althoughthere is no formal mime there is a strong sense of char-acter in his choreography and a number of movementsowe their origin to natural behaviour, such as sighs, ges-tures of sorrow, and actions when playing games.

Bruce frequently makes use of the ideas and essence offolk dance with its simple, clear vocabulary but withoutdrawing on or being inhibited by the traditional dances of

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contemporary dance in using off-balance tilts and atti-tudes, the pull of the body or a limb initiating subsequentmovements. Much of his choreography moves in cir-cles, much of it flows, but more angular gestures appearin, for example, the arm movements in the Huajra andPapel de Plata and in the sharp weighty pliés at the startof the Sicuriadas. In Ghost Dances the weight of thebody is much in evidence and at times the body seemsto hang from ‘broken’ arms.

In several sections of Ghost Dances (for example theGhost Dancers’ line-dance and the folk dance of Papelde Plata) the dancers perform in profile, giving thesepassages a flat, two-dimensional appearance.

An Evolving DanceLike many choreographers Christopher Bruce does notregard his productions as static but continues to work onthem each time he revives them. Some productions,such as Swansong, change very little in choreographicdetail. In others, including Ghost Dances which hasbeen mounted on eight companies, changes are moreobvious. Generally Bruce aims to produce the sameeffect, making an equally powerful impact with all pro-ductions of a work. Sometimes he considers the effectscan be achieved more economically, sometimes they areadapted for different dancers, sometimes he is influ-enced by developments in his own career. It should benoted that Ghost Dances was originally performed onthe tiny stage of the Bristol Theatre Royal (Old Vic) andis now danced on much larger stages so the movementhas had to be expanded.

When the ballet was first created the dancers had moreopportunities for improvisation within the work. This wasnotably true of the Ghost Dancers’ dances and the man-ner of deaths in the Huajra. As Ghost Dances has beenmounted on other companies the choreography and

specific countries. He creates his own folk steps basedon a general understanding of the form. It could bedescribed as a universal folk dance, one that calls onthe idea of folk steps but is not tied to any specific cul-ture. Obvious elements used include fleet, precise andoften intricate footwork, the use of chain and circledances, and the spinning turns at the end of theSicuriadas. Sideways-moving line-dances (also a fea-ture of many different national folk dances) became acharacteristic feature of many of Bruce’s works in the1980’s. Similar devices are used in, for example,Intimate Pages (1984) and Land (1985).

Being a folk-inspired work there is an apparent simplicityin the steps and structure of Ghost Dances. Phrasesare repeated both in the music and the choreography,sometimes performed solo, sometimes by severaldancers or musicians in unison or in layers of contrast-ing material. Sometimes phrases are developed withadditional material. The use of distinct phrases is clearas they are often followed by a break, as with the paus-es in the Ghost Dancers’ opening dance or when materi-al is picked up by another group or solo dancer. Therepeats in Ghost Dances are a reflection of the repetitivenature of the music. They are used both within individ-ual sections and from one dance to another, giving acoherence to the whole.

Ghost Dances incorporates a variety of walks and runs,from light tripping steps as in Papel de Plata to deter-mined heel-first strides seen, for example, in the openingof the Sicuriadas. This gives a naturalistic feel to muchof the production. Only natural turnout is required fromthe dancers, their feet are essentially parallel, and aquite deliberate use is made of flexed feet.

Bruce’s choreography is always noted for its use of flexi-ble torsos and spiralling movements. He follows much

Section 2 Huajra. Ballet Rambert. Photo: Alan Crumlish (1984)

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staging has become more ‘set’. It is not always possible to document the precise point at which all the changeswere introduced but the most significant changes seem to have been introduced for Houston Ballet. A few of thechanges made to Ghost Dances during its years of performance are:

1. The opening dance for the Ghost Dancers has been re-choreographed. Bruce maintains he has repeatedlyrestaged the section to suit the dancers involved. The key change came when three tall dancers (Gerald Tibbs,Nacho Duato and Glen Eddy) were cast in the roles at Nederlands Dans Theater. In 1981 the impression was moreof figures wrestling with one another; now there is more emphasis on bird and reptile-like movements. The danceperformed by Rambert now is very similar to that on the recording of Houston Ballet.

2. The arrangement of the line-up of the dancers for the Huajra has changed. The three women originally‘died’ pinioned to the bodies of the Ghost Dancers in different ways. Now they die uniformly, lifted over the heads ofthe Ghost Dancers, backs to the audience, the Ghost Dancers’ hands under their victims’ shoulders. When loweredthey no longer collapse to the floor but bend over limply and then go into the linking triplet phrase.

3. The man’s focus in Dolencias has altered. This changes the emphasis in the narrative. In early stagings hewalked backwards along a diagonal looking at the woman he was leaving. Now, although still with impulsive returnsto his anguished partner, he seems to walk more courageously (and knowingly) towards his fate.

