Bedtime stories
Amal Choucri Catta finds new fascination in an old tale
Sheherazade: Cairo Modern Dance Theatre, choreographer Walid Aouni; Cairo Opera Orchestra, conductor Nader Abbassi; Cairo Opera House Main Hall, 6 to 10 November, 9.30pm
Sheherazade once again: following the September 2000 performance, the opera's Main Hall saw another performance of Walid Aouni's extravagant conception of Rimsky Korsakov's exotic symphony. This time, the orchestra was marvelously conducted by Nader Abbassi, who invested the music with a particular, lavish flair.
Aouni's Sheherazade is no newcomer to local audiences: the dance was premiered in April 2000 at the Citadel's open-air theatre, Sarayat Al-Gabal, before being applauded in August of the same year at Alexandria's Roman Theatre and in several of foreign cities subsequently. Secrets of Samarkand and Sheherazade are widely regarded as the most astounding of Aouni's creations. Inspired by well-known themes, they are extremely colourful, elaborately staged performances animated by exquisitely varied and continually compelling choreography. Performed in September 2000 at the opera's Main Hall, with Sherif Mohieddin -- founder and, at the time, director of Cairo Opera Orchestra -- conducting, Sheherazade has since frequently made the headlines.
Last Thursday that most celebrated of characters was back at the Main Hall, marking the 10th anniversary of Aouni's ingeniously directed Cairo Opera Modern Dance Company. Having undergone significant transformations yet again, the exotic lady was as fabulous as she was, somewhat overwhelmingly, erotic. Aouni's Sheherazade was never simply a clever young woman who managed to avoid her illustrious husband's hangman, nor was she a beautiful princess telling her beloved prince a bedtime story. Through Aouni's mediation she becomes the naive libertine and the femme fatale, the harem's houri, the seraglio's odalisque and the innocent lover all in one. Provocative, seductive: she is as dangerous as Jezebel the queen and as candid as Vivian the fairy.
Nor is Sheherazade simply the storyteller: she is, equally, the story itself, something that Rimsky Korsakov's music, however implicitly, suggests. Aouni's visual conception of Sheherazade is rather reminiscent of Maurice Ravel's three lyrical poems bearing the same name and inspired by Tristan Klingsor's text -- written for voice and orchestra. Evoking the Orient, from Damascus to Persia and from Turkey to China, Aouni's dance, like Klingsor's verse, is a fantastical medley of movement and colour -- adapted, however, not to Ravel's but to Rimsky Korsakov's more popular musical composition.
Aouni's four scenes begin with the Khedieval Country, followed by King Shahrayar's Persian domain, with a modern pas-de-deux by an Indian couple, going on to ancient Hatti and Dervish Country and culminating in the well-known scene of windblown waves on stormy seas. As the curtain rises a haunting melody escapes from the strings of a lonely oud, and the storyteller's silhouette suddenly appears beneath the backdrop. Clad in long black garments, her face hidden behind a black veil, she advances towards the oud player. In her small hands she bears a solitary heart: in search for the ideal partner. She will go on searching, of course. In the end she will find what she is looking for, the way women tend to. For Sheherazade is the woman of all ages, as ancient as Semiramis, as young as Miss Universe, as alluring as Pin-Up. In black hat and high heels she seduces the man who cannot be seduced, and even as she turns into a modern diva or career girl, she still remains Sheherazade, searching irrevocably for prince charming.
Now the music stops, the oud player exits a darkened stage, the orchestra begins to strike up Rimsky Korsakov.
