9 replies to this topic

[dirac]

Pittsburgh Ballet Theatrewill visit Israel. Item in brief.

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Now in its 25th year, the Karmiel Dance Festival showcases more than 5,000 dancers from Israel and across the world and attracts about 300,000 guests. Israel's Karmiel and Misgav region are Pittsburgh's sister communities through the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh's Parternship2Gether program, which bridges Israel with other global Jewish communities.

[dirac]

Tamara Rojo gives her impressions of ballet in Beijing. Photo gallery.

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I discovered that Chinese ballet is a relatively young art form. It was introduced by Madam Mao during the Cultural Revolution (1966-76) and, until recently, it was used as a form of propaganda for the communist regime -- with communist heroines being saved by communist heroes and so on.

But that part of history is viewed with mistrust by the younger generation, so at the moment ballet is going through a sort of reinvention. What's really surprising is that the youth of China are now obsessed with incorporating traditions from before the revolution.

[dirac]

A preview of the CBC broadcast of Alberta Ballet's "Love Lies Bleeding."

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More than anything else the company has done, the show has put Alberta Ballet on the international map. So how different is the film from what thousands of ballet and music lovers saw onstage?

The Toronto-based filmmaker recalls that the major change to Grand-Maitre's conception of Love Lies Bleeding lay in turning the central Elton Fan figure of the ballet into more of an "avatar for Elton himself," through cutting to images that show what's going on in the legendary performer's head, what he's thinking - something that could never be shown on the theatre stage, Mossanen points out.

[dirac]

A review of the Royal Balletby Sarah Crompton in the Telegraph, with photo gallery.

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Sex, violence, partial nudity, loud rock music, bad language – this new triple bill from the Royal Ballet has got it all. Perhaps as a result the audience age had dipped by a decade and there was an excitable buzz around the place as they settled down to watch two world premieres.

Your reaction to Wayne McGregor's Carbon Life will, I suspect, be conditioned by how much you like Mark Ronson and Andrew Wyatt's score, performed live on stage by an oddly-dressed band led by Ronson on bass guitar, and accompanied by singers including Boy George, Hero Fisher, and Alison Mosshart of The Kills.

[dirac]

A review of the Dance Salad festival by Molly Glentzer in The Houston Chronicle.

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This could describe a sizeable chunk of the choreography on Dance Salad's opening program Thursday, a night that featured companies from Brazil, Hungary, Germany, Italy, Sweden and England.

How do so many dancemakers from so many places end up working from such similar playbooks?

[dirac]

Alabama Youth Ballet Theatre presents Handel's "Messiah."

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Wright, who will be leading a liturgical dance class for Alabama Youth Ballet in the fall, choreographed the three-minute benediction for this weekend’s program.

In flowing white skirts and fuchsia blouses, eight dancers embody the layers of Handel’s music, the polyphonic patterns of the chorus and the unbound rejoicing of the Psalm.

[dirac]

A photo galleryfrom Washington Ballet's "Alice (in Wonderland)."

[dirac]

Reviews of the Royal Ballet.

The New York Times

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Everything was showily chic, nothing more so than the choreography. Both solos and partnering made much of hyperextension. Edward Watson — the Royal’s most poorly aligned principal in terms of classical placement, especially head positions — came into his own here, with legs rearing behind him way above his head. In a pas de deux with Steven McRae, Sarah Lamb’s torso and legs passed calmly through eye-baffling contortions.

The Telegraph

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Liam Scarlett's Sweet Violets, on the other hand, is strangely old-fashioned for a 25 year old. He is obviously in debt to Kenneth MacMillan and Roland Petit as he unfolds the story of the painter Walter Sickert, a man obsessed with murder, and accused by some of being Jack the Ripper himself.

The Arts Desk

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All year we've had to wait for a world premiere, and two come along at once. Last night was built to make some noise about the three most impressive young names in Royal Ballet choreography, and that will be where the PR story ends, but not where the flat disappointment ends. For while Christopher Wheeldon is shown at his magnificent best in an early piece, both Liam Scarlett and Wayne McGregor's new creations are nowhere near the best that either has shown.

The Independent

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Yet the ballet does have a sense of atmosphere. John Macfarlane’s brilliant designs evoke the smudgy world of Sickert’s paintings, from music hall to cheap bedrooms. In the painter’s studio, his employees Alina Cojocaru and Laura Morera flirt with Sickert and his friends. The interactions are teasing and socially precise. Both women freeze when Sickert’s paints get knocked over: this is a Bohemian world, but there’s no doubt who’s in charge. Scarlett’s women, unlike most balletic prostitutes, are insistent about being paid in advance.

[dirac]

A review of Sylvie Guillem in "6000 miles away" by Margaret Fuhrer for The Huffington Post.

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This is a style that Forsythe pioneered with Guillem herself 25 years ago, in the groundbreaking In the Middle, Somewhat Elevated. Murru, sinuous and plastic, is a fine foil for Guillem, but Guillem still does Forsythe better than anyone else. She understands its sense of causal risk. Its cheekiness, too: At one point Guillem, supported at the wrist by Murru, holds an extended développé to the side, then releases Murru's hand to show off her balance -- just as Aurora does in The Sleeping Beauty's Rose Adagio. Remember, Guillem asks slyly, when I used to do this?

[dirac]

Louisville Balletopens its season with "Lady of the Camellias."

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In announcing the new season last week, artistic director Bruce Simpson said the finale will be a program of five pieces, including a new piece from the company’s principal choreographer, Adam Hougland.

Simpson called decisions behind choices made for next season “an exercise in survival.” For the second year in a row, the company has reduced its offerings because of a financial crisis that it averted last year by selling its building to the Louisville Fund for the Arts and scaling back the number of performances.

Related.

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Louisville Ballet headmistress Mikelle Bruzina said she really likes to have a new challenge each time she begins to choreograph a new piece.

“This time was to have original music composed for the piece,” she said just before a rehearsal at the Louisville Ballet’s studios at 315 E. Main St. She was talking about “Sansei,” which she created nearly four years ago and recently expanded for the stage of the Kentucky Center for the upcoming Louisville Ballet performances to mark the company’s 60th anniversary.