4. Just as the arrangement of dancers changed for the Huajra so it is also different at the end of theSicuriadas. At the start of the repeat of Ojos Azules, as the Ghost Dancers walk down stage, the Dead no longercollapse to the ground as the Ghost Dancers pass by but bend over, leaning against one another for support, or arebrutally pushed apart. The lack of bodies on the ground in both this and the Huajra heightens the symbolic reso-nance of the deaths.

Key Movement PhrasesAs with most of Bruce’s productions Ghost Dances contains some movement phrases that recur throughout the workor stand out as particularly memorable.

1. The Ghost Dancers’ line-dances. For this the Ghost Dancers form a chain, each with his outstretched armslinked by their hands placed on one anothers’ upper arms. With legs apart, feet firmly on the ground, they swivelinto profile facing stage right. They bend so the left knee almost touches the ground then, feet demi-pointe, changethe direction of their profile to look stage left, briefly kneeling on the right knee. The Ghost Dancers move forward,breaking away from the line which soon reforms.

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Section 5 Mis Llamitas. Rambert Dance Company. Dancers: Vincent Redmon and Patricia Hines Studio photo: Anthony Crickmay (1999)

This time they perform a series of steps to the side with one leg crossing behind the other and with the foot of the extended leg always flexed.

2. A strong, defiant, proud phrase performed by various dancers. When first seen, performed bythe men in the Huajra, it is a weighty, squatting movement followed by steps to the side. In the same dance it is repeated more strongly when the Ghost Dancers take the men’s places. For the sideways movements the dancers face directly out at the audience. With their feet par-allel and apart and their arms stretched out ahead of their bodies, palms facing inwards as though encompassing a space, the dancers per-form a sharp pliè as an arresting movement, their weight clearly dropping purposefully, with a downward thrust of energy. As the left leg crosses behind the right in a sideways movement the dancer rises, pulling up ready to repeatthe movement. In the Sicuriadas this movementphrase is followed by an heroic step which sug-gests defiance. In this brusque movement the right leg is lifted in an attitude devant but with flexed foot while the bent arms with clenched hands are raised, the right over the head, the left in front of the body (see opposite).

3. A travelling, searching movement with swinging arms to express sorrow, performed as a triplet phrase. This begins with feet parallel and kneesbent. As the arms swing back and forth, the body curves forward, head down following the line of the spinal curve as with a triplet run, the dancer moves across the stage. To change direction a small jump is performed, the elbow islifted so that the hand of the raised arm skims the side of the face. This step is most clearly performed by the women at the start of Dolencias.

Individual Sections

Section 1 Opening and Ojos AzulesThe opening dance for the three Ghost Dancers falls intotwo parts. The first is performed without musical accom-paniment, to the recorded sound of wind. The secondbegins with the distant sound of Ojos Azules (Blue Eyes)announcing the arrival of the Dead and towards the endof this dance their appearance at the mouth of the cave.Bruce has described the Ghost Dancers as being hungryto devour the next group of the Dead. He has also saidthey are ‘birds and lizards as well as men’.

As has been discussed (An Evolving Dance pp. 9-10),the dance for the Ghost Dancers has changed consider-ably, reflecting changes in Bruce’s choreographic styleform the early 1980s to the present, and the changeshave been influenced by the nature of the men cast inthe roles. Nevertheless they have always been dynami-cally strong and powerful, acrobatic and alert with sud-den moments of stillness giving the impression of listen-ing. As the curtain rises the three Ghost Dancers areseen in profile, looking intently into the wing stage left.Two are downstage while the third is raised on a rock

upstage. The one behind the others, stage right, throwshimself to the ground, and slithers between the legs ofthe second Ghost Dancer, moving in the direction all aregazing. After he rises the second Ghost Dancer movesup behind him and they begin their dance. This nowincorporates a succession of bird-like movements -notably attitudes with the supporting leg in pliè, with boldwing-like outspread arms (a gesture many will be famil-iar with from Bruce’s Swansong), and the bird-likescratching of the lower calf by the other foot. Bruce hasrepeatedly likened the Ghost Dancers to condors (hugeAndean vultures, large enough to carry off llamas) withtheir threatening predatory actions. The Ghost Dancersalso perform sinuous reptilian movements, crawling andslithering over the stage and, like wary animals, punctu-ate their movements by striking moments of stillnesswhen all three stop and concentrate on distant sounds.Within the dance there are gestures when the GhostDancers seem to be pulling the air towards themselvesas if they are hungry or irritated. The dance neverthelessretains an acrobatic quality with a variety of jumps,including stage-leaps and barrel-turns, as well as fallsand rolls.

Throughout the wind-accompanied opening section theGhost Dancers move largely independently or in cannon,moving into a dance unison once the music has begun.This section introduces their line-dance.

The Dead enter, led by a woman in red, and walk slowlyacross the stage gazing blankly ahead. Three quartersof the way across they turn upstage. Whereas the Deadoriginally settled on ‘rocks’ they now wander apparentlyaimlessly and as the Ghost Dancers walk through themthey contract as though hit in the stomach.

