ONE HEART
Royal Ballet of Cambodia visits Utah County for one historic show
The Royal Ballet of Cambodia will perform at BYU on Saturday.
Fan-like fingers cut through the air like a breeze through time as the historic Royal Ballet of Cambodia performs at a single show at Brigham Young University on Saturday, presented by the BYU Bravo! concert series.
Audiences can see this national art form created more than a thousand years ago, which was nearly lost during the 1970s due to political and social turmoil in the country. The series producer, Jeffrey Martin, helped bring the troupe to Utah County, a process that began a year and a half ago.
“I really feel like culture of this type enhances the quality of life,” Martin said. “It allows us to view the world through someone else’s eyes and helps us learn things that maybe we didn’t know we wanted to learn or could learn.”
The traditional Khmer dance art form was nearly lost due to the genocide of millions of Cambodians during the brutal rule by the Khmer Rouge regime in the 1970s. Custodians of art, culture and education were eliminated under order by dictator Pol Pot.
Senior artist Proeung Chhieng advises the group’s director, Cambodian Princess Buppha Devi, and also played a critical role in reviving the Royal Ballet from the verge of extinction after the Khmer Rouge era, which came to an end in 1979. Chhieng also serves as dean of faculty in choreographic arts at the Royal University of Fine Arts in the nation’s capitol, Phnom Penh.
“For me, we have two concepts. One, where the dancer is like a tree and the other one the dancer is like a serpent or the naga,” said Chhieng in a telephone interview Wednesday from his home in Phnom Penh.
Performing artists in the Royal Ballet of Cambodia are dressed in extravagant costumes complete with gold headdresses depicting ancient religious temples. Dancers gracefully move in controlled positions with hand gestures iconic to the dance form, often in precise rotating symmetry.
An open palm with closed fingers may represent a leaf or a slow-opening flower might be portrayed with fingers carefully spread apart, similar to a paper fan. He said much of Cambodian ancestry draws from the heritage of the King of Serpents.
“You can see one dancer move like a serpent. Their body, even their hand gestures, you see the serpent move,” Chhieng said. “Some hand gestures we call it moving like the naga. The hand (is) like the head of the naga and the arm like the tail of the naga. And we can see this concept was imitated by our ancestors from the King of the Naga, or the King of the Serpents.”
A key element to the BYU Bravo! series includes a student workshop conducted by the visiting performers. Three sessions will be held during the ballet’s visit -- two dance classes with the world dance students and one music workshop with BYU’s world music students.
Live music will accompany the ballet's public performance on Saturday and will be played by joining musicians from Cambodia who travel with the troupe while on tour. The live music element is meant to enrich the audience experience. Many modern Western ballet companies include music as well, but it is often pre-recorded and played through speakers.
“Our dancers try to educate people how to be calm in the mind and in the heart. After everybody watches our ballet dance they (will) feel a peace in mind and heart,” Chhieng said.
He said art has a uniting power and eliminates differences among nations, peoples and communities.
“We are human beings and everybody wants to live in peace -- like one family, we are the same," Chhieng said. “Even though we have different languages and different bodies, our hearts are the same. We are human beings, and everybody wants peace. Every art (form) has the intention to bring peace, to unite.”
