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[dirac]

More obituaries for Yvonne Mounsey.

Associated Press

In 1966, Mounsey moved to Los Angeles and opened the Westside School of Ballet, teaching the neoclassical Balanchine technique, which has become a signature style of ballet in America. The Santa Monica school became influential and its students have included former City Ballet star Jock Soto and current company principal dancers Andrew Veyette and Tiler Peck. The school also counts Joy Womack, the first American woman to dance with the Bolshoi Ballet, among the world-class dancers it has trained.

Los Angeles Times

The South African-born Mounsey took over Academy West on Westwood Boulevard in 1967 with her close friend and former Royal Ballet soloist, the late Rosemary Valaire; the name was later changed to Westside School of Ballet and they moved to Santa Monica. Mounsey was one of the first alumni of New York City Ballet to establish roots in Southern California, teaching in the neo-classical style of choreographer George Balanchine.

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Reviews of the Mariinsky Ballet and Orchestra in "Swan Lake."

The Orange County Register

All the complaints usually leveled at Russian companies apply here.
The sets, by the current standards of touring ballet, are strictly Old School: simple painted backdrops, for the most part, although there was a handsome and fairly detailed rendering of a palace ballroom in the third act. If you think creative scenic design is impractical for touring ballet, Google Ballet de Monte Carlo's wondrous sets for "Cinderella," which played the Segerstrom Center in February.

The Los Angeles Times

It's clear why Skorik is being groomed for greater heights, but whether she has the strength and confidence to pull herself to the pinnacle is another matter. She drifted precipitously during the signature fouettée (whipped) turns and had to start again. Mistakes happen, but, as the British say, keep calm and carry on. Skorik, on the hand, was rattled and concluded the ballet in a bleaker humor.

[dirac]

A review of Fall for Dance by Alastair Macaulay in The New York Times.

And the final “Suite of Moldavian Dances” shows the thrilling attack of these dancers’ booted feet as they chase across the stage. Hungrily they tear across space, and yet each step onto the ball of the foot has piercing acuity. Formations keep changing: the eye is constantly engaged by geometry as well as by energy. Though the music was taped, alas, the Moiseyev dancers performed as if not only responding to music but also making it.

Ballet West’s “Grand Pas From Paquita” suffered from taped music (Minkus’s music gains greatly from the interplay of a conductor with dancers he knows) and City Center’s acoustics (which seemed to add a couple of strange groans). The staging of Marius Petipa’s choreography is by Elena Kunikova, who has animated the all-female corps de ballet with verve and charm; I have seen more illustrious troupes dance this with less color.

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A review in brief of the Birmingham Royal Ballet in "Swan Lake."

The skill and agility of principal dancers Nao Sakuma (Odette/Odile) and Chi Chao (Prince Sigfried) was enchanting as they devotedly danced away the evil spell of evil magician Baron von Rothbart, performed by Jonathan Payn.

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Society pages item on Houston Ballet's Ballet Ball.

Tony's staff swirled through the art-filled home assuring that tasty food and drink were plentiful for the heavy-hitter crowd that included a number of ballet company members and artistic director Stanton Welch.

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A preview of Smuin Ballet by Silke Tudor for SF Weekly, with video.

Returning from sold-out shows and rave reviews in New York, Smuin Ballet brings the inventive, much-lauded, and uncomfortably resonant Oh, Inverted World back home. In this deft collaboration between choreographer Trey McIntyre and indie-pop darlings The Shins, the Smuin dancers conjure the flutter and flurry of youthful friendship, the physical power and influence of peers, and the glory of cresting adulthood, amid the quiet, lonely internal struggle for differentiation and self-discovery. Michael Smuin, who often choreographed for Broadway and film, would have been proud.

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An interview with ballet mistress and choreographer Betsy Erickson by Allan Ulrich in The San Francisco Chronicle.

San Francisco Ballet Artistic Director Helgi Tomasson assigns the balletmasters to various dance makers. "But, generally, if you've worked with a choreographer before and you develop a relationship, you stay with them," said Erickson. "I had worked with Alexei Ratmansky when he made 'Le Carnaval des animaux' here, so I am assisting him in his new work. Mark Morris is a choreographer whom I've worked with for years. He never ceases to amaze me."

Erickson's grandest project this year is working with Christopher Wheeldon on his new "Cinderella."