Darry

From a purely outsiders perspective, this seems to be about the standard the National Ballet wants to set. Using some of the Ballet companies I am familiar with - Royal Ballet, POB, ABT for example - it's difficult to imagine a Swan Lake with the quality of dancers that the National Ballet cast in the performance I saw in June. Perhaps that is unfair because the National Ballet does not have the resources to be compared to those companies period. The puzzling part for me is that the truly world-class dancers are under utilized. Again, perhaps there are reasons for that.

I'm looking forward to it. First time I'll get a glimpse of Roland Petit's Carmen.

Most of the board members know a lot more about Ballet than I do! I hesitated in my initial posting .... particularly because I can only imagine the amount of effort and dedication required by any dancer to get to that level. So it wasn't a critique of a specific dancer but just an observation that the National Ballet can opt to cast a regular performance without any senior dancers. I almost never know casting when I purchase tickets and I never felt it was an issue until now. Also, if I didn't see the National Ballet - I'd see no Ballet at all. Anyways, enjoying many of the observations here!

I'm in awe of the knowledge of the members of this board! It surprises me that members come from the US specifically for a National Ballet performance. I have to say this situation seems very Canadian. We're socialized to accept what we get without complaint.

I saw Swan Lake in June with Hannah Fischer. While I'm sure she has great potential, if given the choice I would have liked to have seen a performance with principal dancers in the lead roles. Also, it wasn't clear to me why all of the lead roles were cast with second soloists. Perhaps if the casting was set before ticket purchase.....it would have seemed more fair. Since then I have been trying to strategize on what nights to pick tickets for the 2017-2018 Season to increase my odds of having principal dancers cast in lead roles. At the cost of sounding whiny - it dampens my enthusiasm to attend.