Natascha Mair (Principal Vienna State Ballet): talking "about Swan Lake and Odette & Odile" - an interview with many pictures and videos, "just for the record".

During many periods in life, one feels the necessity of writing things down, just „for the record" as the common saying goes.

There are also a series of moments that are so strategically formulated, even if by chance, that they find a place in your mind in which they can be constantly remembered as if to reminding you of something important or something funny...

One of those interesting phenomenons happens to me quite constantly as I remember our Brazilian Prima Ballerina, Cristina Martinelli, telling me a story about her first Swan Lake. While waiting in the wardrobe during the endless first act, she had just a single thought. Take her little handbag and leave the theatre immediately to walk to the garage and get her car to drive to Copacabana... Of course, she never did that and her Odette and Odile composed one of the greatest performances we have ever seen in Rio – but I could never take this image out of my mind: Odette in full costume (perhaps wearing a shawl ?) walking through the most important street in Rio’s City Center to get her car – carrying a little, chic handbag... Miss Martinelli, a person of great humour (who possesses that enviable quality that only the truly great ones have: to laugh about oneself!), told me this story so beautifully, so brilliantly rhetorical that I could never forget it – and here it is: Just for the record.

Natascha Mair had her first Swan Lake in the Theatre in Aspendos (Antalya, Turkey) in the first week of September last (for this performance she was coached by the great Brigitte Stadler) and then on September 25th with the Kremlin Ballet in Moscow, in which she danced with Isaac Hernandéz (English National Ballet) and was coached by no one but the marvellous Tamara Rojo. Moments to be remembered

„Dear Natascha, now you made me curious – I am a big admirer of Miss Rojo's – how was working so close to her?", I ask.

In the Studio in London being coached by Tamara Rojo

„Oh lovely, such an enjoyable experience – especially because apart from her very precise and emotional coaching, she is still dancing! And that is something I am very grateful for: to have been able to work with her in this special moment" (And that made me think of Lillian Hellmann's „Pentimento" and about the passage in which she describes Julia, her best friend, and that moment in which women have achieved maturity and are still young enough... but that is another story... )

„Your approach to Odette/Odile and that, may I say, „duality", in a very „Virginia Woolfish" way?"

She reflects for some short seconds – one can feel that she really goes „into herself" to remember – her honesty is so true that one can nearly „touch it". It is not lost in abstraction, it is „solid" and three dimensional...

„Since so many years I have been watching „Lake" and since so many years I have been wanting to dance it. My attitude towards it has changed 100s of times – especially because, obviously, people seem to identify me much more with Odette and not really know what to await of my Odile's interpretation... I was very happy (and proud, if I may say so) about the response to my Odile, especially in Russia where colleagues, critics and the event's hosts were excited about „her". In fact, during an interview, I committed a small faux pas when I said that „perhaps one true side of my personality did really slip through while constructing the role... „

Then I told her Miss Martinelli's „handbag story" and, even laughing a bit, she opened her eyes and said „Oh... and I do understand it. The first act is so long. Nerves."

And that is what I love about real Artists – the capacity to tell a story that is 100% connected with the truth – and not letting their „egos" turn the story into something else.

„One last thing for our younger readers: tell us please, in a few words about the difference in the way Odette and Odile „move... „

„They are completely different characters... while Odette never stops flowing and being smooth in the last details, Odile „finishes" her variations with „last positions" and is much more angular, enthralling and really „sharp" but this is only the reflection of their characters... „

Yes, and as I would like to add, let us see which surprises Miss Mair's „Swans" will give us in the future. Interpretations change within the years (Just think of the changing in Baryshnikov's „Albrecht", from an innocent boy in love up to a cynical playboy... ). But to what it really counts now: we managed to save „just for the record" a bit of Miss Mair's first Swans – a very special and important moment in the lives of the few Ballerinas who had the chance and the honour to dance such interesting characters in a choreography that truly speaks „deep to my heart"

Here two short videos to finalize this interview.