As each dance takes place the Dead not involved sit onthe rocks. Their positions are not prescribed by the cho-reographer. The Ghost Dancers recline on the rocks asif, having begun as hungry creatures, they are sated bythe deaths.

Section 2 HuajraA ‘folk lament’ which begins as a light, fleet dance to gui-tar music. It is a sextet for the three men and threewomen (the two peasant women and the woman in theturquoise dress). Essentially they dance in two trios, thethree women dancing in unison and the three men alsoperforming their similar material in unison. Much isdanced in lines, men and women moving in counterpointto one another, the back line frequently moving throughto the front. Periodically men and women come togetheras partners. The lively dance with small steps becomesweightier with larger, stronger steps. Gestures in thisdance are more angular than in most Ghost Dances.The men introduce the characteristic bold pliès(described above). The three Ghost Dancers intrude vio-lently, throwing the men to the ground and taking theirplaces. The original Benesh notation score (written byLiz Cunliffe at the time of Ghost Dances’ creation)includes the instructions ‘run terrified’ and ‘ad lib as ifshot’. The Ghost Dancers seize the women and, takingthe men’s places, partner them. They boldly repeat the

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Section 6 Sicuridas. Cullberg Ballet. Dancer: Maria Blanco Photo: Lesley Leslie-Spinks (1983)

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series of movements that are described on the originalBenesh notation score as ‘reaching forward hopefully’,‘heart broken sob’ and ‘symbolically wiping tears fromface’. Once the man joins the woman they repeatedlyrush towards one another and embrace with a sense ofurgency. He lifts her around his body in a variety ofways. (The lifts have become considerably higher as thework has evolved.) Together they bend over and movestealthily forward as if trying to slip away or hide. Theyrun across the stage. He supports her weight as theyturn and in a gesture she places her hand over her face.The woman continues to dance alone while the manwalks slowly away as if drawn to his fate, yet eager toreturn to the support and comfort of the woman. There isa sense that the diagonal from upstage left to the down-stage right is again the direction of progression. Both ofthe Dead look, aware but unseeing, in the direction oftwo waiting Ghost Dancers, as if sensing the dangerlying in wait for them. The man again moves towards theGhost Dancers, accepting martyrdom. He is lifted high,their arms under his shoulders. His death agony,revealed in helpless bicycling movements of the legsand the juddering of the body, is watched by the womanleft alone in despair.

Section 4 Papel de Plata

I wish I had some silver paperAnd a pen of goldTo write a letterTo my favourite woman.

Ahi, little dove,Ahi, my heart,How long must this pain endure.

A playful, flirtatious, youthful dance for the peasant boywho, after a solo in which he introduces the movement

last section of dance performed by the men and then thewomen too are killed, lifted as if hanged above theGhost Dancers’ heads in the eerie green light.

In the silence between Huajra and Dolencias the threewomen are lowered and stand limply, before sketchingand then dancing the triplet movement which becomes acentral motif in the next dance. Meanwhile the GhostDancers and men clear the space. Although the originaltrio of women performed in their own time they nowmove in unison and make a formal pattern, eventually‘exiting’ to stage left as the woman in red, repeating anddeveloping the triplet phase, enters the space fromstage left.

Section 3 Dolencias

Be sad for my sorrows,If you have ever loved meAnd teach me to be happyBecause I was born unhappy.

A duet for the women in red and the man in the suitwhich may be said to encapsulate the experience ofVictor and Joan Jara. This is a danced conversation inwhich the distressed woman appears to know her man isto be taken away and executed. It could be interpretedas her thoughts as she waits for the inevitable knock onthe door, or she relives the terrible experience, trying tobring back his memory. It can also be taken to reflect theexperience of all the partners of ‘the Disappeared’ in theChilean coup of 1973 (see p.15).

It begins with the woman performing a sorrowful solo.Her material is developed from the searching run whichis repeated in her solos throughout the dance. Facingthe audience with arms stretched in front, she jumpsback bringing her curved arm up and over her head in a

Left: Section 7 Ojos Azules, Houston Ballet. Dancers: Paul Legros, Li Cunxin, Sean Kelly Photo: Geoff Winnigham (1989)Right: Rambert Dance Company. Dancers: Christopher Powney, Paul Liburd, Jan de Schynkel Studio photo: Anthony Crickmay (1999)

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material for the dance, is joined by four women. Thisnumber focuses on small, neat folk steps. The dancemoves across the stage from side to side with a fast littleheel-first walk, followed by little jumps from one foot toanother and changes of direction signalled by arm ges-tures at shoulder level. The women’s bodies are turnedsideways to face the audience and weighted forwards bytheir drooping arms. The man first watches them andthen partners them as a group, facing them with hisback to the audience. After partnering three of thewomen individually, the man runs across to a new part-ner and comes face to face with one of the GhostDancers who takes his arm, places it on his shoulder inthe manner already used in the dance, and simply andundramatically leads him away.

