It is festival season and that means that in the next month there is so many great comedy festivals to look forward to! This month we are looking at some of the great shows that you can see at the Edinburgh Fringe. So take note because we are going to give you all the information you need for just a handful of some of the great shows happening this year!
The Great Chevalier
Location: Main Hall at Summerhall (Venue 26)
Dates: Aug 6th-10th. 11th-17th, 19th-24th, 26th-29th
Time: 15:00
Price: £17 Concessions £14.50
Ticket Link: https://www.edfringe.com/tickets/whats-on/the-great-chevalier
Hello! Tell us all about your show!
The Great Chevalier is not simply a dance performance; it is an opportunity to meet and learn from me. Through movement, ritual, music, and physical precision, we look to the traditions and grandeur of the Ballet National Folklorique du Luxembourg.
There are moments of beauty, certainly, but also tenderness, and confrontation. I have always believed that contemporary folk dance must aspire to something dangerous – to create not comfort, but transcendence.
Audiences should expect discipline, intensity, and relentless sincerity.
What other acts are you looking forward to seeing at the fringe?
I doubt I will have time to see anything, my schedule as Artistic Director of the Ballet National Folklorique du Luxembourg is incredibly challenging. The company are currently on tour in Japan, and I must be on call for my dancers 24 hours a day. It is already a huge impediment on them that I am not with them during the Festival.
However, I am interested in artists who operate with conviction first and foremost. Too much contemporary performance hides behind irony because irony is the crutch of failure. I prefer work that risks everything in pursuit of something that inspires immensity.
Have you done the fringe before? What are the key pieces of advice you have been given or would give to new groups or people performing at the fringe.
Yes. Young performers often underestimate the psychological and physical demands of repetition, publicity, fame, administrative chaos, and emotional exposure.
My advice is simple: preserve ritual. Build structure around yourself and your company. Eat properly. Stretch constantly. Protect morale with absolute seriousness. And artistically, never apologise for the scale of your ambition. Audiences are remarkably perceptive; they smell hesitation immediately.
One must perform as though the work is essential. If you achieve that, opinions become irrelevant.
If this is your first time – what are you looking forward to?
Oh, I know Edinburgh so very well. When I was a child, my mother would read to me the great classics of 19th century literature – Robert Louis Stevenson and Sir Walter Scott, among others. These great men transported me through their words to the Athens of the North. In my mind, I walked those cobbled streets to the Castle, down the famous Royal Mile – ‘what better street for a Knight’ my mother would say. Edinburgh has been in my dreams ever since.
Talk us through your daily routine for a day at the Fringe
I wake very early, usually before six, and I jog through the city from East to West. I need to see the order of the place before the chaos of the day descends once again. I then return to my penthouse for physical conditioning and kata practice, followed by black coffee and a review of notes from the previous evening’s performance.
The early afternoon is devoted to extensive technical discussions with my team. I am meticulous; even minor inconsistencies can accumulate dangerously over a run of performances.
Finally, after the performance, I spend two hours meditating in my oxygen chamber and then I telephone my pigeon loft in Bavaria. I find this reassuring.
Ok, where is your favourite place to eat at the Fringe?
I prefer modest establishments occupied primarily by technicians, they are the oxygen of the performing world. They benefit greatly from my presence as well. The food must be simple, restorative, and served without ceremony. A good soup, strong bread, and complete silence.
Best thing about performing at the fringe?
The adulation.
Do you bring anything special from home to make it feel more special whilst you are away?
Yes. I travel with several rehearsal notebooks and sketchbooks for my drawings, my Conde Hermanos flamenco guitar, a Luxembourgish tea blend that I refuse to replace under any circumstances – Mélange Grand-Ducal No. 7 – and my Ferrari.
What are your best hacks to save money whilst at the Fringe?
I never economise.
If people want to find out more about you where can they follow you on social media?
I am on Instagram, I maintain a somewhat cautious relationship with social media so my colleague Will deals with all of this for me. He is extremely committed. I must say I find the self-documentation of social media spiritually corrosive, but I must give something to my public as I am but one man who can only be in one place.
And Finally in three words – Why should people come and see the show?
Relentless. Mythic. Precise.
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