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BLAS presents Elegance 2007
Friday 9TH February
Hammersmith Palais
Review : Amrith Balasingham
Photography : Imperial Light
This year's BLAS Show was held at the Hammersmith Palais. Elegance 2007 could only be described as a true spectacle of 'Cirque De Soleil' proportions as the audience were taken on a rollercoaster ride of drama, fashion and acting all fused into one.
What was very evident from this Show compared to others on 'the circuit' was the amount of time and effort that had gone into putting Elegance 2007 together. The participators in this year's Show numbered into the hundreds. This critic would only have one criticism and that was that Elegance 2007 had too many acts, or perhaps the individual acts were given too much time.
There were eighteen acts in total to be precise. There is the age old issue of providing performers with a platform on which to perform their art but at the same, the Show came in at four hours in total which is a very long time indeed.
The comperes for this year's Show were Jasminder the Man and Veena V from Club Asia who took every opportunity it seemed to plug their station. They were both very warmly received by the crowd but I felt Kat B of Kiss from last year 's BLAS Show was funnier and less hard work.
There were two headline grabbing acts this year. One for its sheer novelty and the second for it sheer brilliance. 'Trouble at the Union' was a Run DMC Style 'dance-off' feature pitting the Bollydollies against the Breakers. The star performers were two kids, Gurleen Khundi and Sukhleen Khundi breakdancing and body popping across the stage with a variety of jaw dropping moves.
The stand-out piece however in this year's Show and one of the best in recollection was 'Per Aspera Ad Astra'. My GSCE Latin is not as sharp as it could be, but the name of the act has a number of translations. The most fitting one I feel is 'The Hard Way to the Stars' which co-incides rather nicely with the Romeo and Juliet theme of the Act. The fusion of Fashion and pure showmanship was simply brilliant and the choreographers, Nabila Virani and Saaman Neriman must be given special mention.
A spectacle such as this one was down to a very tight knit committee headed by Alexander Theivendra, President elect. The British Heart Foundation was again the noninated Charity for the Show with over £12,000 raised for Charity. By quite a margin one, if not the most successful Show this year in terms of monies raised. Hats off to the President and his team on raising so much, but putting on a thoroughly entertaining Show at the same time.
As a proud member of the UCL Alumni, I can't of course sign off without mentioning 'CSI: Sri Lanka' which is next Sunday at the Bloomsbury.
ENJOY THE REST OF THE PHOTOS
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