Section 5 Mis LlamitasThe music for this section evokes the walk of the llama.This is a more innocent duet than the first, danced bythe man in the white shirt and colourful tie and thewoman in the white dress. This is another lively, playfuldance. Apart from the opening accompanied by guitarand a brief introspective pause part way through, like adark cloud passing, it is not imbued with such a sense offoreboding, making the sudden “death” at the end moreshocking. In the introduction the man and woman walkforward holding hands. The man looks at the womanand maintains his gaze at the empty space as she walksaround him. (Dancers have walked clockwise or anti-clockwise as reference to the two videos show. Bruceaccepts this may move in either direction.) The effectsuggests that the man is remembering the pleasure thatthe woman gave him as she walks back into his focusand that this dance is a re-enactment of a memory.When she returns to her starting position she looks athim and a broad grin appears on his face. He holds outthe long end of his tie to the woman who leads him offas he performs a llama-like walk (possibly a teasing

game from childhood). He breaks into a series of wheel-ing turns, arms outspread, then into a stepping, shrug-ging, animal movement which the woman watches untilhe reaches for her hand and pulls her past him in agrand jeté. He repeats some of his material watched bythe woman, who runs to him, is lifted up and then theyembrace. After she is given a piggyback they dance inunison, repeating the wheeling movement and ‘leadingthe llama’. After the woman jumps up for a second pig-gyback she suddenly falls backwards from the man’sback into the arms of a reclining Ghost Dancer.Originally the Ghost Dancer covered the woman’s facewith his hand. In the Rambert video the Ghost Dancerappears to crush her head into the ground as he risestriumphantly over her and then allows the man to pick upthe woman’s body to carry her away.

Section 6 SicuriadasThroughout this dance all three Ghost Dancers lurkupstage and, although watchful, take no part in this num-ber (the re-enactments of death being postponed untilthe repeat of Ojos Azules). This together with the heroic,defiant gestures of the dancers, particularly at the outsetof the number, gives it a more positive and hopefulmood than the other dances. It is the only dance per-formed by all the Dead and without any doubt it providesthe climax to the production.

It begins with the woman in red dancing the defiant sig-nature phrase, followed by the heroic gesture, both ofwhich become the basic motifs of the dance. She isjoined progressively by her partner (the man in the suit)who performs the same movement material and then theother six, two by two (the native American women, peas-ant boy and women in turquoise, llama duet couple).Each pair performs in unison to create a cumulativecanon; then the dancers fall into two lines of four whosemovements are performed in similar counterpoint to the

Section 7 Ojos Azules, the exit of the Dead. Ballet Rambert. Photo: Nobby Clark (1981)

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5. Immersing himself in Hispanic culture. He had already learned much about Spanish culture when preparing his works inspired by Federico García Lorca, Ancient Voices of Children(1975), Cruel Garden (1977), and Night with Waning Moon (1979). His preparation now included reading novels by the Columbian author, Gabriel Garcia Márquez (winner of the 1982 Nobel Prize for Literature and best known for his One Hundred Years of Solitude), and studying paintings by Francisco de Goya. Theseincluded satirical scenes and what have been referred to as ‘images of atrocity’ such as his savage portrayals of the popular uprising in Madrid in 1808, including The Second of Mayand the famous image of execution by firing squad, The Third of May.

6. Absorbing many cultural influences from Latin America, including its traditional rituals (some of them adapted by the Catholic church) such as the Day(s) of the Dead. For example, in Mexico,at the end of October and more specifically on 1st and 2nd November (the days following the Church’s feasts of All Saints and All Souls) food and flowers are left for the departed whose souls will absorb their essence, and the living feast with the dead. Images of skeletons are made and sold - edible sugar skulls, elaborate masks and papier mâché sculptures - while death is celebrated.

The 1973 Military Coup in ChileOn 11th September 1973 armed forces under the direc-tion of General Augusto Pinochet overthrew the demo-cratically elected communist government of PresidentSalvador Allende. Allende’s government of Popular Unity,which had been in office for three years, aimed to redis-tribute wealth and land, improve health and educationservices for all, and end the domination of the economyby foreign multi-national capital. According to the ChileSolidarity Campaign, in a period of intense and brutalrepression following the coup an estimated 35,000 civil-ians were put to death and thousands more imprisonedand tortured. The regime established by Pinochetremained in power (supported by the American andBritish governments). Democracy was restored in Chilein 1990: on 11th March 1990 Pinochet agreed to resignthe Presidency after 17 years of dictatorship. He wasappointed a life senator. On 16th October 1998 Pinochetwas arrested in a West London clinic following a backoperation. At the time of writing he remains in Britainwhile an extradition treaty is being agreed.

