It's a surprise and a very nice end of career.
Clotilde Vayer had never applied for the management of any company.
Stéphane Lissner, who left Paris to take charge of the San Carlo in Naples, offered him to take charge of the ballet's destiny from April.
A company of 30 dancers who could become forty.
“You
can't refuse it,
” she said.
Read also: Opera Ballet: Benjamin Millepied poses his new deal
The dancer entered dance school in 1976. She climbed the ballet hierarchy until she became a Principal Dancer.
Rudolf Nureyev particularly valued this pretty brunette, lively, intelligent, hardworking, endowed with a strong sense of departure.
Besides esteem, there was a bond of old combatants between them.
He particularly valued Clotilde's old slippers, which he collected once she had "
made
" them.
Freedom-loving classical dance genius Rudolf Nureyev died 25 years ago
In 1996, Brigitte Lefèvre appointed Clotilde Vayer ballet master.
Years later, Benjamin Millepied promoted her ballet master associated with the direction of the dance, a position she still occupies with Aurélie Dupont.
Ballet master is being in a studio to work with the dancers and giving it a go to demand that the work be of quality ...
Clotilde Vayer, dancer and future ballet master of the San Carlo in Naples
Clotilde Vayer likes to describe her job: “
Ballet master is being in a studio to work with the dancers and give it a go to demand that the work be of quality, and that they seem together enough to give the impression to breathe together.
It is this passion that holds me and I hope to find it again at the San Carlo: being in the studio is very important to me.
".
And to specify that she refined her line of conduct with the various directors with whom she worked.
She knows how to put 150 dancers in step like no other: “
Flattering is not a solution.
You have to be firm, but also support and reassure,
”she said.
“
And then talk: I don't have an email, when I have things to say, it's in person.
Speech is liberating
”.
In Naples, she doesn't know what to expect.
The confinement forbids him to go see the dancers.
She just saw them on video and their talent speaks to her: “
I'm coming to an existing company, it's important to respect what has been done,
” she says.
For the repertoire and the programming too, she promises to look at what the dancers have already learned, even if she wishes to bring acts from Nureyev's great ballets which she knows how much they shape a company and push it to excellence.
This appointment changes the hold of the Paris Opera on Italian dance.
The big companies of La Botte are now all directed by dancers trained at the Paris Opera: in fact, Manuel Legris in Milan and Eleonora Abbagnato in Rome.
“
There are very good dancers in Italy who go to the United States or to France.
We have a whole group of them at the Paris Opera and these exchanges between France and Italy have always been beneficial,
”says Clotilde Vayer.
Who eagerly and surely gets down to Italian.
And who also promises to go see what is happening with the youngest.
In addition to a ballet, Naples also has a dance school.
