Helene

To clarify, I mean Balanchine's original choreography, not the Petipa, which I assume was what, or closer to what, Danilova was dancing. The style had changed radically since Danilova's, and Hayden's is much closer to the way it's danced today than Hayden's was to Danilova's.

Not recent news, but a few weeks ago, Kurt Frohman posted the first part of the Sugar Plum Fairy variation to his Instagram account. In it Melissa Hayden performs the original choreography, with turning rondes de jambes on the quarter. It replaced the turns coming forward up the center. NYCB revived it for at least the one performance I saw it, and I went back to see if I had notated anywhere what performance that was. I keep envisioning Kyra Nichols doing it, but I'm not certain, because I didn't asterisk it or write down a note. But what I did find was that in 2001, I saw Ryan Cardea as Nephew.

Casting is up for the final post-Christmas performances; https://www.pnb.org/nutcracker/ Here's the link to the downloadable Excel sheet: 2023 12 23 Nutcracker.xlsx I can't stop watching the digital performance. Iliesiu is a magnificent Sugar Plum Fairy, and there was great dancing throughout. There were also wonderful character performances. I loved that Ginabel Peterson's Mother was more annoyed with Fritz than the Father. Larry Lancaster and a PNB student Clara Kang-Crosby were lovely as the Grandparents, charming without overacting. A highlight for me was Luther DeMyer's Mother Ginger, very elegant and demure, and so different than any other Mother Ginger I've seen over 50 years.

Regardless of whether Employee of the Month criteria are objective, there is a formal structure around the awards. They're aren't spontaneous, and they aren't announced in a personal way, here from a personal, not an institutional social media account. For the most part, ballet company management makes its public statements and/or gestures by giving promotions and celebrating major anniversaries for principal dancers, retirements. and milesones They can make formal statements at the time, or if they're prompted by journalists, which often happens with features. Whelan almost doesn't cross a line by marking the milestone and giving a Brava, which is like a combination of "Congratulations" and "It's about time." I think she does with the complement in the sandwich, but I don't think I'd get worked up about it if it happened here. The NYCB account marked the historic first in a way that we'd expect: https://www.instagram.com/p/C04ucv7soLc/ Generally speaking, management usually toes the line, and it's the choreographers and class teachers who give it away more vocally. Class teachers are either paying attention to, by giving corrections or asking dancers to come up front to demonstrate, or they aren't; our interpretations may or may not be accurate. A lot of choreographers don't hold back, though: at the panel discussion/demo before a Forsythe program at PNB, Forsythe (half-?) jokingly asked Jahna Franziskonis if she wanted to come to Frankfurt. Jacques d'Amboise lit up like a Christmas tree watching/coaching Lesley Rausch in "Diamonds." All of the attention and body language, in addition to speech, often lets the watcher know how the person in the front of the room feels.

I thought the second act was fantastic across-the-board: acting, mime, choreography, and story-telling. I didn't understand the point or trajectory of most of the third act variations, but part of it was the frustrating editing choices. The Prayer variation, choreography and costume, seemed like it was dropped in from another ballet. It might have had a chance if it were done for a dancer like Dowell in a different costume. I loved the pirate variation, and I wish that I could see PNB's Kuu Saguraki in it, but we have the Balanchine co-production with San Francisco Ballet here, and it's the season's last rep in May-June. I loved Jerome Kaplan's costumes (aside from Prayer). Watching them, I remembered the PNB/SFB costumer designer Roberta Guidi di Bagno describing that she was warned that the budget was a lot smaller than she'd have in Europe, and, as Tim Gunn would say, she made it work. They're quite beautiful and PNB could never have afforded the costumes at La Scala, but it would have been nice to see what she would have been able to do with a bigger budget. I was able to bring it up just now, which is a few hours after it ended, but there's still nothing on the medici.tv site I see that says anything about how long it will be up. It's definitely worth seeing. .

I remember Myrna Kamara, too. I didn't see Debra Austin at NYCB, but with Pennsylvania Ballet when they came to BAM.

Casting is up for the last week of performances, which begins on Tuesday, December 18 and ends with the matinee on Sunday, December 24: https://www.pnb.org/nutcracker/ Here's the link to the downloadable Excel file: 2023 12 14 Nutcracker.xlsx

Thank you, @cobweb!

Are the partial-view seats the ones in the Fifth Ring -- if they're still calling it that -- the top-most section on the sides?

If they played it during the summer, they could market "Christmas in July*" to tourists who weren't in NYC in December, and to *crafters, because July 1 (Canada) and July 4 (US) starts the deluge of "If you don't start knitting/crocheting/crafting your holiday gifts now, you are going to be one stressed out puddle with aching hands by the beginning of December." They could get snow cone vendors for the lobby, summer program kids if there are roles for them in Ratmansky's version, and they could sell any leftover ornaments and other Nutcracker souvenirs from the year before. It could become a new tradition.

It's not usual for companies to go out of Christmas season, but pre-pandemic at least, and not counting seasons that started around US Thanksgiving and trickled over into New Year's week or galas, Paris Opera Ballet performed the original double-bill -- Nutcracker and Iolanthe -- in late Spring, and, as stand-alones, Northern Ballet started the season early, by 10 November, New Zealand Ballet started their run in October, Zurich Ballet performed it in February and March and at the end of October (different years), Royal Ballet stretched it to mid-January, Australian Ballet performed it in September, ABT brought it to Hollywood in September on tour, and the Mariinsky performed it in April and May as well as mid-late November, just one or two performances amidst their rep. I was always surprised to find these.

