THE dancers at the Hong Kong Ballet have been getting back to basics. Ever since the beginning of the new year, the daily practice regime has involved everyone doing plies and demiplies for hours on end in time to piano versions of The House In New Orleans and the like.
And, in the new regime, 'everyone' means everyone. From the youngest corps de ballet member to the newest recruit - Stephen Jefferies, for 20 years the highly acclaimed principal with the Royal Ballet Company in Covent Garden, and now the new artistic director at the Hong Kong Ballet.
Most mornings Jefferies, a very fit 44, can be seen warming up with the dancers, or, as he terms it, 'pottering around at the back'.
He is full of energy and enthusiasm for the company, joking at one point that: 'I feel like a football team manager; obsessed by the potential of my team.' Jefferies was headhunted for the job last summer, after the surprise resignation in May of the previous artistic director, Bruce Steivel.
Jefferies chose Hong Kong above another, longer established company, which he described as 'better known, but shackled by tradition'.
'I saw that in Hong Kong it would be possible to make an impact very quickly, whereas in the other company there would be plenty of obstacles.' The offers came at a good time for Jefferies: the Royal Ballet had become leaner and meaner, particularly to its older talents, after seeing its funding diminish year by year.