WIN: Tickets to dance spectacular at Theatre Royal, Newcastle

Nederlands Dans Theater 2 are limbering up to bring their vibrant and varied show to Theatre Royal Newcastle from April 26-27 as part of a country-wide tour with Dance Consortium UK.

Last seen in the UK in 2012, NDT2 brings vibrant mixed bills to the UK in performances complemented by visual art, music composition, innovative lighting, set and costume designs.

NDT2 will perform I New Then, by Swedish choreographer Johan Inger, which sees four girls and five boys taken to great heights on songs by Van Morrison.

A spokeswoman from Theatre Royal said: “Inger’s work breathes humour: it’s fresh and optimistic, ranging from comic and theatrical to earthy and organic.”

Inger made his breakthrough as a choreographer in 1995 after a successful dancing career with Nederlands Dans Theater. His choreographies have won numerous prestigious awards.

Meanwhile, a UK Premiere of Romanian choreographer Edward Clug’s Mutual Comfort marks his NDT2 debut.

The spokeswoman said: “The choreography is detailed, sharply defined and at times features a twitchiness where the bodies flick and jerk so extremely and frequently that it can be interpreted as punctuation; a certain acknowledgment of the beat. Clug is interested in highlighting the dancers’ individual stories in his work.

“Mutual comfort emphasises personal experience that arises from the process of creation that is led by illuminating human contradictions and imparting surprising moments of beauty and spontaneous irony.”

Also being performed is Solo, which was created for NDT2 by award-winning choreographer Hans Van Manen in 1997. This seven-minute, fast-paced ballet is set to Johann Sebastian Bach’s violin partita.

Solo is an athletic tour-de-force for three male dancers who portray a single man re-examining his place in the world.

In 2010 Swedish-born choreographer Alexander Ekman created the international hit Cacti for NDT2, which will also be performed. Cacti, for which Ekman uses classical music, resulted in a new arrangement of Schubert’s Der Tod und das Mädchen, created with Het Balletorkest (formerly known as Holland Symphonia).

In Cacti sixteen dancers become the instruments of the orchestra as Ekman challenges the audience to reflect on the way in which art is perceived. Cacti was nominated for a Critics’ Circle National Dance Award (Best Modern Choreography) and an Olivier Award (Best New Dance Production) in 2012. Under the artistic directorship of British-born Paul Lightfoot, Nederlands Dans Theater is headquartered at the Lucent Danstheater in The 
Hague.

In 1978, NDT founded NDT2, its junior division specifically focussing on talent development for dancers aged 18 to 23.

One of the objectives of NDT2 is to acquaint the dancers with a lexicon of dance languages.

•NDT2 comes to Newcastle Theatre Royal from April 26-27. Tickets are £16 from www.theatreroyal.co.uk or Tel. 08448 11 21 21

•To win a pair of tickets to the show on April 26, answer this question: what does the N in NDT2 stand for?

A) Nederlands

B) Newcastle

C) Norway

Email your answer and details to [email protected]

Closing date: April 21