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Alina Cojocaru and James Forbat in Liam Scarlett’s No Man’s Land, English National Ballet, September 2015. © Dave Morgan.

Liszt’s orchestrated piano pieces veer on the melodramatic, except for a plangent start to the final duet for Alina Cojocaru and James Forbat. She never meets his eyes, no matter how extravagant the lifts or how closely she is wrapped around his body. He is a ghost, she a wraith, representing a generation of lost lovers.