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Spring 2004 Week 3


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Lorna Feijoo took no prisoners on Sunday and did a fine Ballo.  She is a strong and beautiful dancer, character and passion in her movement......I thought she looked like she knew what she was doing and delivered the goods a la Regina. 

It's wonderful to hear these descriptions of Lorna Feijoo as a technical virtuoso. It certainly speaks volumes about her versatility, because the only time I've seen her dance when she was still with Alicia Alonso's company: she was a superb, gentle Giselle.

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Bobbi, if you remember Elizabeth Loscavio ( :green: what a loss), I saw her dance Ballo once and the "Merrill special", the jete cambre ( I THINK that's the term...), was BEAUTIFUL, although not as high and dazzling as Ashley's. So it has been seen again, though not recently. I too had only seen Feijoo in less demanding parts and am delighted that she's so brilliant. Mary Carmen Catoya of Miami City Ballet is another ballerina whom I thought of as lyrical ("Emeralds", "Giselle", etc) who surprised me in Ballo. great fast feet!

OK. The board agrees. When do we get Bouder in this role? It's almost, lol, made for her.....

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I also loved Elizabeth Loscavio in this role. She was very young when I saw her (SFB in DC) and if she wasn't a Queen, she was very much a Princess. Another aside -- yes, TF, she was a loss. I'm with those who saw her with Hamburg Ballet in "Nijinsky" and couldn't believe it was the same woman.

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I think if the moderators felt my remarks about Korbes' weight were inappropriate, they would have been edited out. She is one of my favorite dancers, possibly the most beautiful woman in the company right now, and

I am going to BALLO DELLA REGINA tomorrow night just because she is in it.

I didn't say, "She is a big fat pig"; no one gets upset when people mention how bony Wendy is...if you look at the girls in the company right now, Korbes has by far the most voluptuous build. And I do like it (as I like Meunier also). I just think she looked even better a couple years ago when she was somewhat thinner.

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Sometimes editors just gently remind, as Juliet did. It's good to remember, mid-season, that THE DANCERS READ THIS BOARD and we try to avoid comments that could reasonably be considered personal. It's bad enough that we tell the world they fell out of pirouettes, slid across the stage and/or muffed a lift. We'd like to avoid comments along the lines of: "she needs to lose some weight" "I'd like to feed her a barrel of clotted cream" and/or "Maybe it's time for a face lift...." :wink:

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The Newsweek mini web interview with Morris in today's links section is timely. In part of his answer to the last question

Are you going to continue to perform in your own dances?

he says

I like to perform, and I'm good—I can dance better than anybody! And if you think I'm too old and fat, then wait in the lobby. You can skip that part. But if we were in Samoa, people would pay more if I were old and fat.

I saw him about a decade ago in a White Oak piece, in which he danced with Baryshnikov and the striking 6'6"-ish Rob Besserer, and it was Morris I couldn't take my eyes off of. This past January he performed Serenade, and I will be very sad when he stops dancing, regardless of his age or weight. I'm glad he's the boss, though!

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I saw the Sunday matinee. "The Steadfast Tin Soldier" is a light, entertaining ballet. It was very well danced by Yvonne Borree and Damian Woetzl. This is one of Borree's few strong roles along with "Coppelia". I can't think of any others. All my thoughts about "Ballo della Regina" have already been posted. What a beautiful, beautiful performance. The whole cast danced wonderfully, especially Lorna Feijoo and Ganzalo Garcia. Feijoo made the most difficult steps seem so easy and so joyous. Her dancing was an absolute pleasure to watch.

I really disliked "Variations Pour un Porte et un Soupir". I found the sound effects

(or whatever they were) very jarring. And to me the whole ballet just seemed to go on and on. If it had been ten minutes it would have been an interesting novelty.

Unfortunately, I ended up hating the ballet, as did most of the people who sit near me and all the ladies I heard talking about it in the ladies' room during the intermission.

