Find out what’s happening in New Zealand dance news!
The Royal New Zealand Ballet (RNZB) will present a double bill featuring Loughlan Prior’s The Firebird along with Cathy Marston’s My Brilliant Career from 30 April – 1 June. Originally premiering in 2021 to sold-out audiences in Wellington and Auckland, Prior’s The Firebird was cut short due to Covid restrictions. Now, in 2025, it finally makes its long-awaited debut in the South Island. Complementing the work is My Brilliant Career, which is based on Miles Franklin’s iconic novel, and which showcases Marston’s intelligent and character-driven choreography.
“With our first main stage season for 2025, we are delighted to be bringing to audiences across the motu a pair of contrasting, but equally thought-provoking and emotionally charged narrative works which demonstrate the immense storytelling capacity of ballet,” says RNZB Artistic Director Ty King-Wall. “It is wonderful to be presenting for the first time in New Zealand, a work by Cathy Marston. Cathy is a choreographer at the peak of her powers, and My Brilliant Career demonstrates perfectly her skill at adapting literary sources for the stage. It is a privilege for us to be performing one of her works. We are also so excited to be returning to Loughlan Prior’s The Firebird and to be sharing it with a wider audience this time, after receiving such an enthusiastic response to its premiere four years ago.”
The Firebird with My Brilliant Career will be presented in Wellington (30 April – 3 May), Auckland (7 – 10 May), Palmerston North (14 May), Invercargill (21 May), Dunedin (24 – 25 May), and Christchurch (29 May – 1 June). For tickets and more information, visit rnzb.org.nz/show/the-firebird-mbc.
The New Zealand Dance Company (NZDC), with Chamber Music New Zealand and the New Zealand String Quartet, premiered a new multi-artform collaboration, 100 Winds/Taupō Hau Rau, in Auckland on 29 March. Performances will also be held in Christchurch on 3 April and Wellington on 5 April. Rooted in the shifting winds of Lake Taupō, 100 Winds/Taupō Hau Rau is a powerful meditation on cultural and political change, identity, and connection. Created by acclaimed choreographer Moss Te Ururangi Patterson, this work brings together contemporary dance and live chamber music to explore how we navigate transformation — both as individuals and as a society.
“This work is a reflection on identity, change and connection,” Patterson said. “It’s about what it feels like to steer across a lake, feeling the winds shift, reminding us of both where we’ve been and where we’re headed. I wanted to create something that captures that sense of uncertainty, but also the beauty in it — something that speaks to the ways in which we are all influenced by the winds of the past, present and future.”
This Matariki, NZDC will present Whetū, an exciting triple bill marking 10 years of the Tāmaki Tour. Inspired by the cycles of nature, the shifting winds and the celestial rhythms of Matariki, Whetūexplores themes of connection, renewal and reflection — just as the rising constellation invites us to consider where we have been and where we are going. The triple bill will include an excerpt of Patterson’s 100 Winds, as well as Bianca Hyslop’s A Murmuration and ‘Isope ‘Akau‘ola’s Tawhiri’s Ring. NZDC will tour with Whetū from 3 – 19 June. Tāmaki Tour grows in popularity every year, and performances will fill up fast, so enquire to secure a performance for your school by emailing yep@nzdc.org.nz. For more information, visit nzdc.org.nz/whats-on.
The New Zealand School of Dance (NZSD) has successfully launched its revamped Associates Programme this year in collaboration with the Royal New Zealand Ballet (RNZB). This initiative offers pre-vocational dance students across Aotearoa New Zealand a unique opportunity to engage with both NZSD and the RNZB throughout the year. Continuing the School’s close relationship with the Company, five of the students will work alongside the dancers for the children’s production Dazzlehands. Additionally, NZSD 3rd Yr classical ballet student Hui Ho Yin (Mike Hui), who recently returned from the Prix de Lausanne, joins the national tour of Loughlan Prior’s The Firebird.
Since the beginning of the year, some of NZSD’s contemporary dance students have been seconded to various companies, including the Australasian Dance Collective and Movement Of The Human. In the next few weeks, the School’s 2nd and 3rd Yr students will have the opportunity to be placed on secondment with The New Zealand Dance Company, Footnote, Sydney Dance Company and Co3 in Perth.
Every year, NZSD welcomes esteemed guest tutors from across Aotearoa and around the world. Their presence provides the school’s students with invaluable experience and greatly enriches their training. Since the beginning of Term 1, NZSD has had the pleasure of hosting: Catarina Mora (flamenco tutor at the John Cranko School in Stuttgart, Germany), Jemima Matsuda (freelance contemporary dance tutor), Gosia Mielech (founder of DanceLab and Teacher of GAGA), Raewyn Hill (Director of Co3 Contemporary Dance in Perth, Western Australia), Christopher Hampson CBE (CEO/Artistic Director, Scottish Ballet, Glasgow), and Mavis Staines CM DHumL (Global Ambassador for Canada’s National Ballet School, Toronto).
By Laura Di Orio of Dance Informa.
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