Lolly Posted January 21, 2003 Share Posted January 21, 2003 Golly, there are dancers popping up out of nowhere! - I just checked the list and Cindy Jourdain is down as an Artist, Christina Salerno is a First Artist and now Anton Pankevitch! He danced in Nut but I had assumed he was here just for that. I don't know when the others joined but I presume it is very recently. Link to comment
Mel Johnson Posted January 22, 2003 Share Posted January 22, 2003 Isn't he from Kiev? Although with that name, he could ethnically be Great Rus. It's like Veronika Part; she's from St. Petersburg, but I wonder if she's ethnically Estonian. Link to comment
sylvia Posted January 22, 2003 Share Posted January 22, 2003 Yep, Ivan was born in Kiev. There's also Maria Kotchetkova who I'm pretty sure is a Russian apprentice with the company. Link to comment
Tracey Posted January 22, 2003 Share Posted January 22, 2003 The Ukraine was only independent from Russia in 1991 - it may be that Ivan still considers himself Russian, rather than Ukrainian. I guess it would depend where his personal loyalties lie - it can get complicated :confused: !! Tracey Link to comment
fendrock Posted January 22, 2003 Share Posted January 22, 2003 Sylvia mentions Madonna as someone who goes to the ballet -- she was a dancer prior to becoming a pop star, as she was a dance major at the University of Michigan. I knew some of her classmates, who danced for May O'Donnell. Link to comment
BW Posted January 28, 2003 Share Posted January 28, 2003 Robert Greskovic has a wonderful way of explaining the "two faces" of ballet, which I think relates quite a bit to this discussion and this article. It's found in the beginning of his introduction to Ballet 101, on page xiii, where he writes: "Ballet, the world seems to say, has two faces. One is the frighteningly unfamiliar, leading people to insist, "I don't understand it." The other appears quite ordinary and perfectly understandable, inspiring news reporters to describe, for example, the successful docking of one space vehicle with another as "space ballet," confident that the reader will find the usage perfectly clear. If pressed, the person capable of having both the above reactions will say that in the first instance they're talking about the formal activity and behavior on a stage. Meanwhile, in the latter example, the word stand for any sophisticated activity smoothly accomplished that looks effortless. So it's not ballet that people fail to understand, it's Ballet, with a capital B." Mr. Greskovic goes on to point out that if you can understand the "ballets of space modules in orbit, or dolphins...you do understand the essence of ballet, even with its big B and its individuals on stage doing things with their limbs and especially their feet that look quite unlike what you do with your own appendages. The common denominator of this double-edged vision is perfection of participant and of execution." As much as I'd love to keep on typing his words, I'm sure that wouldn't be acceptable...but they are well worth reading and rereading - it's a great book. However, the reason I brought it up was mostly due to this last line about "perfection"...since that is what the journalist Mr. Ferguson quotes his father's description of ballet and then, his own descriptions of why he does fall under its spell, as well. So back to the question of perfection. Is it attainable? Does it really matter if it is or is not? Just a thought. Link to comment
BilboBaggins Posted February 1, 2003 Share Posted February 1, 2003 I'm not sure what I find more fascinating ... the article or the Ballet Alert comments on it!! First, (it's funny: me, a transplanted American, having to explain this ...), "Posh and Becks" are indeed Victoria (the former Posh Spice) and David Beckham (UK soccer star extraordinaire and captain of the UK Team). They are the best known couple in the UK (except, PERHAPS, for HRM The Queen and Prince Phillip) ... their comings and going are documented by papparazzi, their TV ad for potato chips (aka "crisps") show them as royalty and no doubt sold billions of bags of chips. If they go to the ballet ... then it MUST be the right thing for ordinary but "with it" people to do ... and the public will follow. Analogy: if Britney Spears (and whoever she's dating this hour) or Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston showed up at Lincoln Center ... the NYCB would be sold out for the next 2 months ... Heaven knows, if any of them bought something affordable, the implied endorsement would bring on a buying binge of epic proportions. Having spent years going to the NYCB before coming to London, I have to say the prices are about equivalent (and both are lower than the Met or ROH prices), the London crowd is better dressed than the NYCB crowd generally (Saturday nights are the exception, but at matinees, NYCB dress can be sweater and slacks, sports coat as well as more formal attire) and, most pleasingly