Every time I see "The Four Temperments" I get something more out of it. Sunday's performance was no exception. I especially enjoyed Sebastien Marcovici in the Melancholic section, and Arthur Evans in the Phlegmatic section. Even though he's been a principal at NYCB for a couple of years, I've seen Robert Tewsley only once before, maybe twice at the most. Therefore, I was pleasantly surprised at how comfortable he was dancing Balanchine. Sofianne Slyvie, his partner in the Sanguinic variation, seemed off to me. I've only seen Slyvie dance in Balanchine "light" ballets - like "Western Symphony" and "Slaughter on Tenth Avenue". She was wonderful in those ballets, and I think she just needs more experience dancing the more serious Balanchine works. Teresa Reichlen in the

Choleric section proved to be a very promising ballerina, but I really miss Monique

Meunier in this part. Meunier's Choloric variation showed so much power and energy. I also remember a dancer named Audra Dixon (I think that was her name) who also did a great job in the Choleric section.

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Some belated comments on last Wednesday’s performance (May 12).

I enjoyed the chance to get reacquainted with Ballo and Union Jack. I liked the principal couple, with a few reservations. I found Garcia’s overexuberance too rough for the ballet; it was the same quality that made him a perfect Apollo in San Francisco a few weeks ago. Also, he and Feijóo didn’t seem comfortable enough with each other when they began; she looked like she was gripping herself to stabilize. It made her seem stylistically heavy; she got considerably lighter as the ballet went on. She’s a crisp, lively dancer and I enjoyed her performance. I’ll put in a good word for Miranda Weese in this role; I think she, rather than Feijóo gave us back Ballo after Merrill Ashley’s retirement. Feijóo has the chops, the speed and the footwork; I’d just like to see her do it a few more times. She did the “tongue-twister” step exactly right: so it was perfectly clear and impossible to follow. It was like Danilova’s admonishment to her students learning the grand pas in Sleeping Beauty, “Make them think it’s difficult.” I wonder how long it will take before we no longer expect Merrill Ashleyisms in the role. Kyra Nichols did a straight jeté rather than the Plisetskaya leap; we miss it when it’s gone, but it was something Ashley inserted into the role herself with Balanchine’s approval. Feijóo did it, but she missed to photo-finish to a kneel on the four chords at the end.

The real delight of the ballet was the ballet itself. It’s the sort of dance that takes the kind of carefree youth that someone has at age 20 or at age 75. There’s a joyous looseness to the vocabulary, as if the steps were the goofy social dancing from the sixties. The girls in the corps practically pogo at some points. I agree with those who thought the Amandas (Hankes and Edge) should be switched. I think Darla Hoover would have been proud as Air Bouder rocketed through her variation (Hoover did the variation in the 80s, and was one of Bouder’s mentors). Körbes was also lovely in the final split variation.

The second time I saw Whelan in Episodes I still marveled at her coordination, but it would be interesting to see someone struggle with the part again. I’m very impressed with Whelan, but she unlocked all the secret drawers in the Concerto several years ago; she’s figured out how all the puzzle pieces fit together. I’d like to get even a distant glimpse once again of what the ballet might have felt like to an unfamiliar audience in 1959.

I’m not sure how long it’s been since I’ve seen Union Jack; I only recalled the outline of the ballet. I was absolutely mesmerized by the first part and the choreographic walks Balanchine had to create to transpose soldiers from the fields to the stage. I couldn’t take my eyes off of Ansanelli as she entered leading the Green Montgomerie regiment. Something about the drag in the step; something about her hips. It’s fascinating to see Peter Boal and Damien Woetzel dancing together; it doesn’t often happen. It’s like watching the other doppelgangers in the company, Somogyi and Ansanelli; you feel like they inhabit different worlds on the same stage. Weese went for the folk elements of the Menzies/Dress MacDonald dance; she didn’t try to smooth out her jerky, bird-like head movements.

In a ballet that mixes Brigadoon and La Bayadère, Whelan added in the Dance of the Chosen one as she hurled herself and her cadre through the MacDonald of Sleat section. It was an interesting, raw performance, immediately soothed by Maria Kowroski’s RCAF corps.

Nilas Martins and Jenifer Ringer did fine jobs in the Costermonger pas; Martins outdid himself and looked animated by the role. It was less his acting than his movement; he threw himself into the silly walks and strolls. Ringer is very good at “slumming” roles; she does something similar with the Fascinatin’ Rhythm variation in Who Cares? There, she’s a daffy teenager who accidentally strolled into a jazz club; here with her porcelain skin and beautiful carriage, she’s a very grand lady – with a hip flask.

I’m not sure what’s English about the Royal Navy section. Its characters seem completely American to my eye; outtakes from Popeye cartoons. Kowroski had grand time storking in with the Wrens.

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