Sunday, 15 September 2013

BEYONCE IN THE DESERT


                                              BEYONCE IN THE DESERT


Back in 2009 ,around September time I received a call from my very dear friend Elissa Murtaza, whom at that time was CEO of Live Nation, Middle East and also the exclusive agent representing Beyoncé (throughout the Middle East) based in Dubai, asking me if I would manage and produce the concert for Beyoncé at a new resort on the Red Sea in Egypt, called Port Ghalib.

This was not going to be an easy task because the venue site was an empty sand covered island surrounded by water with only one small humpback bridge as access – Throw in the fact that very few major artists had previously performed in Egypt and with religious and political turmoil kicking in – it was the perfect gig! I get to produce all the easy concerts.


(The BEYONCE I AM Poster for Port Ghalib)

Where to begin? I flew to Cairo, initially to meet the event team, who were a great bunch of guys and gals – incredibly enthusiastic and passionate about this event – but with virtually no experience of producing a major concert. Technical rider – what’s that?

Fortunately, the staging company (from the Netherlands), sound and lighting team were experienced (and delightful to work with) but even so – this concert production was going to be much larger than anything that had been produced previously in Egypt.

A flight to Cairo and then onto Marsa Alam Airport (the only privately owned and operated airport in Egypt), a car ride and I had arrived at the new tourist resort of Port Ghalib. The hotel was excellent and together with the event team from Cairo, we were welcomed by the management (owners & developers) of the resort from the Kharafi family (a leading Kuwait family and major developers) whom were promoting the concert.


The Port Ghalib development was quite incredible – they had built a complete town with every conceivable resource – the weather was fabulous with the Red Sea and glistening swimming pools amid an enormous man made lake, that spread amoeba like in and out of the the villas, hotels and apartments that had been built to attract the burgeoning tourist traffic that Egypt. Little did anyone realize at that time, what was ahead with the coming of the Arab Spring, the demise of the Mubarek regime, the democratically voted Muslim Brotherhood President Morsi – and what then followed…

Port Ghalib may have been bright and bushy sparkling, but the island on which we had to build the stage, back stage areas (dressing rooms, productions rooms, toilets, washing facilities etc) the seating and VIP areas, security, public and artist entrances, power generators – you name it - everything – literally everything - had to be brought onto the site, simply because it was barren land and nothing whatsoever was there!


One of the first problems we encountered was that there were only certain limited days each week that flights landed locally at Marsa Allam from Cairo. Since then the international flights may have multiplied, but back then, if the specific flight schedules didn’t work out we had to fly into Hurghada and then face a four hour drive through the desert areas to Port Ghalib – doesn’t sound much, but when you’re trying to run an operation of this size, it was at times, a hell of an ordeal.

(Our team at New Substance put together a spectacular opening sequence before Beyonce came on stage)

The staging company had bought a brand new stage from Holland to accommodate the massive show that Beyonce was bringing to Egypt – this was fine, although it was only just big enough to carry the tons of lighting, sound and enormous video screen that made up the backdrop of the show – all of this being flown in as part of Beyonce’s “I AM” World Tour.

I quickly realized that despite the Egyptian professional lighting and stage crews, the overall local production team, whilst very willing and helpful were hopelessly out of their depth - I made the decision to fly my team from London (Lisa, Karl, Poppy, Emily and others) and my dear friend and excellent production manager Andy Cotton and his team to help - otherwise this show was never going to happen.


In addition, I had also brought in Patrick O'Mahony and his team from New Substance who were providing the extraordinary aerial artists that were to launch the show. These included an aerial tableaux incorporating two puppeted crane structures, from which sixteen performers, across two crane structures, executed a series of breathtaking drops and fire routines - plus two 9 metre, hand painted helium balloons with suspended acrobats that swopped down from a height of 20 metres enthralling the audience. These were to perform at the start the evening's show.

(The Port Ghalib Resort)

Apart from the technical difficulties of building a complex concert and show site on a small desert island, with only one humped back bridge as access, we were also facing serious security problems – the Muslim Brotherhood were up in arms and increasingly threatening.

CNN reported at that time as follows; “Diva Beyonce Knowles strutting her stuff in the conservative Middle East? Looks like it. Even though not everyone is looking forward to the show.


Beyonce's worldwide, year-long "I am ..." tour, which has taken her from Canada to China since March, is due in Egypt on November 6 at the Red Sea resort of Port Ghalib.

The single show will mark Beyonce's first-ever concert in the land of Pyramids. Tickets have reached $400, according to the Al Arabiya television station. But even before she starts shaking her booty on the Egyptian stage, the scantily dressed superstar singer has created controversy".

