A JOURNEY INTO CHILDHOOD

What happened on the stage was not exactly in keeping with what is usually regarded as a "special" event. There was the bewitching atmosphere of childhood, the blindingly radiant, in a carefree manner without any sense of alarm. The round-about of a creative whirlwind, in which everything is good. But what is it like to perform to a full house, with the eyes of not only your own parents fixed upon you?.. The thought might even crosses your mind that children are ready-made artistes. They are coming into the limelight with that "qualification".  Simply, not all of them will work "according to their specialisation" later on, in years to come.

The mental palette

What you have seen can be described as direct professionalism, maximally laconic and exhaustive. Properly speaking, this is what "real" adult actors are trying to achieve and sometimes have not manage to. The children looked so fresh, not as if they had not been rehearsing hard, there were no signs of them being drilled. You see, children do not know how to do anything as if they are a machine that keeps on working. They were doing this as if it were the first time and giving it their all.

The Arab dance, languorously fanciful, the Spanish dance with its internal firing pin fraught with explosions, the Algerian dance which was madly expressive, the Turkish dance - the Turks stood and applauded this show, when the children perform it in Turkey and the "rather mystical" Chinese dance… Then there was "Reyhan raqsi" with a basil bush on the head, "Zariflik" ("Tenderness")… This was followed by the variety hits from all over the world, which they naturally performed in a lively manner, even with outstanding choreographic activity. Children do not know how to "behave like a phonogram" when they are holding a microphone, just as they don't know how to pretend to do things and make something look like something else. In short, they sang in different languages, in German for example and played different instruments, including those that are not really "children's instruments". And finally they danced, creatively, professionally (not just two stamps of the feet and three claps), but tastefully and spiritedly, and without any doubt, talentedly.

The aim is love

When you look at the children, you think of their instructor, not only the well- crafted scenes, but also their feeling for those who are gifted. At this age a child reacts to everything in a lively manner, he or she thirsts for fresh information and absorbs it in passing. The impressions he gets remain in his memory and become the basis for perceiving and learning about the world around him. The latter undoubtedly places a great responsibility on the pedagogues. Naturally, they have to love what they are doing, not just formally and nominally as is frequently the case in the age of the market economy (unfortunately, even the feelings people share and the relations between them, including between the mentor and his charge, have become market-orientated). We are destined to love, when we stop living if we don't love.

This is what happened to Dilara xanim Aliyeva, the director of the Azerbaijan State Children's Philhar-monic Orchestra, a merited figure in Azerbaijani arts. Sitting nearby, she was wholeheartedly paying attention to the ups and downs on stage, whispering the words of her charges and sometimes laughing loudly at their rather awkward performance. She was watching them with the warmth of a mother. It crossed your mind when you were watching her that today there are not many of them who have that attitude to what they are doing, to be concerned in a slightly old-fashioned way is not really a modern trait.

This is a person with a different mentality, one special to her environment. "You have said it all without saying a single word," the words of [Latvian composer] Raimonds Pauls' famous song about Charlie Chaplin rang out across the stage. The song brilliantly performed by a group of dancers in stylised costumes, carrying Charlie Chaplin's characteristic walking cane. 

Then there was the music of Tofiq Quliyev, that same music that you never tire of hearing, no matter how many times you listen to it. And it would appear that this is true no matter how much you dance to it. Well, ad naturally there is the evergreen Uzeyir Hacibayov - "The girls' choir" from his work of art "Arshin mal Alan" ["The Cloth Peddler"] resounded lightly and spontaneously, played perfectly by the ensemble, like a single deep breath… This just shows how versatile these children are. Their concert, which dragged a bit in some places, went off without a single hitch. Although everything was done in a very serious and "adult" manner. Although the order in which the items were performed was somewhat chaotic and it did not quite hang together organically, nor were the pieces announced beforehand. There was some kind of whole to the subject, which comprised a definite scenography. 

Dance of the soul

They say that people dance when they are happy, when the soul is singing. A feeling of lightness appears and you want to take off! But happiness does not last for long, but can we do something to stop it from leaving us for long time? Psychologists assure us that we can. And what is most important is that we don't need medicines or doctors to do it. You simply have to dance, because that is a way of always staying healthy. And as if confirming that thought, a whisper is heard from behind: "Do you see the little girl, the one over there in the very centre, she's come in spite of having a temperature beforehand, despite being ill…" Properly speaking, when you see what they all got up to on the stage, the impression was formed that they all had a temperature without exception. We looked into the audience with the same focus, as they did on the stage.  

The various dance acts were to everyone's liking. The planet was represented in the different personages, in one number after another. It was splendid, without any wars or disasters, hatred and hostility, without political confrontations and religious conflicts. The world was presented by many different faces and always cordially. A smile, a disarming smile, as if grateful to Heaven for coming to this world. A dazzling smile, endlessly affable, conveying the happiness of everyday life. "May God protect them", kept on resounding here and there, as if singing my ideas in unison in the second part. 

And finally, the Azerbaijani dance - with its captivating languor, with its grandiose understatement in its "one gender" version, a dashingly charismatic male dance, the stress on striking, attractive tradition. The magic of Azerbaijani dance has not yet been studied sufficiently.

A fascination with life swept across the stage. The spirited dancing was replaced by a cantilena and applause broke out in the silence. The little children danced with those from the older classes who turned out to be almost dance masters. The very small children were particularly amusing. Everyone was touched by their zeal, they were so funny. They were mincing, stamping their feet, jumping up and down, bowing and laughing loudly.

The first-timer stood out, stepping out onto the stage for the first time and already "making out" that he was "an old hand", looking so confident that he was almost unbelievable. You would never have said that you had a "first-timer" in front of you. He threw himself right into it, there was no holding back. The children continued to amaze us, and not only with dancing, but with performances on the violin and the flute and even with a girl on a double-bases in one ensemble! The little girl's fingers slid dexterously across the finger-board of the "stringed giant"; she simply could not go unnoticed.

And all this was under the leadership of a real conductor. The children, playing high-level pieces of chamber music, looked organically and "musically" convincing. As well as always looking stylish.

Well, and to finish off there was "Odlar yurdu" - this was the title of the concluding item on the programme. The rejoicing or rather frenzy on the stage had reached its height - the little children flitted around the stage, flying right up to the ceiling. Childhood is endlessly endearing, the bobbing up and down with the music in a fairy-like kaleidoscope. This was the case when that worn-out slogan "Children are our future" suddenly ceased to arouse feelings of pathos. Yes, a future that will definitely be a happy one, like that sunny Sunday. When the curtain went down at a least a hundred children took their bows. There was hardly enough room for them all. Only the hats, the papakhas [Caucasian fur hats], the fezes, and the top hats being thrown in the air indicated the scale of the "event", a reminder of its creative repertoire bursting with different images!