Kourlas on Balanchine beyond City Ballet

[Dale]

Gia Kourlas takes the other side in the NY Times, commenting on Balanchine beyond City Ballet:

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/04/arts/dan...r=1&oref=slogin

Also, I think its interesting that just a week after dismissing Miami City Ballet as a regional ballet and poo pooing Gottlieb's support of them, John Rockwell reviewed MCB and decided, "Hey, they're pretty good!"

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/01/arts/dance/01till.html

That's the same thing that happened with his view on classical ballet. Before last year's season, Rockwell was all "classical ballet is dead." Then he actually sees some and says, "Hey, did you know? That Vishneva and Whelan...they're pretty good! That Don Q is fun! Who knew?"

[Farrell Fan]

Interesting how barely two weeks after Rockwell's endorsement of the "Martins era," Ms. Kourlas points out all the things wrong with it. I'm a little disappointed, though, that she made no mention of the Suzanne Farrell Ballet.

[Helene]

Also, I think its interesting that just a week after dismissing Miami City Ballet as a regional ballet and poo pooing Gottlieb's support of them, John Rockwell reviewed MCB and decided, "Hey, they're pretty good!"

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/01/arts/dance/01till.html

But still "a strong, lively regional company."

At the end of Koulas' article, she notes that Körbes will be dancing the lead in Diamonds next month. While I have no doubt she will be luminous in the role, I'm a bit sad that it's not Verdy's role in Emeralds, after the praise Verdy gave her after her coaching session with Körbes. But Kourlas is right: it's worth the plane fare to see her. She is a Ballerina in the best sense of the word.

[canbelto]

I'm a little disappointed, though, that she made no mention of the Suzanne Farrell Ballet.

The Suzanne Farrell ballet isn't a permanent stable company though, not the way the MCB, PNB, and SFB are. It doesn't have a set roster. It's still a pickup company.

[Helene]

I'm not sure Suzanne Farrell Ballet is a pick-up company, though. At this point Farrell has a core of dancers who perform season after season after their longer seasons with permanent companies end. I would call it a seasonal company, similar to Peter Boal and Company's fairly stable roster.

[bart]

I love Dale's snapshot of John Rockwell growing up!

As for Miami: no one can out-fan me where this company is concerned.

But I'd hate to see MCB become a kind of stalking horse for those whose agenda includes criticism of other Balanchine-based companies.

MCB has style, youth, a very ambitious artistic agenda, a brillliant (but not perfect) Artistic Director, and a marvelous policy when it comes to setting and coaching ballets. But its relatively limited list of ballets in active rep -- maybe 15 major ballets a year, including full-evening -- is quite different from NYCB's "impossible schedules" (Kouras, see below).

NYCB and MCB are very different companies, despite a repertoire that overlaps significantly though not entirely. Ditto the larger SF, PNB, and Boston companies, and the much more limited Farrell Ballet.

In "Suki Schorer on Balanchine Technique" (University Press of Florida), ... , Ms. Schorer writes of her mentor: "We needed his technical and his human insight as much as we needed his presence. All three were necessary if we were to be Balanchine dancers." By presence, Ms. Schorer — a dancer with New York City Ballet under Balanchine from 1959 to 1972 and now an esteemed teacher at the School of American Ballet, which is affiliated with City Ballet — also means guidance and motivation. That is not to suggest that today's City Ballet dancers are not driven; they are probably the hardest-working dancers in the world, but this reality, sadly, points more to their impossible schedules than anything else. (For the spring season the company is presenting more than 40 ballets, 7 of them new, for a total of 63 performances.) What the dancers lack is sustained guidance.

Size of active rep does have an effect. So do the number of performances, the number of dancers, the relative vastness of the hall, etc. These factors all make comparing NYCB and the other Balanchine-based companies a tricky business.

Until proven otherwise, NYCB is still first. But now it's "first among equals" in many of the qualities we value in a ballet company.

[Farrell Fan]

The Suzanne Farrell ballet isn't a permanent stable company though, not the way the MCB, PNB, and SFB are. It doesn't have a set roster. It's still a pickup company.

You're not breaking any news to me, canbelto. Of course it's not in the same category as MCB, PNB, SFB, and Boston. It's in a category all it's own. As kfw recently wrote on another thread, it's more than a pickup company, it's a treasure.