Last week, Islamist Egyptian Member of Parliament Hamdi Hassan, part of the conservative Muslim Brotherhood, slammed the government for allowing a singer "who appears naked in her clips" to perform in Egypt, saying it was violating Sharia law.

Sharia, or Islamic religious law, covers many aspects of daily life, including family, sexuality, hygiene and social issues.

"The government is trying to make people indulge in sin and licentiousness to cover up the other crimes it is committing against them," Hassan said in a parliamentary session”.

The threats continued and we had to bring in the local Police, Egyptian Army and Beyonce’s head of advance security (the delightful and very professional) Alf Samuels flew into town – this was getting heavy to say the least.

Well my friends, we did it – against all the odds, the stage got built, the lines of trucks arrived, the tons of equipment were unloaded and the whole island became a concert venue fit for royalty. Even if my team and I were still scrubbing out the portable Loos (toilets) back stage a few hours before Beyonce’s arrival!


Beyonce’s technical teams and management had arrived days before the show and when Beyoncé herself flew in, we were all thrilled. However, as you can imagine more than a little nervous as to security issues. The hotel was great - Beyoncé seemed very happy to be there and was incredibly nice and gracious to everyone.

We had to somehow get Beyoncé onto the island before and after the show - we finally decided that the best route was to bring her by boat onto the site rather than attempt to bring her overland. A magnificent motorboat (one of those enormous cruisers that you see in Monte Carlo or Cannes, made the short trip to the island and the concert began.

Lisa my long-suffering PA had a few weeks earlier given birth to her son Thomas and she had brought him with her and her husband Karl (who was helping advise on security) – Tom at aged 13 weeks became the mascot of this concert and I was holding him when we welcomed Beyoncé onto the island.

Beyoncé’s performance that night was electric and magnificent – what a star? She deserves all the success she has achieved – as many of you know, we have worked with most of the big named artists and sometimes they don’t always live up to their reputations and image – but Beyoncé was a delight to work with – a truly lovely person who was kind and lovely to everyone she met – thank goodness we had no security problems, but we were understandably deeply concerned and all of us sighed a huge sigh of relief when the show was over.

9,000 VIP’s from across Egypt including members of the Government of Egypt. “That was amazing, one of the best shows I have ever seen” Mohamed Samir, Projects Manager for Alkharafi Group

I am told that Beyoncé has subsequently said that this show was one of her favourite concerts – a media report went as follows;

During an interview some considerable time after the concert Beyoncé was reflecting on an amazing decade.

“Beyoncé was posing in a stunning new photo shoot for Harper's Bazaar UK Magazine when she reflected that performing in Egypt (in November 2007) just a few months before the country's uprising started was a deeply memorable experience.

The pop star admitted she found it incredibly moving to see Egyptian women wearing burkas singing along to her female empowerment song “Irreplaceable” - while many of their male partners standing nearby were obviously not too amused”!

Much has happened in Egypt since Beyoncé performed in Egypt – the purpose of this blog is not to debate the rights or wrongs of religious feeling – but I want to say one thing – Beyoncé was a fine ambassador – a truly delightful person – a superb singer and performer – the show she brought to Port Ghalib was stunning – the dancing, the driving all female band, the video film footage, the colossal screen – the energy, drive, dedication, passion and professionalism Beyoncé brought to Egypt was a day to remember. The audience and everyone who met her loved her – an artist cannot give more.

We were all exhausted, but relieved that this was a job done well. Beyoncé flew to Cairo to visit the Pyramids, which she found fascinating and then onto her next concert in Athens, Greece.

We made many friends at that time in Egypt and I don’t think any of us will ever forget the warmth of our welcome, nor the monumental task of producing that concert

It was worth it – every bit of it – and when I read in the press or see on television news the rioting, sad deaths and the turmoil in this ancient land – I feel enormous sadness that people cannot live in peace and happiness without suffering and pain. I know that Beyoncé brought a few hours of musical happiness to the Red Sea – a never to be forgotten experience – our thoughts are with all the crews and people from Egypt that helped us make this show a success and pray that they are all OK.

One small aside - on a gloriously sunny day before the concert date, thousands of beautiful butterflies suddenly appeared - I remember walking amongst the gardens and being surrounded by these exquisite, colourful and utterly endearing butterflies - a wonderful gift to all of us and a memory to be treasured.



Sunday, 1 September 2013

THE BOLSHOI BALLET IN A TENT - iN LONDON - A WEEK TO REMEMBER...

THE BOLSHOI BALLET IN A TENT - iN LONDON - A WEEK TO REMEMBER...






Hi to everyone who so kindly read my blogs. I have posted this article previously, indeed I wrote this back in December 2013, but as the Bolshoi Ballet is back in London this year (2019) at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden - I felt it a good time to remember the time we presented the Bolshoi Ballet in a Tent. It was a wonderful occasion and the result was extraordinary. Thanks for reading....