Victor JaraVictor Jara was a well-known actor, theatre director, folksinger and songwriter. He was born into a peasant familyin the village of Lonquén in the hills less than fifty milesfrom the Chilean capital, Santiago. He grew up withmusic as his mother often sang, and a neighbour taughthim the guitar. His mother was also concerned that herchildren should acquire a good education and while Jarawas still young the family moved to Santiago. Jarabecame a successful theatre director and was theninvolved with several folk groups and artists - writing,

sextet in the Huajra, with lines passing through oneanother. This develops into a farandole-like chain-danceof lighter, faster steps which breaks up into almost hys-terical whirling. This element of frenzy is only found inSicuriadas.

Section 7 Ojos Azules

During the Sicuriadas the Ghost Dancers have slippedbehind the rocks at the back of the stage. As the strainsof Ojos Azules are heard again the Ghost Dancersstealthily emerge from their hiding places behind therocks which they mount, towering above their victims,and slowly and deliberately walk downstage. As theypass between them their standing victims crumple. Atthe front of the stage the Ghost Dancers again link armsand repeat the chain-dance first seen in the openingsection, while the Dead re-group into their opening clus-ter led by the women in red, upstage left, to completetheir progress off downstage right. Although their facesare again without expression, their eyes fixed ahead,this time they perform a more stylised, shuffling walk andas they advance they wheel around, first turning upstagethen downstage before exiting. The Ghost Dancers thentake up their opening positions gazing upstage left,apparently awaiting their next consignment of Dead.

Creation

As with most of Bruce’s productions a collage of ideascontributed to the creation of Ghost Dances. Brucealways thinks deeply about subjects he is portraying andreads about his subject. In choreographing GhostDances he was aware of the need to create theatricalentertainment yet maintain the balance with serious sub-jects such as the experience of living under the dictator-ship in Chile. ‘I have tried to mix a quality of fun, of tryingto live and be happy, but always knowing that you con-stantly live with this threat of a knock on the door.’

Among the influences for Ghost Dances were:

1. Hearing the music of Inti-Illimani. Bruce first lis-tened to the group’s recordings two years beforechoreographing the production.

2. Being asked to create a work for the Chilean Human Rights Committee, a cause with which he sympathised.

3. Meeting dancer Joan Jara, the widow of Victor Jara who was murdered during General AugustoPinochet’s coup, and learning of their experi-ences. Bruce read Victor An Unfinished Song byJoan Jara in proof form prior to its publication in 1983.

4. Learning about South American culture. Bruce was particularly intrigued by one primitive nativeritual at which the dead were cremated and made into soup which was ingested by the tribe members. He was fascinated by the idea of the dead living on within those who were alive! He learnt about masked dances in Bolivia which take their inspiration from fertility dances and ancestor worship.

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peasants and learning their music. Jara used the tradi-tional music as a living expression, writing new songs intraditional style about everyday concerns. Thus therewere two strands to the movement: for some the focuswas anthropological, collecting and cataloguing tradition-al folk music, but for others it was an immediate expres-sion of contemporary problems.

Artists involved with the New Chilean Song Movementcampaigned actively in the late 1960s for the election ofSalvador Allende and his communist government, whichcame to power on 2nd September 1970, taking theirmusic into factories, schools and community centres.They played not only at festivals but also in shantytowns and huge street rallies. Because the music was soidentified with the government of Popular Unity it wascompletely repressed after the 1973 coup. As Joan Jarawrote in Victor An Unfinished Song (p.257) ‘to be foundwith records of Victor, of the Paras, of Quilapay˙n, Inti-Illimani, if the military came to search the house, meantalmost certain arrest’. Traditional instruments, quenasand charangos, and the wearing of ponchos in whichgroups often performed were banned. Inti-Illimani werein Italy, at a youth festival, at the time of the coup. Theygradually found opportunities to work in exile andthrough their concerts and recordings found the meansto keep alive an awareness of Chile’s problems.

North American Ghost DancesWhen looking up Ghost Dances in most referencesources the information given will refer to NorthAmerican Ghost Dances rather than the production cho-reographed by Christopher Bruce. These Ghost Dancesmay date back to Aztec religion but the best documentedGhost Dances developed from native North Americanworld renewal religion in the 1870s and 1890s. Thesedances were based on the idea that the dancing wouldraise the spirits of the dead, restore natural resources(notably here to bring about the return of the buffalo) anddrive away European settlers. These dances involvedside stepping in linked circles, and slow steps performedin unison as well as frenzied twisting, turning and gazingat the sun in a trance, a characteristic of many renewaldances, such as rites of spring. Although ChristopherBruce was aware of these Ghost Dances they had nodirect influence on his production.

performing and recording his own material. He con-tributed to the developing interest in the traditional artsof Chile. He played an active part in investigating thefolk music heritage but also adapted folk forms for hisown songs.

