Daniel Agésilas, director of choreographic studies at the Paris Conservatory of Music and Dance

Interview

Daniel Agésilas

By Patricia Boccadoro

PARIS, 28 October 2004—"My aim is to ensure that all students are capable of getting a job after they graduate", Daniel Agésilas, director of the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris, told me recently in his office in the great white and glass modern building that houses the school in the Cité de la Musique at La Villette. "I want them to have a career, be it classical or contemporary", he said, " and when they leave here, they are in demand".

"Contrary to the Paris Opéra School, where the pupils are formed for the company, the 150 students of the Paris Conservatoire, aged from twelve to twenty, are trained for different companies and are consequently very adaptable. They have to be open to all the new techniques, and malleable enough to join the contemporary troupes of Forsythe or Angelin Preljocaj, as well as such companies as the Ballet of Bordeaux and the Paris Opéra Ballet", he continued.

Daniel Agésilas
© Photo: courtesy of Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris

Indeed, stars such as Elisabeth Platel, Isabelle Guèrin, and more recently Clairemarie Osta as well as premières danseuses Nolwenn Daniel and Isabelle Ciaravola all studied at the Conservatoire of Paris before completing their training with a year at the prestigious Paris Opéra School, where in fact, there is no place for the twelve year old boy who lacks inches, or the teenage girl a head taller than her peers. What counts at the Conservatoire, provided the students fulfil the basic physical requirements, is their motivation.

The Conservatoire of Paris was actually created in 1795, becoming an Institute of Music a few years later. It wasn't until 1925 that the first dance class, for girls only, was opened, the boys having to wait for another twenty years. Housed at La Villette since 1989, the students attend the nearby college and Lycée Georges Brassens for their general education up to the Baccalaureat. It's unique in that it not only proposes classical and contemporary dance training in two distinct sections over a period of six years, but also has a second department of approximately thirty students, concerned with dance notation. It is, in fact, the only public institution in the world to offer a higher form of the notation of movement in both the Benesh and Laban systems. While videos have their place in transmitting works to the next generation, notation gives a more neutral and precise indication of choreographies, and Benesh notators now work with almost every important ballet company in the West. People who study Laban, on the other hand, tend to work in the contemporary field.

Agésilas himself spent eight years at the Paris Opéra Ballet before leaving to follow a contemporary career. He became the administrator and director of the Ballet Theatre Joseph Russillo before being swept up by teaching at the Paris Opéra, at the Ballet of Kiev, and in Toulouse and Rouen before accepting his present post in December 2002. Fully aware that the reputation of the school, at least as far as classical dance is concerned, had been slipping, he has been busy with changes since his arrival.

Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris
© Photo: courtesy of Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris

"To begin with", he told me, "the classical students study more contemporary and the contemporary students more classical. It gives them more opportunities to find work as companies want dancers who are polyvalent", he offered by way of explanation, "for example, with Forsythe's Ballet of Frankfurt, a contemporary troupe who works on pointe."

"All students from their second year are given the opportunity to perform on stage, in front of an audience. Before, they had to wait for several years. Recently, they danced Les Aprés-Midi de la Danse, interpreting works by Balanchine, Lifar, Alwin Nikolais, and Dominique Bagouet. It's part of our programme of Dance Conferences which are held regularly with ballets from the repertoire, where a specialist explains to the public and dancers how the work has been passed on over the years."

Many of the teachers are the same as at the Paris Opéra and currently include people like Wilfride Piollet, Claude de Vulpian, Cyril Atanassof and Jocelyn Bosser, as well as the modern choreographer Joseph Russillo, but in addition, guest teachers including Monique Loudières and Laurent Hilaire have been invited.

Agésilas has invited hip-hop dancers, a novelty for the school, and has generally been shaking things up with people from the outside, believing that contact with different teachers was essential. To that end, he has also been encouraging cultural exchanges on an international level, to enable students to see what was happening elsewhere.

"I invited many of the world's most important schools to a dance forum here", he told me, "and I now plan to visit the London Contemporary Dance Theatre, and the English National Ballet school."

Exchanges of both teachers and pupils are being promoted between Budapest, Prague, Rome and Hong Kong, and Agésilas is also in contact with Korea.

"What matters is what the dancer communicates, "the director insisted. He pushed a piece of paper towards me, "Look", he said, "here is where some of our students are now; Isabelle Brusson is at La Scala, Milan, Marina Robert joined the Ballet du Rhin, Marie Séverine Hurteloup dances with the Ballet of Nancy. Others are with Hervé Robbe, Blanca Li, or Preljocaj, whereas some opted for a career in musical comedy."

Leaving, I paused to watch a senior contemporary class, aged probably from seventeen to twenty, rehearsing in their luminous airy studio with its floor to ceiling windows. Thinking of the 5,000 highly trained dancers in France, I could only wish them good fortune.

Patricia Boccadoro writes on dance in Europe. She contributes to The Observer and Dancing Times. Ms. Boccadoro is also the dance editor of Culturekiosque.com.

If you value our reviews, please tell a friend or join our mailing list!

[ email Patricia Boccadoro | Back to Dance Magazine | Back to Culturekiosque ]