1999: Artistic Director of Stockholm 59° North
I first met Madeleine Onne at Jacob’s Pillow in August of 1997. Her ensemble, Stockholm 59° North, had just finished a matinee performance and the dancers were picnicking and resting before the evening performance. It was the debut for this troupe of dancers culled from the ranks of the Royal Swedish Ballet, where Madeleine herself holds the distinguished title of Royal Court Dancer.

Having seen so many dance ensembles struggle to stay afloat in a financially challenging world, I was curious to hear how Madeleine made hers work. Being affiliated with a major company surely held some benefits, but I wondered if it was as simple as that.

I caught up with her again at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., in June of 1999, where the main company was performing two programs before heading off to the west coast. I asked her about the formation of Stockholm 59° North and what it took to make it all work.

What first sparked the idea of forming the ensemble?
When I was 18 or 19 there was this famous opera singer named Kjerstin Dellert, who is married to an ex-ballet director, who found an old theater in Stockholm— it’s called the Confidencen Theater. It’s from 1700, it’s 14 years older than the famous Drottningholm Theater.

To collect money to renovate Confidencen, Mrs. Dellert started to do performances. We did free performances outdoors, indoors on a tiny, tiny stage, and we also traveled abroad: we went to Miami, China, and Israel; it was great, I really enjoyed it.

After a few years the Confidencen Court Theater became more established. Now it has support from the city. And Mrs. Dellert is getting older, she’s over 70 now, so there are no more tours. And so things stopped happening. As the economy of the Royal Opera is not as good as during the 1970s, we aren’t touring so much. Before we used to do at least one big tour a year. And now it has been four years since the last time.

I was looking at my colleagues and I saw that the younger dancers of today have a better technique than we’ve ever seen in Sweden. And I felt it was really a shame that they wouldn’t have the same chance to show themselves that I had... and I wasn’t half as good as they are.

So I started to write to festivals, embassies and so forth— wherever I could— but nothing really happened. And then Frank (Andersen) came and I knew he had his Bournonville group for ten years so I thought he was a good person to ask for advice. I remember the best advice he gave me was ‘Don’t only take people who are great in dancing, take people who you would like to travel with because it’s going to be tough and you all have to function well together.’

He put me in contact with Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, and that’s how it got started. I didn’t have enough money to go to Jacob’s Pillow so I had to get a sponsor and I went up to Philip Morris in Sweden and they really got hooked on the idea. They really gave me support and they are helping me still.

So the Jacob’s Pillow performance (August 1997) was the first performance for the ensemble?
Yes.

How many people are in your ensemble? Or does that fluctuate?
That depends on what repertory a presenter wants, but usually 13 to 14.

Speaking of repertory, how does it work in conjunction with the main company? Do you share repertory? Do you have works that belong exclusively to the ensemble?
My goal is to buy new ballets for the future. I got $15,000 from Philip Morris in New York and that money will go to buy new choreography. This year we’re talking about two pieces for next summer— one will be by the Swedish choreographer Örjan Andersson and the other piece is by Millicent [Hodson] and Kenneth [Archer] who did our Ballet Suedois program.

They will do a piece with photo projections by Gerald Ackerman and it will be to music by Prokofiev.

So that’s what we’re aiming for, but then it all has to do with time, since the dancers do it on their free time, which is limited. We have to be realistic and see what happens.

But otherwise, for the first two years, we have borrowed rep from the Royal Swedish Ballet. Now this year we are doing things that the theater has in their rep but I’m dealing directly with the choreographers so I’m getting the permission from the choreographers themselves. There’s one piece from Mats Ek that’s not in the rep of the main company.

Grass?
No, this one is called Meaningless Fields. And we’re doing Prodigal Son by Ivo Cramér which is very, very Swedish. This is actually a bible story, but very Swedish and set to super Swedish music by Hugo Alfvén so I thought that was a good start. We are also doing another small part from a piece by Mr. Cramér which was created together with Mary Skeaping— it's called The Fishermen and is based on a ballet pantomime from 1789.

This year we are going to Imatra in Finland and they want classical pieces so we’ll do third act from Swan Lake, the pas de deux from the Swedish version by Pär Isberg of The Nutcracker, and we’ll end with Dancing on the Front Porch of Heaven.

The costumes I get to borrow from the theater, they help me with all the musical recordings; they’re very helpful.

And lighting designers, as well?
I’m bringing one from the theater. And he’s doing it on his free time, as are the dancers. So it’s a good cooperation with the theater; and I think they feel they’re getting good publicity.

And now the Confidencen Theatre has offered to be our home stage so we will see what happens in the future…

So the dancers rehearse on their own time. And when you go on tour, is that when the main company is in their off-season?
Yes.

Having no vacations must make for a long year of work.
Yes, but don’t forget we have nine weeks of holiday; even though we do this, they still have seven weeks of holiday this year. The dancers are going to be different each year. They’re busy one year, they’re injured another… This year we’ll start just two weeks before the company starts. This is very late; last year it was three weeks.

What kinds of things do you look for when you’re searching for choreography? Or do you look for certain choreographers?
When I started the organization for this it says in our mission statement that we will collect Swedish choreography, by Swedish choreographers, or at least choreography made for the Swedes. So I’m just looking for something I think is interesting.

It’s hard today because everyone is inspired by Forsythe or Kylián and you can see somehow that there is this line of choreographers following them. It’s very hard to see something really new. On the other hand, if something’s really good, it doesn’t matter!

Where would you like to see the company go?
We should have our own repertory. We will still use works from the opera house, as long as they will let us. I think it is very important for us to get out in the world so people will know we exist. Not only this group, but I’m talking now about the Royal Swedish Ballet. You could say we are like a pre-troupe for the main company. For example, after we were in Canada last summer, the main company got an offer to go to Canada, I think, and that’s the first invitation we’ve had. So, it is good that we’re going out.

The goal is just to show off as much as we can. The current group of dancers isn’t going to be able to do it every year. They need holidays, too, so maybe one year we’ll say ‘No, this year we will just not do anything’ and then we’ll go next year instead.

So you see the ensemble as always being affiliated with the main company, it doesn’t need to be it’s own entity.
That’s right. That was never my goal. The thing is, we’re not doing this for money. We don’t have to. We have our salary. This is more to get out, meet a new audience. That is so important for a dancer, and to get more experience by performing under very different circumstances. It would be different if we needed this to support ourselves. Then I would probably think totally differently. But we’re doing this to get out, see new places, and to show the world that we exist and that we are worth looking for. We want to enjoy it at the same time.

The other thing is that we have nine weeks off in Sweden. No dancer can be off for nine weeks. Which means that all of us are going somewhere in the world and paying a fortune to take class. So I said ‘Why not perform somewhere, and keep in shape without having to pay for it?’

Learn more about Stockholm 59° North at their Web site.

Read the 2002 interview with Madeleine Onne, named Artistic Director of the Royal Swedish Ballet.

Photographs by Mats Bäcker