Q&A with Kally Lloyd-Jones

Award winning director and choreographer Kally Lloyd-Jones is Company Chordelia’s founder and Artistic Director.

The company’s new show, Revel, is a 60+ coming-of-age story that fuses, dance, physical theatre, dialogue, and music. It is touring to venues across Scotland in autumn 2026.

Kally spoke to us about how the production came about, and shared her reflections on the impact of ageing on a creative career.

Can you tell us about Company Chordelia – when was the company established and what sort of work do you produce?

I created Company Chordelia in 2002 because I wanted to make my own dance theatre productions.  I was really very new at choreographing and making work but I had a strong feeling about the kind of work I wanted to make.  I have always wanted to make work that is theatrical, that connects with people and tells stories.  Over the years, I have developed that vision and I’d like to think I have improved with practice and experience. I use different ingredients depending on the subject matter and what best serves the story.  There is always dance and movement and there might also be singing, dialogue, live music.  I often work with singers and actors as well as dancers in my pieces.

Company Chordelia is the place where I can choose.  I can choose what to make, how to make it, who I work with and how everyone is treated.  I like to create a space where people feel safe, valued and respected and that’s important because it’s not always the case.

How did the idea for Revel come about and how has it developed?

Revel is the result of a sort of perfect storm.  I was approaching 60, and at the same time I was also diagnosed with osteo-arthritis in one of my big toe joints, which is very painful, and also high cholesterol.  I think this hit me quite hard and I realised that I was now in a new phase and that when things start to go wrong with your body, they aren’t necessarily going to get better, and if you’re lucky, you just have to manage them.  I also think that I thought if people knew my age, the work would dry up, and for a while I was a bit secretive about turning 60.  At the same time, I had started gradually dancing more again, renting my local village hall and just dancing by myself, figuring out how to navigate the big toe and my older body. I was wondering what virtuosity would look like for an older dancer.  What could I still do really well, or even better? It’s much easier to know what I don’t do well anymore.

I would say that much of my work is, in some way, a way of exploring, healing, salving things that are difficult or painful.  And Revel was a way for me to come to terms with, and actually come to enjoy and celebrate, ageing.

In my first notes and thoughts about Revel, I didn’t plan to be in it myself.  I thought I had finished performing.  But then I realised that of course I should put myself there because that’s what it’s about and I just needed to be brave.  I asked Steinvör to work with me – she is a beautiful dancer and a choreographer too.  After working together many times over the years, it felt completely right to do this show together.

The characters in Revel reflect on the losses, gains and adjustments of ageing. What are your own reflections on ageing with regards to a creative career?

Steinvör and I play ourselves in the show, and although it’s a theatrical version of ourselves, it is almost entirely true and has emerged from our real thoughts and feelings, conversations, difficulties, routines, joys.  Our relationship and similarities as well as our differences are a key element.  Steinvör is 6 years older than me and so is kind of ahead of me in dealing with, processing and managing, some of the changes and challenges we face.  I think we also share a sense of humour which has been a great part of working together and how the show has come together.

The realisation that I am still me and I didn’t fall into an abyss on my 60th birthday alongside the making of this show, has given me a renewed appreciation of the amount of knowledge, skill and experience we both hold and how valuable that is, and should be.  I do think that society is generally quite ageist, and that in dance, we hold youth and “virtuosity” as the standard for excellence.  I would like to be a part of changing that perception.  We can be as expressive, creative and imaginative.  We bring great care to the details, we understand our bodies, ourselves and what we need to thrive, and perhaps above all, we bring our life experience.

My feeling is that I never want to stop doing what I love and being who I am, so although how I do that may evolve and change, I think that I still have a lot to offer.

How do you hope audiences will respond to Revel?

Well, mostly I hope audiences will see something of themselves reflected in the show.  That they will climb inside our world with us for a bit and laugh and cry with us, and leave feeling uplifted and ready to take on the world.