Ananiashvili & Georgian stars - Ratmansky Triple Bill

[Natalia]

A small contingent from the State Ballet of Georgia, led by Nina Ananiashvili, will be in NYC and Wash, DC, this weekend, performing three Ratmansky ballets, to the accompaniment of Bolshoi instrumentalists.

http://www.playbilla...ticle/8609.html

The fun begins on Thursday with a Welcome Reception for the dancers at a NY-area art gallery;details in the above article.

No word yet on who will be the other dancers...but I am seriously hoping for Lali Kandelaki!

[Natalia]

Went to last night's performance @ Lisner Auditorium in DC. Lovely, lovely program, featuring three ballets by Alexei Ratmansky + an added 'bonus' by Nina Ananiashvili: The Swan.

Wishes do come true: Lali Kandelaki was there...still fouetteing beautifully, after all of these years! She danced the roles that had been originally taken by the Kirov's Tatyana Terekhova back in Jan 1998, when I first saw the two earlier works -- Charms of Mannerism and Dreams of Japan -- at the Mariinsky. The newer work, the romantic piano ballet Bizet Variations, was choreographed for the Georgian troupe in 2007/08, and presented on tour in the USA, including the Brooklyn Academy of Music, where I first saw it in March '08. In addition to the three Ratmansky works, the audience was treated to the Struchkova version of Fokine's 'The Swan' by Ananiashvili, full of emotion, with a dollop of the affectations that we've all come to love in this artist. The audience, packed with Georgians from the DC area, went crazy.

During intermissions, a crew from Georgian TV ran around interviewing audience members. During the show, strong lights would be beamed at sections of the audience to register the adoration.

Sole complaint: The theater ran out of playbills early, so half the audience had none; I was lucky that a very kind gentleman offered to share with his wife and gave me his own copy. The show had been nearly sold out for a while; hence, one would think that the organizers would have printed the correct number of programs.

I am seriously hoping that the entire Georgian troupe returns to the USA (incl. DC) soon with a full Laurencia...starring Lali, who, I'm told, is extraordinary in the title role. Take a sneak peek:

[puppytreats]

^{The NY audience was filled with Georgians and Russians. I went at the last minute, having seen "First Position" at a film festival in NY in the afternoon. I had no time to change my clothing, so I went in jeans, but the entire audience was all dressed up. I felt really out of place. It was quite different from the way New Yorkers and tourists dress at the State Theatre or the Met.}

^{Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center is not meant for ballet -- so many of the seats had obstructed views. Still, I was lucky to be there.}

^{I felt the first piece, "Charms", was rather vacant, even though it received good reviews. I disliked some of the repeated hand movements, and found two many open spaces in the choreography. The program improved as it proceeded.}

^{The audience was passionate and wild. I have not seen anything like this in my travels through ballet world.}

[cinnamonswirl]

I was at the DC performance at Lisner, and the dancing was superb.

While I liked all of the Ratmansky's and think Charms of Mannerisms and Bizet Variations should get wider exposure (maybe at ABT?), I thought they all suffered from Ratmansky-itis -- nice music, inventive choreography, and yet they all felt a little too long.

The costumes for all of the ballets were lovely.

Hopefully next time the company can perform at the Kennedy Center or somewhere else where the theatre is as professional as the dancers are. (Not enough programs, wonky stage lighting ...)

[rg]

not sure if the program for Washington was precisely the same as that for NYC, but f.y.i. here are scans of the credits from the NYC performance at Avery Fisher Hall.

[abatt]

Interesting that no choreographer is attributed to "Swan". Did she do the Fokine version, or something else? Or did she "borrow" from Fokine without attribution?

[Natalia]

Thanks, RG. The program's ballets & castings were the same. This is very similar to the 1-sheet hand-out (printed front and back) what we got in DC, with the frustrating exception that the bottom of DC's page two included the beginning of brief descriptions of each ballet...which cut-off in the middle of the first sentence describing the 2nd ballet (Bizet Variations). In other words, DC got only the little write-up for Charms of Mannerism and non of the rest. RG, if it's not a huge problem, we in DC would love to have scans of the subsequent write-ups of all 4 ballets on view + any little bios of the dancers.

Abatt, I noticed that too but I only saw this attribution in the playbill sheet. It appeared to be '95% traditional' Fokine Swan with the one major change in the very last seconds and the placement of the ending pose...Ananiashvili (Struchkova?) did a curious 180-degree 'scoot' on the floor, turning around so that the swan dies in the opposite direction from that which she normally faces. She's about to die in the traditional pose (facing the audience-right wing), then gets a sudden burst of energy and propels herself 180-degrees around, so that she dies facing the audience-left wing.

[YID]

I attended the Saturday NYC performance.