He first worked with the folk group Cuncumén(Murmuring Water) which gave him the opportunity tomake his first recording and tour abroad, and then withthe vocally stronger Quilapay˙n (Three Beards).Quilapay˙n used traditional folk material but often updat-ed it for more immediate impact. They learnt indigenousinstruments to present the music in authentic style andunlike some commercial neo-folk groups did not prettifythe songs, the words of which now put across relevantand powerful social and political messages. Jara alsoadvised and wrote material for Inti-Illimani, which formedin 1966, one year after Quilapay˙n. As the 1960s pro-gressed Jara was recognised internationally and hebecame increasingly involved with dissident politicalgroups. He was an authentic freedom fighter, using hisguitar as a powerful weapon in achieving his ends. In1965 he married British-born dancer, Joan TurnerRoberts (who had previously been married to herChilean partner in the Ballet Jooss, Patricio Bunster)who had lived in Chile since 1954.

In the unrest at the time of the 1973 elections the Jaraswere frequently threatened. On 11th September VictorJara went to keep an appointment with the University.Because of a curfew he could not return home, he wasrounded up and taken to the Chile Stadium in Santiagowhere on 16th September he was murdered. Havingbeen a leading figure in the socialist era and a vocifer-ous supporter of Allende, he and his songs became apowerful symbol of ‘the Disappeared’.

Inti-Illimani and the New Chilean Song MovementInti-Illimani was one of a number of Chilean folk groupswhich investigated indigenous music of the Altiplano inthe 1960s, a period in which a new interest was taken inChile in South American folk music. Their name means‘mountain of light’ (Inti is the Inca sun-god and Illimanithe name of a multi-peaked mountain towering over theBolivian capital La Paz). Inti-Illimani was formed at theend of 1966 by a group of students from the StateTechnical University in Santiago. It was particularly influ-ential in popularising the haunting sound of the quenaand the sparkling brilliance of the charango.

The interest in the folk music of the Andes in the 1950sand 1960s coincided with the rise of commercial folkmusic on an international basis and in particular with theNorth American protest songs performed by such artistsas Joan Baez and Bob Dylan. However the growinginterest in native music was also a reaction against theformal classical repertory of ‘old Europe’ and the flood ofimported (mostly from the United States) pop musicwhich dominated programmes on radio and television.The South American music was played in ‘penas’, cafesand clubs where many of the artists were influenced bytwo remarkable individuals, Violeta Para and Victor Jara.Para had travelled throughout the country living with

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Performance History ofGhost Dances 1981 - 1999

Ballet Rambert / Rambert Dance Company

First performed on 3rd July 1981 at the Bristol Theatre Royal(Old Vic) by Ballet Rambert.

First cast: Hugh Craig, Michael Ho, Yair Vardi (The GhostDancers); Frances Carty, Diane Walker, Catherine Becque,Lucy Bethune, Cathrine Price, Paul Melis, Ikky Maas, GuyDetot (The Dead).

Musicians: Christopher Swithenbank (panpipes), MichaelTaylor (quena), Simon Rogers (charango), Forbes Henderson(guitar), Anthony Hinnigan (bass guitar), Andrew Tyrrell (per-cussion). Conductor: Nicholas Carr.

First programmed with Landscape and The Right of Spring(both choreographed by Richard Alston).

First performance of revival on 24th June 1999 at the TheatreRoyal Norwich, by Rambert Dance Company.

First Cast: Paul Liburd, Trevor Schoonraad, Simon Cooper(The Ghost Dancers); Deirdre Chapman, Patricia Hines,Miranda Lind, Rachel Poirier, Antonia Grove, Jan deSchynkel, Conor O’Brien, Vincent Redmon (The Dead).

Musicians: Francesca Hanley, Tony Robb (panpipes/quena),Richard Wright (guitar/guitarrone), Claudia Figueroa (bassguitar, singer), Forbes Henderson (tiple, charango), RobertMillett (percussion, panpipes). Conductor: Paul Hoskins

First programmed with Four Scenes (Bruce) and The GoldenSection (Twyla Tharp)

Britain1981 Bristol, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Leeds, Oxford,

Edinburgh, Glasgow, Liverpool, Cardiff1982 Leicester, York, Birmingham, London (Sadler’s

Wells), Brighton, Southampton, Coventry, Bristol, Mold, Nottingham, London (The Big Top Battersea Park), Oxford, Newcastle, Liverpool

1983 Birmingham, Manchester, Leicester, London (Sadler’s Wells), Norwich, Southampton

1984 Manchester, Brighton, Exeter1985 London (The Big Top, Battersea Park)1999 Norwich, Manchester, High Wycombe, Edinburgh,

Sheffield, London (Sadler’s Wells)

OverseasItaly Venice (1981)Greece Piraeus (1982)USA Brooklyn, Wisconsin, Lafayette, St. Louis, Iowa City,

New Orleans, Berkeley, Los Angeles (1982)Mexico Mexico City (1982)France Paris (1983)Finland Kuopio Festival (1983)Germany Ludwigshaven, Frankfurt, Weisbaden, Luverkusen

(all 1983), Cologne (1983 & 1999), Neuss (1999)Portugal Lisbon, Orporto (1984)Turkey Istanbul (1984)Cyprus Nicosia, Limassol (1984 & 1999)Poland Gdansk, Warsaw, Lodz (1985)

Ghost Dances continues in the repertoire of Rambert DanceCompany on tour in Britain and overseas.

