"The dancers of Dutch National Ballet are fearless, quick and muscular" The Independent

"[Hans van Manen is] almost certainly the best ballet choreographer working anywhere today" The Independent

"A Van Manen ballet is like Chanel tailoring: classic, enduring, always chic" Danse

Hailed as the master of movement and "the grand old revolutionary of ballet"(The Independent), Hans van Manen's elegant choreography forms the cornerstone of modern ballet repertoire. His works are regularly staged by the world's greatest dance ensembles including Paris Opera Ballet, The Royal Ballet, Royal Danish Ballet and the Kirov, and have been danced by such stars as Sofiane Sylve, Lucia Lacarra, Uliana Lopatkina, Marcia Haydée and Rudolf Nureyev.

Dutch National Ballet is world-renowned for its interpretation of Van Manen's choreography. This top ranking company now returns with a celebration of his creativity in three programmes featuring six iconic pieces from his repertoire of nearly 120 original creations. The works include Live, a groundbreaking dance for stage and realtime video, and his signature explorations of the tension between the sexes – Adagio Hammerklavier, Concertante, Solo, Sarcasmen and Trois Gnossiennes.

Dutch National Ballet

Dutch National Ballet is the Netherlands' largest dance company. Renowned for its rich, varied repertoire - embracing works from the traditional to the innovative - the Company and its international troupe of 80 technically outstanding dancers are among the finest in the world.

Hans van Manen is lauded as a grandmaster of dance. He has been awarded numerous prizes, including the Erasmus Prize for his outstanding achievements in Dutch dance (2000) and the Benois de la Danse for Lifetime Achievement (2005). In 2008, DNB staged a Hans van Manen Festival to celebrate the 75th birthday of this legendary choreographer.

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Olaf Erwin (Hans van Manen), Angela Sterling

Mar 11 
Adagio Hammerklavier*, Concertante, Live* 

Mar 12
Adagio Hammerklavier*, Trois Gnossiennes*, Solo, Sarcasmen*, Live* 

Mar 14
Adagio Hammerklavier*, Trois Gnossiennes*, Solo, Sarcasmen*, Concertante

*Live piano accompaniment

Adagio Hammerklavier (Music: Piano Sonata No 29 in B flat, Op 106, Hammerklavier (Beethoven)
Concertante (Music: Petite symphonie concertante, Op 54 (Frank Martin)
Live (Music: Un sospiro, Bagatelle ohne Tonart, Wiegenlied, Vier kleine Klavierstücke and Abschied (Liszt)
Sarcasmen (Music: Sarcasms, Op 17 (Prokofiev)
Solo (Music: Partita for Solo Violin No 1 in B minor, BWV1002: Corrente & Double (Bach)
Trois Gnossiennes (Music: Trois Gnossiennes (Satie)

The Language of Emotion: Hans van Manen and his ballets
by Jessica Voeten

Watching a Hans van Manen ballet is a mysterious experience. "In what way mysterious?" would be the celebrated choreographer's reply, no doubt adding: "There's nothing mysterious about my work."

But there he's mistaken.

Two or more dancers appear on stage. Within seconds they subject themselves to laws and rules in dance that seem as natural as they are surprising. Audiences feel the choreography is being created before their very eyes. That it cannot be otherwise.

How difficult can it be to make a Van Manen ballet if it is so logical, so clear and therefore so moving and meaningful? Against their better judgment, the spectators sideline the creator. That is the mystery of his work.

Hans van Manen is lauded both at home and abroad as a grandmaster of dance. For more than half a century the Dutch choreographer moves (and moves with) his dancers in a quest for the right movement at the exact moment. Anyone witnessing the results of this voyage of discovery feels its compelling effect.

As Dutch as the rural landscape of the Netherlands that affords no more than a row of trees on the horizon, Van Manen arms himself against pathos and spurious glamour with a clean aesthetics. His ballets seem to be pervaded by a pure simplicity.

Nonetheless for all his renown as the king of abstraction, Van Manen's language is the language of emotion. His dancers speak it with subtlety, encouraging us to understand by looking and listening keenly, because observation (call it voyeurism) is the most important part of Van Manen's work. The dancers react to the music and to each other, not just with their movements but also specifically with their eyes. Eye contact is part of the choreography. It is his creative principle.

The design for a Van Manen ballet is always functional, and springs directly from the action. The softly ruffling backdrop for Adagio Hammerklavier, the grand piano on the stage – the music source of Sarcasmen and Trois Gnossiennes, the seemingly identical costumes for the three men in Solo. The dancers are always bathed in plenty of bright light. Nothing is unintended. Everything has to be seen; indeed must be seen.

The way Van Manen choreographs infallibly steer our gaze. The apotheosis was the premiere of Live, that masterpiece for a male and a female dancer and a cameraman, on a June summer evening in 1979 at the Amsterdam Royal Theatre Carré by the river Amstel. The audience held their breath, riveted by the big screen, which showed close-ups of the lonely woman in the arena alternating with pre-recorded images of her duet with a man. But the arena was now empty and the woman was disappearing from view as she walked slowly along the river. The choreographer redefined the impression of Amsterdam as a city for those in the audience. Since that day, he has done this for other cities around the world, and he will do this again for Hong Kong.

Like Live, all the other encounters which Van Manen sets in motion don't last very long: 10 minutes, 20, half an hour at the most. And yet, from the languid classic Adagio Hammerklavier (1973) to the more recent speed challenge Solo (1997), from the witty duet Sarcasmen (1981) to the mesmerising ensemble piece Concertante (1994), each of his ballets reads like a chapter of an ongoing tale charting the eternal attraction and repulsion between the sexes. After Satie's Trois Gnossiennes (1982) one wonders how the fascinating power struggle between the man and the woman continues.

Van Manen has emphatically refused every request to create a full-length work. What he has to say about the human condition he does so in a short story. His choice of music points the way: the selection which Dutch National Ballet is going to perform includes Bach, Beethoven, Liszt, Frank Martin, Prokofiev and Satie. Van Manen's discography reveals him to be a glutton: the great classics, jazz, pop music, present and past avant garde. But within the variety there are definite criteria and clear patterns. He is fond of melodic solo instruments: the piano, the violin. The structure, the melodic lines and above all the rhythm determine the choreographic content. "Rhythm," says Van Manen, echoing his model the great choreographer George Balanchine, "is the basis." A complex symphonic score, interweaving a multitude of voices and colours with a bewildering array of options is not for him. Van Manen eschews grand gestures.

Dutch National Ballet, Van Manen's creative base from 1973 to 1987 and again since 2005, is a company with an extensive repertoire. Since founded in 1961, the company has groomed generation after generation of dancers in classics as well as 20th century works, especially its large repertoire of George Balanchine's ballets, and contemporary dance. Embracing tradition and innovation, the international family of dancers based in Amsterdam form one of the foremost companies in the world.

The crisp virtuosity and daring performing qualities of Van Manen's works are tailor-made for Dutch National Ballet dancers. The chance to see this company perform six of his finest ballets is indeed an opportunity not be missed.

Jessica Voeten writes about the history of Dutch performing arts and is also a freelance journalist in the Netherlands.