To start, i should state that i had watched Lopatkina's dying swan from the Guardian article twice a night before and then watched the Bolshoi reopenning a week ago, then the full u-tube report on the forum and again on Saturday morning at Big Cinema. So, the Georgian state ballet and Nina "were against tough competition". I'm glad i had the 3rd tier seat (I was seating front row last time they performed at BAM, which showed some sign of "aging").

The dancer I HAVE to praise is Ana Albutashvili (the non-lead in Bizet Variations and Futa Omote's 1 of 2 female parts). She has fluidity and elongation of her limb movements, great port de bras and musical and flexible movements. She could have just stepped back from Mariinsky stage. I found WIlliam Pratt's dancing very sloppy (1 of 4 dancers in first piece "charms of Mannerism". And i recalled that BAM's version of Dreams about Japan had more precision in movements, feet & arm positions (well, probably Sergey Filin's participation helped), and I couldn't recall the "red snake" dance. Yep, the Georgian fans were happy, and Nina carried the Georgian flag. Very patriotic. The dying swan was Struchkova's variation, with the swan "actively" fighting death and as Natalia described the 180-degree last moment flip.

But i couldn't get over Lopatkina's " the most beautiful arms in ballet... the way they move not from the elbow, or even the shoulder, but from deep in her back. That rippling flow has its origins in the steely core of abdominal and lower-back muscles from which, in the fully finished dancer, every impulse radiates outwards". http://www.guardian....s?newsfeed=true

I wish I'd seen Nina Ananiashvili in her youth years. Currently, i'd prefer her stepping on stage in a nice dress and just walking on stage.

PS: Nina's second swan died facing the "traditional direction".

[Natalia]

....

PS: Nina's second swan died facing the "traditional direction".

Second? Nina must have been tired by the time she got to DC; no encore here.

To her credit, Nina ceded her Bizet Variations role to a younger dancer...and the new interpreter cut the matronly long sleeves that used to be on her costume. (Remember the long sleeves in Brooklyn-2008?) But Nina looked fantastic in her 'red snake' unitard and red pointes; let's give credit where credit is due!

[rg]

regarding further scans, N. i'm happy to email these to you in large-enough files for clear print-out all the data you're seeking, no problem.

[Natalia]

Thanks, RG. I had forgotten about file size for this forum but will gladly accept them privately. I truly love to read program notes.

[puppytreats]

....

PS: Nina's second swan died facing the "traditional direction".

Second? Nina must have been tired by the time she got to DC; no encore here.

To her credit, Nina ceded her Bizet Variations role to a younger dancer...and the new interpreter cut the matronly long sleeves that used to be on her costume. (Remember the long sleeves in Brooklyn-2008?) But Nina looked fantastic in her 'red snake' unitard and red pointes; let's give credit where credit is due!

Her encore was better than the first time.

Nina looked great, in terms of her body, but she looked like a woman toward the end of a career. It must have taken a lot of courage and sense of duty to dance next to younger women.

[FauxPas]

I too saw the Ratmansky Triple Bill on Saturday night at Avery Fisher Hall. General note: Avery Fisher has a rather unromantic proscenium with limited lighting options and no scrim. The lighting which I am sure was done quickly sometimes left dancers in the dark. We had to look at the ugly back wall the whole night. I suspect the floor is hard and uncomfortable to dance on. Another problem is that the largely Russian and Georgian audience was snapping away with flash photos even during the dancing. So we had strobe effects the whole night until the last ballet when there was an announcement. Nina Ananiashvili still looked very credible as a prima ballerina but lacked the suppleness and abandon she had in the past. She was solid technically and often evocative in her phrasing and sense of style. Whether it was the choreography or her current performing condition, there was little excitement. Clearly the audience hit was "The Dying Swan" where in the first rendition Ananiashvili did her boneless rippling arms effect to wild applause and flashing camera bulbs. The second time she did less with arms. I noticed that Ananiashvili didn't do any high arabesques but perhaps they were not required by the choreography. As for the other dancers, I liked Vasil Akhmateli and Philippe Solano in "Dreams of Japan" and all the company dancers in "Bizet Variations". Lali Kandelaki looks exciting but nothing really let her cut loose like she might in "Don Quixote" or "Laurencia". As for Ratmansky's choreography it is a mixed bag. "The Charm of Mannerism" was overlong and at times precious - no one looked at their best in it. Nina's sense of fun and elegance scored some points but what was the point, really? A little too much cleverness over substance. The "Bizet Variations" was fluid and elegant but didn't show me anything I hadn't seen before. "Dreams of Japan" didn't sustain or develop choreographic passages in a creative fashion. It was theatrical but I didn't care for most of the mini-dramas all about scorned lovers turning into fire snakes or hermaphrodite demons and going after their betrayers. It was different and Ratmansky isn't afraid of being theatrical or telling human dramas. The music seemed to be canned for the first three ballets then there were live musicians onstage for "Dreams of Japan". An Italian conductor and Georgian orchestra musicians were listed in the program.