[Dale]

A couple of thoughts:

1 - I think in many ways the non-NYCB companies have a certain advantage by not being Balanchine's company -- they can vear off or stay with the NYCB model. SFB, MCB, PA Ballet, Boston Ballet all do Giselle. NYCB cannot and will not do a ballet like Giselle. There are certain things these companies can do that, if NYCB were to do them, would have people with pitch forks at the gate.

2 - I think I've posted this in the past, but in the 50s, 60s (and even 70s), if a dancer wanted to do Balanchine/Robbins or even have a top-level career, they needed to come to New York. With Balanchine disciples and/or former ABT dancers fanning out and working around the country as teachers, coaches and ADs, the "regional companies" have grown strong. Now, if a top dancer lives in San Francisco, she can study at SFB and enter SFB and perform in a strong company with a long season (therefore making a living, too), unlike, say, Conrad Ludlow or Suki Schorer, who left SF to come to NYCB.

Combining those two ideas, "regional companies" also seem to be freer to hire non-SAB dancers. The men at SFB, for example (or even MCB), are very strong. Many of them came from foreign schools. Same with several women, like the Feijoo sisters. Yes, NYCB has a tradition of bringing in Danish men, but the company has not really brought in the Spanish or Latin dancers that other companies have recently. (Plus, some of NYCB's recent imports have not been at the level of the imports from the 70s, except Igor Zelensky and Hubbe. Ask la Cour is not as good as Adam Luders was).

But I think Kourlas is trying to grasp, as many of us are, why she is seeing a company like MCB dance Balanchine with such verve and why NYCB is so uneven. It's something that's hard to grasp. Maybe, as she seems to suggest, it's inspiration or moral. And why a dancer like Korbes was dancing in the last line of the tall girls at NYCB and in less than a year she is leading Concerto Barocco - a ballet she almost never would get a chance to do at NYCB.

[Leigh Witchel]

[Moderator Beanie on - haven't worn it in a while!]

We've debated the relative importance of Farrell's company a few times; there's plenty more to discuss about her company and dancers, but the nay-sayers probably aren't going to convince the yea-sayers and vice-versa.

[Moderator Beanie off]

[bart]

...why NYCB is so uneven.

This observation, from someone who sees many performances, is very interesting. One quality of Miami that impresses me -- and I see 2-4 performances of each program -- is precisely the consistency of artistic approach, energy level, dancer commitment and involvement, etc., over the relatively short (one month?) period a ballet is in active rep.

I'd really appreciate hearing NYCB regulars discuss specific examples of how this "unevenness" shows itself on the stage in recent seasons.

[Dale]

I want to also add that, I agree with Bart. NYCB is still first. I think it needs to be the gold standard where Balanchine and Robbins is concerned. In fact, many people even think the Danes perform Martins' ballets better than NYCB and SFB is better with Wheeldon.

But, but, but... The overall level of NYCBs dancers is still, in my opinion, at the top. It still gets the pick of the litter at SAB. The ballet bodies (legs, feet, looks), for example, at NYCB is still overall stronger from top to bottom than elsewhere.

[canbelto]

If this article is missing something, I think it's the complete non-mention of all the international ballet companies and their performance of Balanchine. Jewels has practically become a staple of the Mariinsky, and in general many, many ballet companies across the world are performing Balanchine. And from the little I've seen, they are doing it very well indeed, in their own style.

And the ABT. They've consistently performed Balanchine over the seasons, with great results.

Really, Mr. B wanted his ballets to belong to the world, not the NYCB. And that's what happened. So in a way, we should feel grateful.

[socalgal]

..........as well as mentioning the Pennsylvania Ballet, co-founded by Balanchine himself.

It performs a vast rep of Balanchine ballets and is beginning to build a Robbins rep as well. A wonderful solid company with great talent!

[Paul Parish]

The factor I haven't seen mentioned re NYCB is the deleterious effect on Balanchine style of dancing and rehearsing Peter Martins' ballets.

I haven't seen NYCB often enough to make my observations worth much, but when City Ballet has toured, or I've been in NYC, I've noticed that Martins's ballets are extremely well-rehearsed and danced with tremendous conviction and style -- and the things I noticed in particular are the kinds of pedal-to-the-metal effort required to bring them off. (I know Martins HAS craft and works in different styles himself, but I haven't seen everything -- I'm referring to the effect of dancing the ambitious symphonic pieces.) In particular, I remember in some big-statement ballet (Adams concerto maybe?) seeing a man doing grand pirouettes a la seconde like a demon -- his releves were not on, he had to hop to keep them going, but it didn't matter, the expressionist force was making them very effective.