Nederlands Dans Theater

First performed on 23rd September 1982, at ScheveningenCircustheater.

First Cast: Gerald Tibbs, Nacho Duato, Glen Eddy (TheGhost Dancers); Jeanne Solan, Sabine Kupferberg, JokeZijlstra, Marly Knoben, Catherine Allard, James Vincent, RicMcCullough, Leigh Matthews (The Dead).

Danced in the Netherlands and on tour in Europe includingGermany and France.

Australian Dance Theatre

First performed on 4th November 1982 at the Playhouse,Adelaide Festival Centre.

First Cast: Mark Jeitner, John Nobbs, Peter Lucadou-Wells(The Ghost Dancers); Vanessa McIntosh, John Salisbury,Simone Clifford, Robert Canning, Claire Stonier, Linda Gay,Mark Baldwin, Victoria Jestyn (The Dead).

First programmed with Broken Head (Jonathan Taylor), Frieze(Margaret Wilson) and Portrait (John Salisbury). Productiontoured extensively in Australia until 1985.

Cullberg Ballet

First performed on 11th February 1983 at Vasteras, Sweden,by the Cullberg Ballet.

First Cast: Yvan Auzeley, Jarck Bemschop, Mats Ek (TheGhost Dancers); Maria Blanco, Luc Bouy, Anna Diehl, StefanKarlsson, Ana Laguna, Daniela Malusardi, Jacek Solecki,Allyson Way (The Dead).

First programmed with Bernardas Hus (Mats Ek).

Performed extensively in Sweden 1983 - 1990 and touredinternationally to:Denmark Nykobing (1983)Italy Sulmona (1983), Verona (1984),

Bari (1985), Reggio Emilia (1985)Norway Oslo (1984)Hungary Budapest (1984)Germany Neuss (1984) Ludwigshafen (1986)Canada Toronto (1985)France Paris (1986)

Zurich Ballet

Lighting by Nick Chelton, Sid Ellen, Jürgen Hoffman, Assistant to the Choreographer; Vanessa McIntosh.

First performed 14th April 1985 at Zürich Opernhaus,Switzerland.

First cast: Donald Dadey, Hugh Craig, Gerard Ebitz (TheGhost Dancers); Sibylle Acatos, Toni d’Amelio, Julie Hopkins,Clare Keane, Ellen Piendl, Bohdan Lahola, Wesley Robinson,Robert Wayne Rudd (The Dead).

First programmed with 5 Tangos (Hans van Manen) and LoveSongs (William Forsythe).

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Ballet Gulbenkian

First performed on 20th November 1985 at the GrandeAuditório Gulbenkian, Lisbon, Portugal.

First Cast: Luis Damas, Fransisco Rousseau, António Teles(The Ghost Dancers); Isabel Queiroz, Agnelo Andrade,Barbara Griggi, João Natividade, Teresa Lopes, Paula Valle,João Afonso, Vera Mantero (The Dead).

Performed extensively in Portugal 1985 -1989 and touredinternationally.

Britain London (Sadler’s Wells) (1986)Senegal Dakar (1986)Italy Turin (1987)Egypt Cairo (1988)Yugoslavia Ljubliana (1989)

Houston Ballet

First performed on 26th May 1988 at the Brown Theater,Wortham Center, Houston, USA.

First cast: Li Cunxin, Sean Kelly, Timothy O’Keefe (TheGhost Dancers); Sandra Organ, Kenneth McCombie, PaulLeGros, Martha Butler, Rachel Beard, Mark Arvin, MarkMckendry, Dawn Scanell (The Dead).

Original folk instruments played by members of HoustonBallet Orchestra.

Programmed with Four Last Songs (Ben Stevenson) and LaValse (George Balanchine).

Performed in USA at Houston, Washington DC (1991) andLos Angeles (1992).

Scotland Edinburgh Festival (1989)Denmark Aarhus (1990)Canada Ottawa, Montreal (1991)

Ballet du Grand Théâtre de Genève

First performed on 25th January 1991 at the Grand Théâtrede Genève, Switzerland.

First Cast: Lars Bethke, Lucas Crandall, Sampo Kivela (TheGhost Dancers); Simone Ferro, Gabriele Manferdini,Lucianita Farah, Vanessa Mafe, Didy Veldman, ChristopherChang, Tamar Shelef, Rafi Sadi (The Dead).

Programmed with Les Sept Peches Capitaux (Oscar Araiz)and Axioma 7 (Ohad Naharin).

Rambert Dance Company would like to thank BelindaScarlett, Nicholas Mojsiejenko, Roslyn Anderson, JoãoCosta, Meg Denton, Andrew Edmonston and Margareta Wallfor assisting with information for Ghost Dances Study Notes.

