Falling in love

Tonight's show had a rather mysterious description in the brochure; it wasn't at all clear what it involved, and arriving to see a cello standing proudly alone in the middle of the stage was a surprise. It turned out to be a dance and cello show by Marion Parrinello, dramatising her love affair with the cello. Her colleague Clément introduced it. "This is a new show for young people, and this is the first time we've performed it for, erm ..." -- he looked round at the audience, not wanting to say "old people" -- "...the general public". 

Well, we were a mixture of adults and children, and we all enjoyed it. It was short -- only about 25 minutes -- and more dance than cello playing, as Marion found a cello in the forest and figured out what to do with it (another attempt in extras). It got treated fairly roughly -- at one point she was grasping it by the neck and whirling it round her head. The stage was very dimly lit, so I didn't even try to take a photo of this. Scroll down this page for some better photos and a video teaser.

At the end of the show she did an audience participation routine where we clapped out a series of rhythms on and with our bodies, no doubt something they regularly do with children. Nearly everyone joined in (first extra). We are so spoilt for free entertainment here!

The wind has finally dropped, thank goodness. The water in the pool is still cold but we got to warm up in the sun afterwards, in fact I got sunburnt. And the show was not disrupted by gusts of wind as they often are.