And I thought -- wow, hmmmmm, no wonder the Balanchine ballets are looking so intermittent in their phrasing. The kind of transitions needed for Balanchine, the clarity of the action and the simultaneous musicality of the phrasing aren't necessary to Martins's style, there's a different kind of drive to this that's almost Massine-like -- and the dancers sure can DO it.

The Balanchine ballets on the same program looked sharp but pinched by contrast, without follow-through (though as a regular at SFB, the thing I'm MOST used to enjoying is the sweep and follow-through of dancers here, they may not be sharp enough, but the liquidity of their phrasing is going to be very nice).

Still, in Balanchine as opposed to Martins, NYCB's dancers looked under-rehearsed and under coached -- and of course, at NYCB the choreographer has always been the best coach. It was so in Mr B's day; it's the tradition. If the choreographer is also the director, the pressures of getting ahead are going to tune the dancers into making his ballets as presentable as possible, getting the idiom as natural-seeming as possible, and the logic pellucid.

But if Mr B is no longer alive, for his ballets there needs to be supplemental coaching.

[bart]

As an aside to this discussion, thanks, Paul, for the following:

The Balanchine ballets on the same program looked sharp but pinched by contrast, without follow-through (though as a regular at SFB, the thing I'm MOST used to enjoying is the sweep and follow-through of dancers here, they may not be sharp enough, but the liquidity of their phrasing is going to be very nice).

I've not seen SFB, but this rings very true where Miami is concerned. Your observation may be a clue to what it is that so many reviewers seem to find in these companies' performances of Balanchine, but claim is sometimes missing at NYCB, despite the undisputed world-class quality of NYCB dancers.

So much on Ballet Talk helps me to see things better. I'll definitely be looking for what Paul describes in my future viewing.

[Farrell Fan]

Makes a lot of sense to me.

[richard53dog]

Paul's words also make a lot of sense to me and they also raise a number of important questions.

Richard

[Leigh Witchel]

In the two decades I have been watching NYCB there has been a perceptible change in style, but not an intentional one. It's been like continental drift. The company's dancing has gotten more punctuated; less about the phrase and more about shapes. I am not entirely certain that this was caused by the changeover from Balanchine to Martins. It was already underway from what I could see of tapes while Balanchine was alive. It isn't just coaching either; it's bodies. The change in the sort of dancer being taken into the school and company has made more of a difference in dancing style than almost anything else.

The change I have seen that I think can be attributed directly to Martins is that the company has gotten smaller. He's responding some to market forces (ABT's gotten shorter too. The public wants male pyrotechnicians.) It also suits his style of choreographing, which is allegro. That's also where I've seen the change in the Balanchine ballets. They look different when someone like Benjamin Millepied (whom I consider pretty much the essence of a Martins dancer) doing them - it's what Paul mentioned, the sharp, punctuated attack of the movement.

[kfw]

Paul Parish wrote: The Balanchine ballets on the same program looked sharp but pinched by contrast, without follow-through. . . .

Your observation may be a clue to what it is that so many reviewers seem to find in these companies' performances of Balanchine, but claim is sometimes missing at NYCB, despite the undisputed world-class quality of NYCB dancers.

World-class dancers hit or miss in world-class choreography, sharp in usually forgettable choreography. What a legacy. Would that more dancers would take a tip from Korbes and head to the provinces, there to be coached by Balanchine's own dancers, eventually to pass on what they won't learn at City Ballet.

[Leigh Witchel]

Come now, kfw.

The company isn't trashing its legacy. It's more like Harvard - it could do better and shouldn't rest on its laurels - and we have an obligation to prod it not to. Still, no amount of best efforts or wishful thinking makes Oberlin into Harvard.

[kfw]

The company isn't trashing its legacy. It's more like Harvard - it could do better and shouldn't rest on its laurels - and we have an obligation to prod it not to. Still, no amount of best efforts or wishful thinking makes Oberlin into Harvard.

But Leigh, in this case aren't the "Harvard" profs -- Villella, Tomasson, Farrell and Boal, and the coaches they bring in -- teaching at "Oberlin"? What if "Harvard" applicants began applying there instead? Of course I simplify far too greatly, but according to much and perhaps most critical opinion in the last 15 years NYCB is indeed resting on its Balanchine laurels, and has anyone been able to prod Martins and his team into treating it more carefully?