Sheherazade's theme, beautifully played by a solo violin, rises up like a plaintive sigh onto a multi-coloured backdrop depicting scenes from the Middle East. In the first movement the dancers, inhabitants of the Khedieval Country, are primarily male. Unlike ballet, modern dance does not abide by a given set of rules, nor does it follow any given steps to the musical rhythms, thus allowing dancers to move freely on stage before entering into a certain formation to take part in the movements of the entire corps de danse, according to the choreographer's directions. Modern dance likewise gives the choreographer abundant, virtually unlimited scope for innovation, opening up new perspectives, setting new ideas in motion and activating new trends. Thus Aouni's imagination is given free reign as he visualises Korsakov's music according to the dictates, not of tradition or even of art as such, but of his own fecund and provocative imagination. Here as elsewhere the result is remarkable indeed -- a sort of peculiarly, individually ordered chaos.
In that first scene, dancers in modern costumes are wearing the Tarbouche, while King Shahrayar, elated, arranges for his hangman, Masrour, to take Sheherazade's life the next morning. But the storyteller never tires of her tales and, the following night, she is once again to be found at Shahrayar's side, recounting the story of the genie and the lamp, of the Taj Mahal lovers -- who are seen performing a seemingly endless, erotic pas-de-deux of their own
In the second scene, the audience is introduced to a delightful danse d'ensemble enchantingly performed by the king's men, in superb costumes, evoking the luxuries and splendours of a glorious past. The scene ends with a meditative interlude of Oriental tunes, which sound rather lonely, even forlorn, following the opulent orchestration of Korsakov's musical fancy.
The latter strikes back in the third scene -- with the world famous dervishes, not necessarily those from Konya, but from ancient Hatti turned Ottoman Empire and home to the great Jalaluddin Al-Rumi. Aouni's dervishes bear many-branched chandeliers on their heads: their faces are symbolically veiled, they embody the heritage of the Fertile Crescent, which extends around the Tigris and the Euphrates, in a semi-circle from Palestine to the Persian Gulf, where, Aouni seems to be saying, the great ancient civilisations -- Sumerian, Assyrian, Babylonian, Phoenician and Arab -- flourished.
It is at this point that the Crescent begins to grow: every sequence exhibits a larger crescent, with a larger cedar to match. Tiny objects in the hands of Masrour and other performers, they assume gigantic proportions, turning into symbols identifying the entire Middle East. The cedars of Lebanon are as old as the earth on which they have been growing since time immemorial: they are descendants of the Tree of Life with its roots in Paradise and its branches extending into the seventh heaven. Such, at least, is Sheherazade's testimony in the course of one of her 1001 nights. The white crescent and the evergreen cedar will be returning at several intervals, up until the end of the third scene, when the dervishes disappear, while a couple from China perform another, rather erotic pas- de-deux. At this point, the Rukh, legend's enormous bird, escapes from Paradise and takes hold of the sage, whom the diva releases, battling the creature's multi- coloured, giant wings.
With the wings firmly out of sight, the fourth and last scene of this extraordinary masterpiece begins.
Korsakov had originally intended to musically visualise a sinking ship. Now Aouni turns this tragic vision into a poetic performance of pirates carrying enormous sails, which they swing in every direction while executing their enchanting dance. But Sheherazade's anguish is not over yet, for Masrour still hovers in dark corners and King Shahrayar is not always as benevolent as she would like him to be. Finally, as Korsakov's melody culminates in a closing crescendo and the tune quietly echoes on the darkened stage, the oud player returns to his nostalgic desert song, while Sheherazade, having found her partner, returns to the arms of her beloved king and the curtain falls.
Once again Walid Aouni has succeeded in creating, out of a given situation, an unforeseen string of states, turning the expected into the unexpected, and the usual into the unusual -- his forte. The 14 shows he has put on thus far were almost invariably received with enthusiasm -- precisely for displaying this quality. Having proved to be Egypt's most important choreographer-director, the promise implicit in his plans to collaborate with Nader Abbassi and the Cairo Opera Orchestra was adequately fulfilled in this show, hopefully a prelude to many interesting shows to come.
Al-Ahram Weekly Online : 13 - 19 November 2003 (Issue No. 664)
Located at: http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2003/664/cu2.htm