to me, the London crowd has more children generally present -- ballet seems to be more of a family event here than in NYC. My sense of food and drink at the interval is that it's no more expensive than in NYC or in the theatres at Leicester Square, although the theatres seem to have service better organized. Given the superb restaurants in Chinatown just a short distance from Covent Garden and the other restaurants nearby, I'd restrict interval refreshment to the liquid variety anyway. Now, to the heart of the matter ... perfection? I'm not sure I agree. Technically, I don't know enough to be able to detect perfection from "almost perfect" when discussing NYCB or RBC calibre dancers, but I know when I've been moved by a performance and when I've been left cold ... and the author was moved ... and that's may be his ultimate definition of "perfect". Dancers are "naked" when performing ... their expressions, their muscles, their motions are completely visible ... there's nowhere to hide. We see their full efforts and can even detect the practiced fluidity which allows great dancers to hide the effort -- but then we "see it" by its absence. What brings me back time and time again, and what I think will bring the author back, is that in viewing, we vicariously move to the stage and become that movement, that poetry ... we are simultaneously in the audience and on the stage ... and NYCB and RBC have mastered the art of encompassing us in their motion. I can't dance to save my life in reality... but I can become part of what I see regularly at Covent Garden ... and share in the art and joy of dance ... and that can be understood by anyone who appreciates music and coordination of motion, even a "footballer" and his mate, and not just "older, balding snobs and their shoulder sagging spouses" ... BB Link to comment
BW Posted February 8, 2003 Share Posted February 8, 2003 Thank you BB. I especially enjoyed your comments at the end when you wrapped it up by saying: I can't dance to save my life in reality... but I can become part of what I see regularly at Covent Garden ... and share in the art and joy of dance ... and that can be understood by anyone who appreciates music and coordination of motion, even a "footballer" and his mate, and not just "older, balding snobs and their shoulder sagging spouses" ... Link to comment
Tracey Posted February 8, 2003 Share Posted February 8, 2003 Originally posted by BilboBaggins "Posh and Becks" are indeed Victoria (the former Posh Spice) and David Beckham (UK soccer star extraordinaire and captain of the UK Team). BB Being English as well as British, can I just be pedantic!! He's the England team captain, not UK team - we don't have a British football team only seperate England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland teams, hence no participation in Olympic or Commonwealth soccer competitions! OK - back to subject ....... Link to comment
BilboBaggins Posted February 8, 2003 Share Posted February 8, 2003 Thanks, Tracey ... I have a lot to learn ... and not just about Ballet!! BB Link to comment
beckster Posted February 12, 2003 Share Posted February 12, 2003 Oh yes, it is very important to get the distinctions between Britain, UK, and its constituent countries. Take note, visitors to the UK. Particularly important is the fact that Scotland is not in England, being a separate country. And was it Eminem who thought that England was in London?! I thought that was a great article, btw. I didn't find the comments about the audience members to be either unfair or insulting. You really do get a very mixed bag at the ROH, and that is the way it should be! It ranges from the students at the back of the amphi, in jeans and trainers, to the people downstairs in posh frocks. Incidentally, to get a good view you don't have to pay £40. I've had good seats for £25 and less. Link to comment
BW Posted February 13, 2003 Share Posted February 13, 2003 Thanks so much, Tracey, Beckster and, yes, Bilbo with your American abroad's perspective, for all of your input on this article. I'm happy to hear that you feel the author's description of the audience was accurate and not insulting. Sometimes, I think that we Americans have a tendency to take things, such as ourselves, much too seriously, whereas the British have such a wonderful self deprecating sense of the absurd. I will add that in the NYC ballet scene one does see quite a variety of fashion statements, as well. One article like this (and even that article by our American humorist Dave Barry that there was another thread on) is, in my opinion, helpful to the cause - but it's really the follow-up article to this one that I'd like to read! I want to know that this first taste of ballet - of "perfection" - was so seductive that he just had to go back for more. Please do let us know if the author takes another trip to the ballet and writes about it! Link to comment
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