‘They don’t ever stop being dancers’ … Betsy Gregory in rehearsal for Elixir festival. Photograph: Tony Nandi
The last time I performed at Sadler’s Wells,” says Namron Yarrum, with a chuckle, “there was still gas lighting back stage.” Namron, as he was always known, was one of the UK’s great pioneering dancers. For a long time the most high-profile black dancer in Britain, and a founder member of London Contemporary Dance Theatre, he dominated the 1970s and early 80s with the powerfully earthed grace of his performances.
When the years took their physical toll, Namron moved into a career in teaching, and had no expectation of returning to the stage. But now, at the plumper and more grizzled age of 70, he’s agreed to come out of retirement, and join eight other seniors in performing a new work at Sadler’s Wells, London, as part of a short season celebrating the artistry of the older dancer.
The Elixir festival is the brainchild of Jane Hackett, director of creative learning at Sadler’s, who’s long been fascinated by the trajectory of dancers as they age. While most stop performing in their late 30s or early 40s, Hackett believes they don’t ever stop being dancers. “I think something develops in them during their career,” she says. “It stays with them – in their muscle memory and in their sense of who they are.”
It was exploring that core “something” that prompted Hackett to assemble a group, ranging in age from 54 to 70, to collaborate on a new work with choreographer Jonathan Burrows. Namron was one of the people at the top of her list, along with several other former LDCT dancers, includingLinda Gibbs and Christopher Bannerman. Namron couldn’t resist the chance to reconnect with his peers, nor to dance at Sadler’s again. But he admits he was also nervous, worried about his ability to remember steps, and about being shown up by younger cast members. “I said to Jane, ‘If they can’t show their bus pass, don’t bother to let them in, because I can’t compete with them.”
In fact, when I meet up with the group, they all admit to varying degrees of trepidation. There’s no disguising that, collectively, they are a wrinklier, baggier version of their past selves, and there’s much searching for reading glasses whenever they need to consult their rehearsal notes. Even Gibbs, an impressively fit Pilates teacher, says her first reaction to Hackett’s request was: “Oh my God, I’m just too old.”
Kenneth Tharp rehearses for Elixir festival. Photograph: Tony Nandi
Yet they’re also curious and excited. Kenneth Tharp was intrigued to discover what had happened to his dancing over the years. “I wondered if I had just frozen when I stopped, or whether I had carried on growing by having watched and absorbed other people dancing.” And for choreographer Burrows, even though he started the group on a limited palette of movements, it’s been extraordinary seeing how quickly they’ve rediscovered their skills. “Almost as soon as they started to move, the sense of grace and strength came back. As if some pattern had been reactivated. I saw it especially with Betsy Gregory. She’s been behind a desk for some years, as director of Dance Umbrella, but when she started dancing I thought, ‘I remember this woman and how amazing she was.’ It was almost like nothing had changed.”
At the same time, Burrows has been entranced by the life experiences, the knowledge, the range of references the group have brought to the project, along with a collective confidence no younger dancers can match. Watching them in rehearsal, it’s striking how much they query and analyse what they’re developing, how frequently they answer back – and how raucously funny they are. Burrows at one point floats the theory that, irrespective of what happens in performance, “the work of art is here in this room with the exchanging of all our stories”.
“That’s all well and good,” snorts Gregory, “until we’re on stage and we fall on our faces.”
Lizie Giradeau, another former LCDT dancer, feels that, in some profound way, this project has reconnected her with her true self. “For years, my identity was defined by being a dancer, and when I stopped it was a big challenge to find other ways of being expressive. I had my garden and the textile work that I do, but it’s still been very poignant for me coming back to this.”
Gibbs adds: “It’s what I love doing, what I’ve always loved doing.” And Namron feels he too is continuing a 50-year journey that he never really abandoned. “Its great to be going back on to the stage,” he says. “As I always say, dance fell in love with me – and I have never stopped being in love with it.”
• The Elixir festival is at Sadler’s Wells, London, 12-15 September. Box office: 0844 412 4300.
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