The Bolshoi Ballet performing in a Tent ! Impossible everyone shouted...

"The Bolshoi Ballet is the grandest and finest ballet company in the world, they will not perform in a tent - forget about it - it will never happen" - well my friends it did happen - and here is the story...


On the 26th August 1986 the Bolshoi Ballet opened their season of 7 performances in a massive tent in Battersea Park, London, with a stunning Divertissement programme. The BBC cancelled their Saturday night programming to present a live broadcast on BBC1, the main channel and the DVD of this broadcast "The Bolshoi in the Park" is still a big seller according to Warner Music some 32 years later. It was a magical, memorable and never to be forgotten happening.




(The wonderful Bolshoi Ballet, Corps de Ballet)

It had been 30 years since the Bolshoi Ballet had first appeared in London and indeed (as far as I recall) to the West. When the Bolshoi Ballet first performed in the UK (in 1959) and USA, their tours were a triumph. Two ballerinas whose names become legends in the ballet world and beyond - Galina Ulanova and Raisa Struchkova became world famous. At that time, their performances had "received standing ovations with bouquets and rose petals strewn on the path from the theatre to the hotel" (wrote ballet critic, Margaret Willis, who toured with the Bolshoi Ballet at that time ) - During the summer of 1986 these two legends again appeared on the stage of the Royal Opera House - this time taking their bows for their roles as ballet coaches alongside their protegées.



(Dancer rehearsing on the stage of the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow)

As written in a previous blog Part 1 of "Our time with the Bolshoi Ballet"  Victoria Charlton and I, began working with the Soviet Ministry of Culture and the State Concert Agency, Gosconcert in 1981 - we had taken the first British artists to perform at the Pushkin Museum in Moscow, under the Directorship of Marina Antonova and the artistic director of the December Nights programme, the great pianist Sviatoslav Richter. This was the very first time we had met Sviatoslav Richter and his wife/partner, Nina Dorliark, which was an incredible start to our years of working with the cream of Soviet artists. We contracted Philip Pickett and the New London Consort, Tenor David Rendell, Cellist Elisabeth Wilson and others to perform at this festival - you can imagine how we felt, being in this wonderful museum - our first Christmas in Russia - surrounded by heavily falling snow, ice and the finest music anywhere - wow - we were on the road - the political barriers were beginning to fall!


The next big event for us was to bring the Moscow Classical Ballet with the Bolshoi Ballet Star ballerina Ekaterina Maximova to the UK - and this experience deserves its own blog - it was a riveting time and broke many cultural, and as mentioned above, political barriers - the world was changing and so were we! These performances were a huge success.


However, back to the Bolshoi Ballet - by that time we had gained the confidence of the Soviet authorities - Victor and Lilian Hochhauser has originally brought the Bolshoi Ballet to London in 1959, but had stopped working with the Soviet Cultural Organisations when they began working with Mstislav Rostropovich the great cellist - at that time if you worked with an artist such as Rudolph Nureyev, Mikhail Baryshnikov or Rostropovich who had either defected or expressed opposition to the Soviet Powers - you didn't get to work with the main Soviet Artists and companies - as mentioned in my earlier blog, no-one had worked with the Soviets in the UK for more than 20 years and in the USA for 25 years so you can imagine what a journey of discovery we were making.



(The flyer for the Bolshoi Ballet at The Royal Opera House, Covent Garden)

People have asked me whether we were worried about working with the Soviet Union at that time - the answer to that was "no". Both Vicki and I felt very strongly that the arts, dance, music etc had to be placed above politics (although of course there were geo-political issues)  - Indeed we felt deeply, that if we could bring the greatest artists from Russia and the Soviet Republics to the UK and Ireland (and the US/Canada and other countries) plus touring the finest British and American companies to Moscow, Leningrad (which changed to St.Petersburg) and other major cities, we would be doing more to help a greater understanding between the West and the USSR. I still feel this today and I am enormously proud of what we achieved.


We were told that the Bolshoi Ballet would only tour the UK, if they opened their season at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, London - I remember Vicki and I meeting Sir John Tooley, the Director of the Royal Opera House and having a hell of a fight to get the ROH to allow us to bring the Bolshoi Ballet and present them on their stage. Vicki was pulling as much political influence (very successfully) as she could, and I was building a great relationship with Paul Findlay the Assistant Director of the ROH - after some tortuous twisting and turning we eventually negotiated the contract for a three week season commencing July 22nd 1986 with a Royal Gala Performance of Grigorovich's "Ivan the Terrible" music by Sergei Prokofiev attended by HRH Diana, The Princess of Wales in aid of the British Deaf Association. Diana was radiant that night and she was a wonderful supporter of our shows.



