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[dirac]

The Staten Island Ballet hosts its 12th Annual International Choreographers' Festival.

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On Saturday, Askegard and Anna Liceica, a frequent guest in SIB programs, will dance "Tilted Dream," a piece performed to music by Donald Knaack.

Askegard's own new choreography, "Morseaux" (meaning: morsel or short work of music) will be performed by two members of Ballet Next: Kristie Latham and Lily Nicole Balogh.

[dirac]

More details on the renewal of "Breaking Pointe" for a second series.

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The show was not exactly a hit in Season 1. It averaged fewer than a million viewers during its six-episode run from May 31 to July 5, which is a weak showing even for The CW network. But "Breaking Pointe" did have a large online audience, and that was enough for the network to bring it back.

[dirac]

Scottish Ballet practices community outreach with its 'Find your Feet' program.

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It will focus on creative dance, ballet technique, music, costume and design. Various events will take place involving local organisations, venues, community leaders, schools and nurseries as well as a wide range of recreational groups – including a special practical dance session with Greenock Wanderers Rugby Club and a fun armchair ballet event especially for residents of the Holy Rosary Residence care home.

[dirac]

Aspen Santa Fe Ballet will perform in Santa Barbara.

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“Square None” will open the program, which also includes Czech-born choreographer Jirí Kylián’s 1983 classic “Stamping Ground,” a work that takes its inspiration from the aboriginal tribes of Australia. Finnish artist Jorma Elo’s 2011 work “Over Glow,” created for ASFB, completes the bill. Mossbrucker acknowledges that many of contemporary ballet’s defining artists hail from Europe rather than the United States. “The Kylián and the [William] Forsythe years in Europe spawned a lot of creativity,” he explained. “Here in the States, you don’t have a lot of time to create; you have one day on the stage, and then it’s over. In Europe in the ’80s and ’90s, they really invested time and money in the creative process.”

[dirac]

A story on the Australian Ballet's new production center.

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Artistic director David McAllister described the $12 million production centre at Altona as the "world's biggest dress-up box''.

Among the goodies inside will be 29,000 costumes, the sets of 90 productions and 132 containers of props including a pumpkin carriage, radio-controlled rats and fake bodies.

[dirac]

David Hallberg is interviewed by Deborah Jones in The Australian.

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The connection with the AB was made because Hallberg's manager has a good relationship with AB chief executive Valerie Wilder. The ballet circle tends to be quite small, and Hallberg's manager also managed former ABT star Ethan Stiefel (now artistic director at Royal New Zealand Ballet). Stiefel had been a guest artist with the AB for Don Quixote in 2007. "Valerie just mentioned me over dinner," says Hallberg, and the deal was done.

His experience in Melbourne was "very different from (that with) other companies . . . The company is so unique, so unified and humble in the most beneficial sense -- sometimes humility can get in the way of individuality. They are so supportive of each other," he says, which is why he wanted to fit the 50th anniversary gala into his schedule: "There's always time when you make time."

[dirac]

The Mariinskyreturns to Southern California next month.

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"The audience in Costa Mesa is very warm and very understanding of the art," Interim Ballet Director Yuri Fateev said in a phone interview.

[dirac]

The Vienna Festival Ballettours with "Coppelia."

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It is the latest show which the Vienna Festival Ballet has brought to Folkestone following the likes of Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, The Nutcracker and Swan Lake.

[dirac]

A feature on the daily pressures faced by ballet dancers by Matthew Cain for Channel 4.

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But what about the need to create work of artistic excellence? Surely if dancers were required to attend fewer rehearsals or were excused from daily class, the work would suffer?

“Yes, you’re right to a degree,” Kevin O’Hare told me. “But I think actually when we’re rehearsing a dancer for a leading role, sometimes the dancer really might want to rehearse every single day, and it’s up to us to say no actually. It would be better for you to do it three times a week and really rehearse properly for those three times, and then you’ll be ready for the performance but you won’t be burnt out...."