38 replies to this topic

[leonid]

dirac, on May 30 2010, 12:18 AM, said:

Quote

Hodson and Archer in this reconstruction, gave flesh to the historical record.

Definitely such work is certainly of interest, as long as everyone is aware of the implications of "reconstruction."

Of course you are absolutely right and such reconstructions may have limited appeal to many amongst an audience.

What I like most about the Hodson/Archer endeavours , is their archaeology. This may not tell the whole story, but like a tour around the British Museum viewing artefacts, we are brought into contact with a work of the dance almost lost.

Having read most of the literature on Jeux I feel I have seen Nijinsky's ballet if only, through a glass darkly.

[Ray]

Balanchine's Gounod Symphony.  The music is so similar to Bizet's symphony in C; I'm intrigued as to how B handles the similarities (the pictures I've seen look quite different from his Symphony in C).   I don't know if it's been performed since the 1985 revival.  

Also, I've somehow never seen B's Tombeau de Couperin, and I'd like to.

[papeetepatrick]

Ray, on May 30 2010, 10:44 AM, said:

Also, I've somehow never seen B's Tombeau de Couperin, and I'd like to.

Yes.  Tombeau is one of my favourite of all pieces, esp. the Prelude, which is the most ephimeral effervescent thing nearly ever written, and the Minuet, which is almost as ineffable--oh, this music takes you into a secret world.  I don't doubt that Balanchine must have loved it too, and I don't know why I've never even seen it on NYCB programs, but probably it was there sometime in the 80s and 90s and I just missed it, don't know.

[Rosa]

Pillar of Fire
Jewels
Flames of Paris
Lost Illusions

[Hamorah]

Going back to the first post on Enigma Variations - I was fortunate enough to see the original cast and it was amazing.  As far as I am concerned no-one can replace Svetlana Beriosova as Lady Elgar - she was simply divine in it.  The whole cast was brilliant, including Anthony Dowell, Antoinette Sibley and Wayne Sleep.

A review by Mary Cargill that I found on the web sums it up perfectly I think -

"Enigma Variations is a picture of Elgar’s friends, but it was also a picture of Ashton’s Royal Ballet in 1968, and like so many profoundly subtle works, its success depends very much on casting. Derek Rencher was a dignified and distinguished Elgar, but the soul of the ballet was Svetlana Beriosova’s Lady Elgar. Beriosova’s dark eyes had untold sympathy and understanding, and her elegant line had a unique dignity."

I seem to remember seeing it on TV - I just wish they would release it on DVD - oh and Anthony Dowell and Antoinette Sibley in Les Deux Pigeons too..........

[LiLing]

Tudor's Echoing of Trumpets.  There ws talk of ABT doing it this year.  What happened?

[Kerry1968]

The ballet I've always wanted to see is Daphnis et Chloe. Ravel's most beautiful composition excepting perhaps L’Enfant et les Sortilèges. Does the ballet exist in any American company's rep?

[cubanmiamiboy]

Kerry1968, on 07 April 2012 - 07:11 PM, said:

The ballet I've always wanted to see is Daphnis et Chloe. Ravel's most beautiful composition excepting perhaps L’Enfant et les Sortilèges. Does the ballet exist in any American company's rep?

Ah, I recently saw a wonderful rendition of the complete score played by the New World Symphony...such beautiful music..!

[jsmu]

Balanchine:
Metamorphoses
Roma (!!!!!!!!!) a marvelous score and what was sometimes said to be LeClercq's best role
Opus 34
The Figure in the Carpet
PAMTGG (all right, yes, this one is necrophilia...)
Divertimento Brilliante, simply for the Villella-McBride pdd
Modern Jazz: Variants
the original versions of many ballets, including Marie-Jeanne's Barocco (much, much more strenuous) and Ballet Imperial;
Hayden's Donizetti Variations; the first cast of Agon; Kent's Seven Deadly Sins (with LENYA!) ; Wilde's Square Dance (dazzling even
on a kinescope, but....) and Raymonda Variations; Paul in Valse-Fantaisie (the photos are maddening); the first Valse
with its trinity of goddesses; Don Quixote with the cast of the premiere, Liebeslieder likewise, Episodes ditto, esp. Paul Taylor!


Ashton:
Lament of the Waves
Nocturne
Jazz Calendar (similar corpse-sniffing to PAMTGG....)
Ondine, with Fonteyn (apparently similar to Meditation with Farrell--undoable without its original ballerina)
Patineurs with Harold Turner, Mary Honer, Elizabeth Miller, et al
Enigma Variations with Beriosova
Symphonic Variations with Fonteyn, Shearer, and May
Sylvia with Grant as Eros


Taras:
Piege de Lumiere


Most of Martha Graham's choreography
(particularly Letter to the World, Errand into the Maze, Herodiade, Night Journey, Frontier, Primitive Mysteries,
El Penitente, Every Soul is a Circus) WITH GRAHAM