ABT Studion & RBS Joint Performance 4/21-22, 15

[mussel]

https://web.tututix.com/client/abtcompany/

[bingham]

https://web.tututix.com/client/abtcompany/

Anyone knows who are the dancers in the picture? Thanks.

[Dale]

Official release:

ABT STUDIO COMPANY AND THE ROYAL BALLET SCHOOL TO PERFORM AT THE AILEY CITIGROUP THEATER, APRIL 21 AND 22, 2015

ABT Studio Company and the graduate students of The Royal Ballet School (RBS) will perform a shared bill at The Ailey Citigroup Theater on Tuesday, April 21, and Wednesday, April 22, 2015 at 7:00 P.M. Performances by ABT Studio Company will include the New York City premiere of Susan Jaffe’s Metallurgy and excerpts from Marius Petipa’s Le Corsaire and Merce Cunningham’s Duets. The RBS repertory will feature Derek Dean’s Chanson, Liam Scarlett’s Classical Symphony and the First Movement of Christopher Wheeldon’s Rush.

The shared performances are part of a unique exchange, which began in 2003, between ABT Studio Company and The Royal Ballet School. During past exchanges the companies have traveled to each other’s respective homes for performances, master classes and training sessions with senior coaching staff.

Limited tickets, priced at $20, are available for purchase online through Thursday, April 16. To purchase tickets, please visit the following, http://web.tututix.com/ABTCompany or call 855-222-2TIX.

The Ailey Citigroup Theater is located at 405 W 55^th Street at 9^th Avenue in

New York City.

(

For more information on ABT Studio Company and performances with The Royal Ballet School, please visit ABT’s website, www.abt.org.

[bingham]

Official release:

ABT STUDIO COMPANY AND THE ROYAL BALLET SCHOOL TO PERFORM AT THE AILEY CITIGROUP THEATER, APRIL 21 AND 22, 2015

ABT Studio Company and the graduate students of The Royal Ballet School (RBS) will perform a shared bill at The Ailey Citigroup Theater on Tuesday, April 21, and Wednesday, April 22, 2015 at 7:00 P.M. Performances by ABT Studio Company will include the New York City premiere of Susan Jaffe’s Metallurgy and excerpts from Marius Petipa’s Le Corsaire and Merce Cunningham’s Duets. The RBS repertory will feature Derek Dean’s Chanson, Liam Scarlett’s Classical Symphony and the First Movement of Christopher Wheeldon’s Rush.

The shared performances are part of a unique exchange, which began in 2003, between ABT Studio Company and The Royal Ballet School. During past exchanges the companies have traveled to each other’s respective homes for performances, master classes and training sessions with senior coaching staff.

Limited tickets, priced at $20, are available for purchase online through Thursday, April 16. To purchase tickets, please visit the following, http://web.tututix.com/ABTCompany or call 855-222-2TIX.

The Ailey Citigroup Theater is located at 405 W 55^th Street at 9^th Avenue in

New York City.

(

For more information on ABT Studio Company and performances with The Royal Ballet School, please visit ABT’s website, www.abt.org.

Anyone went to see them.Please report. Thanks.

[Amour]

I just came back from the Wednesday night performance.

The RBS kids were beautiful. Just gorgeous! In the first piece ("Rush" by Wheeldon) you could see just how great these kids are. They are all about the same height and body type: tall, slim (some girls a little too much so) with long arms and legs. They danced very much together so you could see they had the same training. Clean footwork, nice epaulement (but RAD not Vaganova) and very polished. Very musical. In Rush I especially liked one of the female leads (Chisato Katsura) and an Asian boy in the corps. I also like Chisato in a rather difficult (but too short) PDD entitled Chanson by Derek Dean. The flexibity of her back and the relative with which her partner Gareth Haw entwined her around him (shades of Grgorovich) was fantastic. But every one of these dancers had great stage presence and was interesting to watch. They also all did a terrific job in the tutu ballet Classical Symphony (this version choreographed by Liam Scarlett), especially the leads both nights, Leticia Dias Domingues and Harry Churches. Each one of these dancers is ready for a professional career right now. Bravo!

Unfortunately, the opposite was true, IMO, of ABT's Studio Company. A mishmash of different heights and body types. Compared to the RBS, they looked kind of stubby. None of them really look like they received one type of training. Their upper bodies and arms all need a lot of work. I failed to see one clean fifth position (they all looked like third). And for me, with the exception of Aran Bell (of First Position fame), none of them was interesting to watch. They all kind of looked like dancers you might see in an intermediate class at Steps. I think it was a bad choice to have these kids perform an excerpt from a classical ballet like Le Corsaire. Aran, who is now tall, long legged and handsome did fine as Conrad but I had expected his dancing to be more exciting. Ali (Tyler Maloney) was able to execute all the jumps but, again, the upper body and arms seemed a bit wrong. And he was simply not at all exciting to watch. Medora (Breanne Granlund, whose mother we sat next to) is a sweet short blond but again fairly uninteresting to watch. She did all her fouettes but they travelled all the way downstage. The last piece they performed was Lidberg's Untitled (seen a few days ago at David Hallberg's Legacy gala and which replaced Cunningham's Duets, seen Tuesday). They look more rehearsed and better in this. Then again, the contemporary choreography and costumes can hide a multitude of sins.

Judging from last year's SAB Workshop, YT's of the Vaganova, tonight's RBS kids, and I'm sure the POB school, the JKO school needs to up its game and fast.The contrast tonight between the RBS kids and the Studio Company was really quite significant. If this is where Kevin is getting his dancers (and according to Alastair Macauley, at least two are already ABT apprentices:(http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/23/arts/dance/review-british-and-american-ballets-showcase-youthful-blend-of-style-and-skill.html?ref=dance), no wonder ABT (again IMO) looks so stale.

Just wanted to add that a lot of ABT's glitterati attended tonight. My husband and I sat behind Irina Dvorovenko, her husband Max, their daughter and her parents. A few seats down were Julie Kent, Gillian Murphy and Ethan Stiefel. In front of them were David Hallberg and Susan Jaffe (whose piece Metallurgy was performed by the Studio Company). With all that talent hopefully helping them, one hopes the Studio Company will improve.