Fernando Alonso: The Father of Cuban Ballet

Carlos Acosta

129 anywhere, compliments me on my classes, I always say, “Yes, thank you, but my personality, knowledge and way of teaching, come from what I learned from my teacher, Fernando.” Carlos Acosta On the advice of a neighbor, Carlos Acosta’s father, a truck driver, sent his son to ballet school to introduce discipline into the rebellious boy’s life. Having danced with the Cuban National Ballet, English National Ballet, and Houston Ballet, Acosta is now a principal dancer with the Royal Ballet of London. When asked to name the best male dancer of the past decade, the majority of contributors to the prestigious London-based international magazine Dance Europe chose Carlos Acosta. Acosta is partial to Cuba, and returns there regularly to dance, renew old friendships, and recharge his authentic self. In 2010 he arranged for the Royal Ballet to appear on the Cuban stage for the first time in Cuba’s history. I was able to interview Carlos Acosta at the Hotel Presidente in Havana on November 2, 2008, during the Twenty-First International Ballet Festival, in which he had performed the solo piece Le bourgeois. What special contribution did Fernando Alonso make to your dance education and career? I think the first thing is that Fernando is conceived of as the father of ballet , the architect of a whole movement that started in 1948 when he and Alicia returned to Cuba and the movement became the school that trained my teachers. Thanks to those teachers—that is where I came from. It’s like a family tree, passed on from generation to generation, and even though some of those on the tree may be infirm, even though your grandfather isn’t around anymore, even though he never rehearsed me as such, the traditions still run through the blood, and I can sense that I have some of that knowledge from my teachers who were Fernando’s students. I think that is the most important connection for me. What does the legacy you just described mean to you on a personal level? Part III. Recuerdos (Recollections) 130 Actually, my teacher, Ramona de Sáa, was one of Fernando’s students, but I never worked with him; he never took me in rehearsal. He was in Camagüey or Monterrey at the time I was in the school. Even Alicia, who was here in Cuba, and director of the company, did only one rehearsal with me, Spectre de la rose. Josefina [Méndez] was rehearsing me, and Alicia walked in and began speaking about Fokine, making general points, and because she is still the director, and I’m still more or less a member, I have more contact with her than Fernando. So now, I visit Chery [Ramona de Sáa] whenever I am here, and so, especially now that Fernando is back, I often bump into him at the school. He now asks me to take some of his rehearsals, and is interested in seeing how I approach them; he’s very flexible and very open-minded, and not critical. He is very much a compendium of knowledge. I remember one time, there was a thesis presentation by Miguel Cabrera; it was a socially constructive and informative evening. My generation is the opposite of theirs. We didn’t have the benefit of having gone to the plantations on trucks in order to build an audience by dancing, and educating them by explaining what pointe shoes are, what a double tour is. My generation doesn’t know much about that. I’m still learning all about that period—so important to know! At that event, in the course of the thesis, there was a tape of Fernando speaking in a philosophical way, and it impressed me so deeply. He is so knowledgeable, and feels so good about sharing what he knows, and the way he spoke was a revelation. It made me appreciate him more, because before that, he wasn’t around. You knew his name through the teachers. I saw a tape of him from during the Cuban Revolution, and he had a gun. He took off the gun and holster and asked someone to hold them while he lifted a dancer in a promenade. There he was back in those days, making the revolution and still teaching these kids how to dance! I thought, “What the hell? These people were really something!” He is the father of dance in Cuba. That’s the most accurate way to...