Music and Recordings

The music was initially taken from the recording Canto dePueblos Andinos by Inti-Illimani (Zodiac VPA 8227). Three ofthe numbers, Ojos Azules, Huajra and Papel de Plata, are ofArgentinean origin and two Mis Llamitas and Sicuriadis, comefrom Bolivia. Four are traditional, the Huajra is by AtahualpaYupanqui and Mis Llamitas is by Ernesto Cavour. The wordsadded to Dolencias are by Victor Valencia. Apart fromRambert and Houston Ballet (and Ballet Gulbenkian whenthey performed in London) all productions have been accom-panied by recordings by Inti-Illimani.

In 1982 the music as arranged by Nicholas Carr was record-ed by the Mercury Ensemble and released privately. Some ofthe musicians of the Mercury Ensemble formed the groupIncantation and their initial recording, Cacharpaya (Pan Pipesof the Andes), originally entitled On the Wings of a Condor(Beggars’ Banquet BEG 39 or cassette BEGA 39) includedfour numbers from Ghost Dances. In 1999 NicholasMojsiejenko wrote a full score of the music.

In 1994 the score for Ghost Dances was re-recorded byIncantation and released with the Sergeant Early Band play-ing Sergeant Early’s Dream on CD and cassette (COOK 069).

Ghost Dances Study Notes by Jane PritchardText copyright (c) 2000 Rambert Dance CompanyISBN 0 9505478 6 7

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Bibliography

Mary BRENNAN‘Dance Rambert Triple BillEdinburgh Festival Theatre’in the Glasgow Herald22nd October 1999

Martha BREMSER (ed)Fifty ContemporaryChoreographersLondon, Routledge 1999(pp.42-47)

Jo BUTTERWORTH and GillCLARKE (eds)Dance Makers Portfolio con-versations with choreogra-phersBretton Hall 1998 (pp.25-36)

Mary CLARKE‘Sadler’s Wells BalletRambert’in The Guardian 20th March1982‘Rambert Dance CompanyThis Season & Next’ in TheDancing TimesAugust 1999 pp.1013, 1015

Debra CRAINE‘Flesh on ghostly bones’ in The Times 2nd December1999

David DOUGILL‘Shades of the past’ in TheSunday Times (Culture) 5thDecember 1999 p.14

Noel GOODWIN‘Shadows and Substances’in Dance and DancersSeptember 1981 pp.31-33

Lisa GRAY‘Christopher Bruce’s Soul ofDance’ in Houston Press15th October 1992 pp.36-42

Pauline HODGENS‘Ghost Dances (1981)Christopher Bruce TheBeginnings of an Analysis’ inJanet ADSHEAD Choreography: Principalsand Practice Report of theFourth Study of DanceConference University of Surrey 1987pp.269-278

Joan JARAVictor An Unfinished SongLondon, Jonathon Cape1983

Jane KING‘Haunting ballet foroppressed Latin America’ inThe Morning Star 17th July1981

Alastair MACAULAY‘Ballet Rambert’ in TheDancing Times December1981 pp.174-175

Nadine MEISNER‘Heart and Soul’ in TheIndependent 1st December1999

Ann NUGENT‘Paler version of a RambertGhost’ in The Stage andTelevision Today 30thOctober 1986

John PERCIVAL‘Good heart and creativespirit’ in The Times 17thOctober 1981, p.15‘Ballet Gulbenkian. Sadler’sWells’ in The Times 22ndOctober 1986‘Brave and handsome effort’in The Times 24th August1988

Charles WARD‘Ballet Program exploringdarker side of the psyche’ inHouston Chronicle 22ndMay 1988 pp.14, 18.

BBC Radio 4Kaleidoscope Monday 12thOctober 1981 interview byStephen Phillips withChristopher Bruce and review by Bryan Robertson

Videos & DVDs

Videos of ChristopherBruce’s choreography com-mercially available in Britain.

Three by Rambert. RambertDance Company. LonelyTown, Lonely Street (North),Intimate Pages (Bruce),Sergeant Early’s Dream(Bruce).Available on DVD

Swansong (ENB); GhostDances (Houston Ballet).Christopher Bruce.Available on VHS.

Ghost Dances, Journey(Christopher Bruce). HoustonBallet. Ben Stephenson’simage is also included.Available on DVD.

Only released in USA onAmerican format video)

Ballet Rambert GhostDances (GHO 01)

Also available fromRambert Education

Ghost Dances Teachers’NotesGhost Dances posterGhost Dances and SergeantEarly’s Dream CD (CookCD69)

Swansong Study NotesSwansong Teachers’ NotesCruel Garden NotesFour Scenes NotesRooster Notes

Christopher Bruce BiographyRambert - A Celebrationbook

Rambert EducationRambert Dance Company94 Chiswick High RoadLondon W4 1SH

Telephone 020 8630 0615Facsimile 020 8747 8323Email education@rambert.org.uk