valentina11

No Cuthbertson tonight - Pennefather is injured?

Skorik is promoted to 2nd soloist also.

Smirnova looks more Bolshoi than Mariinsky! I find it strange that Shapran went to dance corps in this company... but there you are!

I wish she would guest with ABT. I would suppose her schedule at the RB hardly leave time for it...she dances almost every productions because she does much on the triple bills also which some dancers doesn't. She's beautiful in Glen Tetley's choreography I think. RE: Cojocaru, I saw her only one time since her return of injury, it was my impression that technically she lost a bit but the artist remains!

As I know it, she didn't do a lot in classical solos. She did "summer" in Cinderella, the huntresses in Sylvia, she might did Moyna or Zulme in Giselle. This season only she danced Florestan pd3 and Bluebird pdd, as well as the 2nd fairy variation and maybe 1st? And apparently her Arabian in Nutcracker is very good.

I agree it's maybe a pity they chose this cast for the cinema show. Lauren Cuthbertson in my opinion, she's good on the 20th century classics (like Manon or Juliet) but not so much in Petipa... She seems stressed in her technique and then quite withdrawn from the character because of it. For whatever reasons that Alina Cojocaru didn't dance it this season, it wouldn't make a lot of sense to have another recorded performance of her on the same role! Plus it's good to see Polunin who is so impressive (although as a partner he still learns... maybe Cuthbertson needed someone stronger in partnering like Kish or even Pennefather..) But I agree, why to choose a dancer who is NOT at her best in 19th c work? Record her in R&J, yes it would do justice to the work and to her also. But not in Beauty!! Hikaru Kobayashi, 1st soloist, was a beautiful Aurora this run (Akane Takada should have had her debut but sadly did not because of the injury). Sarah Lamb was nice so I heard, Rojo is probably amazing in this role as most others, Nunez apparently had some lovely performance. I'm not such a Nunez fan as many (in London it seems like she can do no wrong) and I found her Aurora too flashy but she is a technical genius and has a lot of personality on the stage, also she can do adagio with the proper emphasis and understand English style. Or Rojo with her amazing Rose Adagio! Why not to record one of these two to share with the world? Nunez especially is as much a Royal dancer as Cuthbertson, she did after all spent her whole adult career in this company and she hardly guests much. I agree on Akane Takada, apparently her SPF a few nights ago has been gorgeous. Melissa Hamilton also did it. I don't find her so great in classical roles, but in contemporary she is surely great and I think as Juliet she will do good things..

New names are on the list of the Mariinsky corps de ballet - they include from the Vaganova graduates Irina Tolchilshchikova, Ekaterina Bondarenko, Yulia Kabatova, Elizaveta Kaukina. Galina Rusina and Tatiana Goryushkina new on the reserve list. We knew already that Olga Smirnova goes to Bolchoi but: Kristina Shapran is also not in the Mariinsky, as far as this list says anyway. Neither, for this matter, is Alexandra Somova. I don't see new names from the men, but I could have just made an oversight.