By DAVID DUPONT
BG Independent News
Just in time for “Christmas in July,” the Black Swamp Fine Arts School is staging “Masha & the Nutcracker,” its version of the holiday favorite.
Of course, the show is a Christmas holiday favorite. Last December, though, on the day the troupe was prepared to take to the stage, the party, the mice, dancing confections, and the Sugar Plum Fairy were all were put on ice.
Now Masha and the whole colorful cast will be back for performances on Friday, July 23 at 7:30 p.m., and Saturday, July 24 at 11 a.m., 2 p.m., and 4:30 p.m. in the Bowling Green Performing Arts Center.
The dancers from the school’s Pre-Professional Company and its other classes are excited to be back on stage, Sophia Jarrell, the school’s director and founder, said.
Back in January, the school’s staff started looking for alternative dates, but conditions weren’t right for later in January or February, then they saw that the dates in late July were “Christmas” dates. That also meant that the production could be staged in the Performing Arts Center, instead of indoors at Simpson Garden Park.
That makes room for a far large audience than possible under last winter’s restrictions. Tickets are available online and at the venue the day of the show. Admission is $12.
“Masha and the Nutcracker” is the school’s original adaptation of the Tchaikovsky ballet that they first staged in December, 2019. This version is set in the composer’s native Russia in 1816, the year E.T.A. Hoffmann published the original story. Other alterations have been made to make it appropriate for the age and largely female company of dancers.
“The story of ‘the Nutcracker’ with this young girl who has this wonderful party and then these crazy vivid dreams – I think you can celebrate that story line any time of the year regardless of the holiday,” Jarrell said. The score is instrumental without seasonally themed lyrics, so that makes it more adaptable.
The dancers will perform to recorded orchestra tracks.
Also, the company is bringing in Feather Weldon from Ballet Legato in Cleveland to perform the role of the Sugar Plum Fairy.
The school’s dancers rehearsed the show monthly to make sure they remembered the choreography. In June, after the school had staged “Peter and the Wolf,” weekly rehearsals began, all with an eye to avoiding any last minute meltdowns as “Nutcracker” comes in the from the cold.
The energy is picking up, Jarrell said. A camera crew from a Toledo TV station stopped by to do a story, and Jarrell could see the young dancers perking up.
Getting into costume will provide another energy boost. “That will magnify when they get onstage.”
This performance will do double duty as both the school’s 2020 and 2021 “Nutcracker.”
In December the pre-professional company, the dancers who train multiple times a week, will perform Gustav Holst’s “The Planets.”
Jarrell has also gotten performers, both dance and instrumentalists, out in public as much as possible. Earlier this summer they appeared at the farmers market in downtown Bowling Green.
Being able to perform amidst “the hustle and bustle” instead of the quiet of a concert hall is a good skill to have, especially in times when flexibility is the order of the day.