(From the Ballet "Spartacus")

The Ballets performed during that visit: The performances of Ivan the Terrible, Raymonda, The Golden Age and Spartacus - were stunningly successful - tickets flew out the door - young dancers were introduced to us - Natalia Bessmertnova, Boris Akimov, Sergei Radchenko, Nina Semizorova, Alla Mikhaichenko, Nina Ananiashvili and Irek Mukhamedov who amazed audiences with this breathtaking role in "Spartacus".

We had many sponsors Goldman Sachs, UBS, Nomura, Laing & Cruishank, Jaeger, Phillips & Drew - the great and the good attended, but what about the general public who couldn't get a ticket if they tried?


The idea of a tent or some form of temporary structure had come to us when we persuaded the Bolshoi Ballet to perform in Dublin, Ireland during the opening the tour. We had transformed the atmosphere of the huge livestock market arena - The Royal Dublin Society (RDS) into a 'magical kingdom' of a large opera house, which we built from scratch. 


I remember our Dublin based architect Gar Hololan, working with us to dig the orchestra pit for 90 musicians and build the stage large enough to take the Bolshoi Ballet (there were no theatres at that time, big enough to present the Bolshoi Ballet anywhere in Ireland) - as the local press wrote - "the RDS was transformed into a magical kingdom of ethereal nymphs ("Les Sylphides"), powerful warriors ("Spartacus"), and a dazzling array of make believe characters from the great classical ballets".



(The splendid Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow)

The RDS - the scene of a farming fair the week before, was turned, almost overnight into a 4,000 seat world class theatre, with a stage comparable to the Bolshoi in Moscow and the Royal Opera House in London. It was a monumental feat and one that we all feel great pride in even today. 


The performances were an incredible success with the Irish audiences and the Irish Prime Minister (Taoiseach) and President attending. On the opening night - the national anthems were played on tape because the Bolshoi Orchestra in the pit didn't have the music for the Irish national anthem.  The Irish national anthem was played everyone stood and waited for the Soviet national anthem - I don't know what went wrong, but they played the Irish national anthem three times, before they got the right one - everyone was laughing - so a diplomatic incident was averted!

It was this programme (Les Sylphides, Spartacus Act 2 and a stunning divertissement 3rd act), that we proposed to Yuri Grigorovich and the Cultural Tsars in Moscow. To be produced in a Tent in Battersea Park, to an audience that would never normally have the opportunity to see the Bolshoi Ballet. 


Rather amusingly, the Bolshoi management team were very suspicious of taking the mighty Bolshoi into a tent - not that I blamed them, because we had never done that before either! - but then we had never converted a huge agricultural cow and sheep barn into an opera house! "The Bolshoi Ballet in a tent - are you people mad"? When I pointed out that this will let the ordinary people of London, as opposed to the great and good, see the Bolshoi and not just the VIP's, they weren't sure about that at all!

After much wrangling backwards and forwards, we got agreement - contracts signed and we were off and running. My dear friend Michael Gelardi and share holder in the Entertainment Corporation, had introduced me to Robert Peel, who owned Thistle Hotels and they sponsored this season. Robert and his MD Norbert, ended up cooking and selling burgers outside the tent - everyone was having fun.

The weather was appalling - but despite the rain, damp and cold - and one of the worst summers remembered in England, the Bolshoi Ballet stole the hearts of London and the British public. In a three hour live television broadcast, the commentator spoke for all of us when she said - "We have watched a stage full of extraordinary talent and a great company putting its best foot forward - what a thrill"


Battersea Park is the largest park in South London and well known throughout the world. Created in 1857 by Disraeli's government to fulfil the needs of Londoner's for open space - the park was an ideal location for this Bolshoi Ballet season. The site of the tent was on the ground of the former "British Genius Site" but there were many obstacles - the tent had to be massive and sight lines carefully worked out because of tent poles. Orchestra pits had to be dug to allow for a 6'2'' tall conductor and an 80 piece orchestra; an enormous stage built and all the hanging facilities to take the 13m high Bolshoi Scenery - waterproofing the staging areas and orchestra pit - creating backstage dressing rooms, wardrobe areas, wigs, shoe rooms you name it!


The seating capacity was approximately 4,000 per show (I recall there were seven performances), with ticket prices kept as low as we could to allow just about anyone to come who could get a ticket. The demand was huge - we could have sold out weeks and weeks of shows in that park. All of you can see these performances on the wonderful DVD of the BBC broadcast (I believe it is still available). I am enormously grateful to Alan Yentob of the BBC who turned the filming/broadcast agreements around so quickly.


It was an incredible time and one that all of us involved are deeply proud of - yes, the Bolshoi Ballet did perform in tent and the Bolshoi dancers and the ecstatic audience had a ball


A season to remember

Thanks for reading
Peter