Extended Interview with Demis Volpi When the curtains rose at the 9th International Competition for the Erik Bruhn Prize, Canada’s National Ballet School was very well represented on stage. Not only were both The National Ballet of Canada’s competitors NBS grads – Shino Mori and Naoya Ebe- but so were three of the five emerging choreographers whose work was being performed! The Erik Bruhn Competition was created by The National Ballet of Canada in 1988, following Erik Bruhn’s 1986 death. Held every other year, companies with whom Bruhn had a close tie are invited to enter the competition. Dancers must represent the ‘future’ of the companies, they cannot yet be Principal Dancers and they cannot be over the age of 23. This year saw competitors from American Ballet Theatre, Hamburg Ballet, Royal Danish Ballet, Stuttgart Ballet as well as The National Ballet of Canada. This edition of the Bruhn Competition saw the traditional prizes – best male dancer, best female dancer and best choreographer (based on the contemporary performances only) – augmented with new Audience Choice Awards. When it came time to announce the choreographic prizes, NBS had a clean sweep! NBS alumnus Robert Stephen took home the audience choice award for his work for Mori and Ebe, entitled Passacaglia. Winning the prize for best choreographer was fellow NBS alumnus Demis Volpi, of Stuttgart Ballet, for his work Little Monsters. With each of the prizes comes a monetary win, and Demis Volpi chose to donate his winnings to the School. NBS caught up with Demis after the exhilarating weekend to find out more about this spontaneous moment of generosity. NBS: What did winning the choreographic prize at the Bruhn Competition mean to you? Demis Volpi: I think this recognition gives me encouragement, but also lots of responsibility. I now must work as hard as physically possible to keep improving and to make each piece as good as I possibly can. I also see the prize as an encouragement to be a bit braver. To trust my inner voice and let it speak through movement. But of course I will still be pretty freaked out every time I do something new and take a step into the unknown! NBS: You decided, after winning the award, to donate your winnings back to NBS. What motivated such a generous action? DV: I actually had decided that months in advance! As soon as Reid [Anderson, Stuttgart Ballet Artistic Director] told me that I would be creating a pas de deux for the Erik Bruhn Competition I knew that this would be a big deal for me personally. Not just because of the extremely unique chance of exposing my work at such an important event but also because I have a very special bond with the city of Toronto. I went to Page 1 of 4 Canada’s National Ballet School when I was 14. That was a big deal for me and my whole family. I made many friends and had very important experiences in my life there, things that have had a big influence on who I've become as a person. So going back after almost ten years was a huge deal! One thing I was especially excited about was to show my friends and former teachers in Toronto what kind of work I'm doing today. So a few days after I found out that I was flying to Toronto, I decided that if I won the prize money, I would donate it to NBS. It made total sense to me and my family was absolutely thrilled by this idea. Unfortunately, shortly before I flew to Toronto, Glenn Gilmour, who had been my teacher for almost two years at NBS, passed away. It was Mavis Staines’ idea to direct my contribution towards Glenn Gilmour's Celebration Day. It was the best thing I could ever have done with this prize money! Mavis took a huge leap of trust by bringing me to Canada all those years ago. She and her wonderful staff showed me a whole new way of thinking and opened a new world of possibilities for me. The School also helped my family and me financially so that I could stay at the School's residence. The School very generously gave me a lot. It feels great to be able to give a little bit back. NBS: What does your time at NBS mean to you? DV: NBS taught me a new way to see things. I wasn't forced into stretching my knees. I was shown the aesthetic differences and was given a choice! I was also taught that dancers aren't dancers but rather are people who dance - even if sometimes we are a bit like beings from another planet! And I just had great time! Residence was so much fun. I got to meet people from all over the world and I realized that dance is the mother tongue of all people. NBS: Do you have a favourite memory of your time at NBS? DV: I do! In Buenos Aires, my home town, it never snows. I was so excited about finally getting to see snow. I remember standing facing the barre in studio A/B and suddenly I saw through the window a weightless, white, tiny creature flying down from the sky. My first snow flake! And then another one and another one! So I ran out on the street in my ballet uniform! Mr. Gilmour came to the door and kindly asked me to get back to class and I said to him, “but Mr. Gilmour, it's snowing!” That became one of my graduation quotes for the yearbook. Mr. Gilmour was chuckling. NBS: What are your goals for the future? DV: I hope to be able to develop my own choreographic language. Something that is only and truly mine. That will probably be the task of a lifetime! NBS: What made you interested in choreography and how did you start choreographing? DV: The reality of the first years in a professional ballet company is tough. No one can prepare you for that because every place has its own set of rules. But this might be a good thing because you're forced to define who you are as an artist. Page 2 of 4 When I first joined the Stuttgart Ballet - which is a company of somewhat over 70 dancers - I was the last one in line. I was confronted with being the smallest link in a huge clockwork like mechanism. Just having come out of school and being used to dancing solos or pas de deuxs it was hard having to stand at the back understudying the smallest roles in the corps de ballet and mostly not even getting on stage to perform them. Being used to a very tight schedule in school it was also very difficult to deal with the immense amount of free time in my hands. As my frustration got bigger, friends and respected colleagues encouraged me to try something new to basically 'kill time and frustration' and many suggested that I should do a piece for the Noverre Society for Young Choreographers in Stuttgart. I really think they just didn't want to hear impatient me complaining anymore! And so I did my first piece which was a pas de deux called 'on and on and on'. NBS: You’re part of Stuttgart Ballet, and you’ve created several works for the company, including a work that appeared as part of the celebration of Reid Anderson’s 60th birthday. What’s it like creating works on the dancers you also dance with? DV: Once you go into a studio, dancers immediately take you seriously and will do anything for you. Still I had difficulty during the process of my first couple of pieces because I was very afraid of not being taken seriously. Which wasn't the case. They really worked very hard for me! One of the biggest things one learns as a choreographer is dealing with people. All sorts of people. I feel like I've come a very long way. I know that when I go into the studio the dancers are there to work. You learn to respect people's times and rhythms and different ways of working and you learn to trust them. Changing sides back and forward is not always easy but sometimes gives me great advantages because I can understand better what's going on. The one thing I always remind myself before going into the studio as a choreographer is that dancers are hungry beings. Hungry for steps. And I'm there to feed them! And if I don't, well, then they'll probably eat me alive. NBS: How do you begin choreographing a piece? Do you select your music first, or are you inspired by a theme or a movement? Is your process always the same? DV: My process changes from piece to piece. Sometimes I really like a particular quality in a dancer and build around that so that we can explore it. Rarely music is there first. Sometimes it's a theme. Sometimes a word or a movement. One thing I've learned is that things tend to look differently in real life than in my head and so I try to create directly on the dancers as much as I can. NBS: Do you remember how it felt the first time you saw a piece of yours performed? DV: Yes, I do. It was 'on and on and on'. I was backstage. Right before it started I wanted to throw up.