[Helene]

Still, no amount of best efforts or wishful thinking makes Oberlin into Harvard.

Nor does Oberlin want to be Harvard, at least from any public info I've seen. Get the respect that Harvard does? Have Harvard's endowment? Get first crack at most of the best students in the country and faculty? Wouldn't any institution?

However, there are many ways in which Oberlin is superior to Harvard -- the conservatory, for one -- because that is where it puts its energy. There are many ways in which the experience of being an Oberlin student can be preferable to being a Harvard student. There are advantages to being in a smaller institution, which include personalized attention that is difficult to get in a larger one, smaller class sizes, smaller and more affordable cities, etc. Big fish in small pond does not necessarily mean lesser quality, intelligence, etc., as the number of Fullbright scholars coming from smaller schools (including potted Ivy) shows.

SAB graduates a huge amount of talent every year. It can absorb a tiny number of those graduates. Even among those graduates who dance with NYCB, there is more than one lifelong corps members who more or less belong there for every Tiler Peck. It's not just Korbes, though, who's at PNB. Peter Boal said there were 15 of his former students in the company when he showed up to turn in his application, among them Porretta and Pacitti, most of whom were hired right into the company. (That's about one third of the company.) NYCB's loss is Seattle's gain, and Seattle is only one company that feasts at the SAB table, although, thankfully, Francia Russell is friends with Suki Schorer, who recommended dancers to her, including Porretta (source: Russell and Porretta, each in a Q&A).

[Leigh Witchel]

[A]ccording to much and perhaps most critical opinion in the last 15 years NYCB is indeed resting on its Balanchine laurels, and has anyone been able to prod Martins and his team into treating it more carefully?

I'm afraid the only critical opinion I trust on this issue is my own - and I think everyone is going to have to come to their own conclusion about this. Critics seem to be particularly vested in the position they've staked out on this issue, including myself I'm sure. Still, I travel a fair bit and see a reasonable amount of companies, including those being discussed. I'm seeing fine performances. Once or twice (SFB's Apollo with Gonzalo Garcia comes immediately to mind) I've seen a great one. But I'm not seeing anything that supports the contentions made. I'd love for the company to do better. It's still a notch above everything else.

[gynecia]

Wise words. It just seems to me like there are a lot of people of wish they were running NYCB instead of Martins. That's the veiled point of Koulas's article. Why not Villela? Why not Farrell? Why not Gottlieb? And if they can't take control of it, why aren't they brought in to coach? Isn't a more provocative criticism of Martins that he's changed the Balanchine model at City Ballet too little? Villela and Miami do what, three Balanchine ballets during their home season, plus a Nutcracker? They do far more work by other choregraphers. They perform to TAPED music. How do you compare that effort to the 30 or more Balanchine ballets each year at City Ballet, not to mention Robbins? And don't the City Ballet staff travel the world setting these ballets on other companies?

I actually agree with the idea that more companies dance Balanchine well today than ever before. I don't know that it's news. The omission is that the Balanchnine Trust has helped these companies build their Balanchine repertories, and that they do it selectively--one or two ballets per season at most.

I also find myself wondering if the provocative approach of Kourlas is more about winning a chief dance critic post at the Times than about the work.

[A]ccording to much and perhaps most critical opinion in the last 15 years NYCB is indeed resting on its Balanchine laurels, and has anyone been able to prod Martins and his team into treating it more carefully?

I'm afraid the only critical opinion I trust on this issue is my own - and I think everyone is going to have to come to their own conclusion about this. Critics seem to be particularly vested in the position they've staked out on this issue, including myself I'm sure. Still, I travel a fair bit and see a reasonable amount of companies, including those being discussed. I'm seeing fine performances. Once or twice (SFB's Apollo with Gonzalo Garcia comes immediately to mind) I've seen a great one. But I'm not seeing anything that supports the contentions made. I'd love for the company to do better. It's still a notch above everything else.

[drb]

And don't the City Ballet staff travel the world setting these ballets on other companies?....

The omission is that the Balanchnine Trust has helped these companies build their Balanchine repertories, and that they do it selectively--one or two ballets per season at most.

I wasn't aware that the City Ballet staff did that. Of course the Balanchine Trust does, but does not set a limit of one or two per year. In fact, nine Balanchine ballets were set on Nina Ananiashvili's company in Tblisi, Georgia in the past year. Of course he was Georgian. Nina, by the way, was taught Mozartiana by its co-creator, Suzanne Farrell.