Symphonic music crescendos around you so forcefully that you can feel the arms of your seat vibrating beneath your palms. You want to close your eyes and just feel the music, but you don’t want to miss a moment of what’s happening on stage. Bright costumes flit from one end of the stage to the other faster and more delicately than you thought a human could move. Legs are kicking in perfect harmony, dancers are rippling left and right, and people are performing lifts that have you sitting at the edge of your seat. If circumstances keep you from your favorite show, you can still enjoy the magic that is performing arts from the comfort of your home.
Though the stages remain empty, a number of ballet companies have begun a digital season where they release performances digitally on their websites. One such example is the Northern Ballet Company, which has made several performances available for a limited time online, including Ego, Little Red Riding Hood, Geisha, and more. In the upcoming weeks, they’ll be releasing a performance of Dracula, which originally made some rounds in theaters last year. The show should provide both an artistically stimulating and spooky evening for any dance fans stuck indoors.
Another dance troupe that combines the emotion of dance with theatrics and physical dexterity of circus performers is making the rounds online as well. The troupe Motionhouse is releasing a series of shows online as well, including performances such as Scattered from 2009 and Charge from 2017. These hours-long shows include a range of acrobatics, emotion, and powerful dancing. Both the Northern Ballet Company and Motionhouse aren’t requiring donations to view their performances, but make the option available in hopes that those who partake in the arts will be supportive.
A second piece of creativity you may be missing during these trying times is symphony performances. Luckily and very generously, symphony performances are also being made available online for those craving a date night out to the symphony (but from your living room). The Melbourne Symphony Orchestra has been releasing performances weekly to provide us with some much-needed culture.
The London Symphony Orchestra is also uploading streams from their archive of concerts to their Youtube channel every week (similar to National Theater Live). Some of their upcoming performances include Brahms German Requiem (May 28th), Berlioz Damnation of Faust (May 31st), Stravinsky The Soldier’s Tale from LSO St Luke’s (June 4th), and BMW Classic 2019 from Trafalgar Square (June 7th).
