9 replies to this topic

[dirac]

A profile of Carla Körbes by Gia Kourlas in The New York Times.

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“In the end it was for an artistic desire to keep growing,” she said. “I felt that I hit a wall with where I was working, which happened to be the New York City Ballet.”

Ms. Körbes, whose career in New York was also marred by injury and illness, found herself dancing parts suited for taller ballerinas like Darci Kistler and Maria Kowroski. “Not that that’s a bad thing,” she said. “To fill in for Darci Kistler was intimidating and glorious all at the same time, right? But then at some point I felt like I was struggling to even develop my jumping abilities. When I left City Ballet, I really felt maybe I can’t jump anymore.”

[dirac]

Sergei Filin is interviewed by Anna Nemtsova for Newsweek.

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Despite the harassment, the threats, and the acid attack, Filin is undaunted. When doctors removed the white gauze bandages from his face after his most recent surgery, he didn’t care to look at himself and didn’t even think to ask for a mirror, he said. “All I really felt concerned about was how many lines I could see on the eye chart,” he said. “The attackers were eager to stop me from watching every ballet from my director’s seat, from marveling at the beauty of my dancers on stage.”

[dirac]

Sacramento Ballet presents "The Great Gatsby."

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The Sacramento Ballet roars into the second half of its season with co-artistic director Ron Cunningham's world premiere of the classic period novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald.

The show – Cunningham's first new ballet in five years – opens Thursday and runs through next Sunday at the Community Center Theater.

[dirac]

Svetlana Lunkina has more to say on her decision to remain in Canada.

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This week, the 33-year-old dancer announced she was leaving the world-famous Moscow-based company for Canada where she has lived off and on for the past 10 years, saying she is the victim of threats and blackmail in the form of defamatory letters sent to international ballet companies, including the National Ballet of Canada, that allege she is an accomplice in a crime.

Related.

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Russian prima ballerina Svetlana Lunkina is set to speak publicly in Toronto Friday to shed some light on her apparent relocation to Canada amid threats she received at home in Moscow.

[dirac]

More on the Bolshoi's postponement of its new "The Rite of Spring."

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In a news release Barry Rebo, a managing partner at Emerging Pictures, said, “We very much regret this unavoidable cancellation.” But it remains unclear why Mr. Filin’s incapacity makes this particular production impossible. The Bolshoi, which has about 220 dancers and a technical and administrative team of around 3,500, has soldiered on stoically through the crisis, continuing to rehearse and perform as planned. It is unlikely that Mr. Filin would have been directly involved in the creative process of Mr. McGregor’s “Rite,” and the Bolshoi has many ballet masters who assist visiting choreographers in teaching and rehearsing works.

[dirac]

A story on the Filin affair by Natalya Krainova in The Moscow Times.

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Boris Akimov, a ballet repetiteur at the theater and one of Filin's former teachers, said he believes the attack on Filin was motivated by the "fight for power and posts."

Akimov, who himself worked as director of the Bolshoi Ballet from 2000 to 2003, said people who occupied the post were often attacked in some way. Within a month of his appointment, Akimov said, he saw a false media report saying he had been fired, part of what he described as a smear campaign.

[dirac]

More  on the Bolshoi and the attack on Filin.

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In multiple interviews this week, members of the Bolshoi’s troupe and staff shared their theories about the attack — money, ambition, artistic rivalry, a love affair gone awry. In a sign of how poisonous and conspiratorial the atmosphere has become, some have even asked whether Filin, who suffered third-degree burns to his face and neck, staged the attack himself, an accusation to be aired this weekend on one of Russia’s main TV channels.

“It is an absurdity, such an insane idea. But I understand where it is coming from,” Anastasia Meskova, a Bolshoi ballerina, said of the latest conspiracy. “Because truly, you throw up your hands, you just can’t explain it. You think, maybe this? But of course not! Maybe that? Of course not!”

[dirac]

The Birmingham Royal Ballet Sinfonia gives a concert performance.

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We rode with Wagner’s Valkyries in a full-on atmospheric opener. Gems then interspersed the concert–style presentations with a fascinating mix from Birmingham Royal Ballet dancers, doubtless delighting the musicians who rarely can be aware of what is happening on stage as they give of their all in the orchestra pit. It was a delight to see the six young dancers from Elmhurst School for Dance in a comic vignette based on Morris dancing including nippy dancing flea.

[dirac]

A review of the Joffrey Ballet  by Leigh Witchel for danceviewtimes.

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“Rite” isn't “Faun” but it does have a similar pictorial inspiration. From the turned-in posture of the Chosen Maiden to her exhausting sacrificial dance, with tight jumps under herself and circling arms, the expression lives in the body. Erica Lynette Edwards acted her way through the solo. She was frightened, she tried to escape, she pleaded for mercy; her Chosen One became a female counterpart to Albrecht in “Giselle.” For an 21st century audience that was probably unfamiliar with the ballet and the myths behind it, that connected the dots and made it comprehensible. But it felt a giant step away from Nijinsky's intentions.

[dirac]

A review of New York City Ballet by Brian Seibert in The New York Times.

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The 15-member corps is still very much involved, and there’s Tiler Peck as a catalyst, the friskiest girl on the beach. These days there are few more exciting ways to begin a dance at City Ballet than to set Ms. Peck in motion. Mr. Peck (they are not related) capitalizes on her unequaled musicality, turning her every which way to the music’s quick and tricky syncopations. But even better is Ms. Peck in complex relation to an ensemble embodying the designs of Mr. Peck’s fertile imagination.