Casting is up for the third and fourth weekend (scroll): https://www.pnb.org/nutcracker/ Link to downloadable Excel file: 2023 12 05 Nutcracker.xlsx

Rollofson grew up here -- across the Lake -- and went to the PNB school. I first noticed him when he was a tween or teen, and he danced Chinese Tiger in the Stowell/Sendak Nutcracker. He left PNB and danced on Broadway before returning to ballet. In 2017 he joined BalletMet, but I'm not sure if that was straight from Broadway.

Sean Rollofson! He used to dance with Pacific Northwest Ballet and was a terrific dancer.

And it’s not like Nutcracker isn’t performed in other seasons in other countries.

There are four companies represented: Dance Theatre of Harlem, Pacific Northwest Ballet, Miami City Ballet, and American Ballet Theatre. The first three don't mostly dance Petipa -- their founders danced for Balanchine -- and, from what I've been reading, Gillian Murphy hasn't been dancing much of it lately, and, with Aran Bell, will be dancing a Robbins work choreographed for ABT.

And dad to NYCB’s Shelby Mann: https://www.nycballet.com/discover/meet-our-dancers/corps-de-ballet/shelby-mann/ She danced in this discussion between Wendy Whelan, Jacques d’Amboise, and Christopher d’Amboise from 2015:

Thank you for the link, FPF. I didn’t know that Ashton Edward’s was performing. For the 1993 Balanchine Celebration, Martins invited Elizabeth Loscavio from San Francisco Ballet (Who Cares?) and Patricia Barker (Apollo) from Pacific Northwest Ballet from the US Children of Balanchine companies. My apologies if I’ve forgotten someone. Edited to add: Ronald Perry from Dance Theatre of Harlem (Who cares?) and Jeremy Collins of ABT — I’d forgotten the men! That was a four-part celebration, with lunch and dinner and desert in between, and I don’t think that kind of marathon has been repeated, hence distributed guesting this season. Also, PNB’s Noelani Pantastico and Lucien Postlewaite guested with NYCB in one movement of a Balanchine ballet, maybe Brahms Schoenberg? Since it was before Pantastico left to dance with Maillot, that might have been a 50th or 55th Anniversary guest performance. (I think she was in Monte Carlo for the 60th). Surely there have been other examples over the years of planned invitations, aside from Royal Danish Ballet, Mariinsky Ballet, and Paris Opera Ballet dancers.

Ashton Edwards will guest with NYCB in Justin Peck’s The Times Are Racing on January 27 (8pm) and January 28 (3pm) to celebrate NYCB’s 75th Anniversary season, representing PNB. Dancers from other companies with NYCB connections who will participate are Alexandra Hutchinson from Dance Theatre of Harlem (Dewdrop), ABT’s Gillian Murphy and Aran Bell (Other Dances), and Miami City Ballet’s Taylor Naturkas and Brooks Landegger (Midsummer Night’s Dream Act II Divertissement). Also, Terrence Mann will be in Carnival of the Animals. https://www.broadwayworld.com/article/Terrence-Mann-More-to-Join-New-York-City-Ballets-75th-Anniversary-Performances-20231128

Casting is up for the first two weekends; my apologies for just putting two-and-two together now that it opened this past Friday: https://www.pnb.org/nutcracker/ Link to downloadable Excel sheet: 2023 11 26 Nutcracker.xlsx This year's "Opening Night" was actually "Opening Matinee."

She has a link in the Instagram bio to her upcoming schedule, which lists three performances: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ljmlTBTrbSTgbMl2zZwLwucKfEER95OtLsjiQ3P714s/edit?pli=1 which would be a good thing to track as the season goes on. As @matilda posted, the schedules for the rest of the season aren't out yet. Some dancers don't post anything until the official dates are up. However, sometimes dancers do know what they are rehearsing and will be cast in at some point, even if they don't know the dates, and have posted photos and hints/details to their social media. Also, in some companies -- confirmed through Q&A's -- dancers discuss offers they've had to guest at other companies and seek/get permission pretty far in advance, because they need to be able to sign contracts, or not. Often there are articles in local newspapers, which are posted in our Links forum, that announce the guests before those dates appear on the official home company cast lists. But the dancers know, at least, when they are *not* dancing. Nutcracker season is rife with these, because it's not just an opportunity for dancers to make extra money: there are many dancers who guest at their former schools' productions. Pre-pandemic, many of these were the weekend or two weekends before Christmas, depending on when the holiday falls. I havven't followed closely to see if this has changed. (I'll be watching online.) Unlike local pre-professional school based independent companies, even big ones like Goh Balllet, which rely on guests, big company Nutcracker sales aren't as sensitive to specific dancers, as the market goes way beyond company followers to families who will buy tickets when it's convenient to go and tourists, who generally will either buy before casting comes out to be sure to have tickets or will take their chances when they get there. And if they get tickets, changes are great that they will see many great performances, no matter what the ranks of the cast.

We just got the following piece of correspondence: I am a doctoral candidate at the CUNY Graduate Center and former Morgan fellowship recipient. I would like to alert the participants and organisers of Ballet Alert to a future exhibition that the Morgan will hold in the summer of 2024 on the Ballets Russes. The exhibition focuses on the less known contributions of Ida Rubinstein and Bronislava Nijinska, particularly their places as choreographers and patrons/creators or creator adjacent work in the Ballets Russes. The exhibition seeks to take part in the celebrations of Nijinska’s centenary, with her choreographic notations being part of the exhibit. I enclose a link to a blog post that I wrote for the Morgan describing my work as an assistant to Dr.Robinson McClellan, the curator of the exhibition. I hope it will be of interest to your website: Blogpost: https://www.themorgan.org/blog/adventures-choreographic-notation-and-tale-two-ballet-rebels-or-nijinskynijinska

That's exciting news: you'll be able to see them before they rise up the ranks!

Paula Citron interviewed Stancyzk on his impending retirement for the Ludwig Van newsletter: https://www.ludwig-van.com/toronto/2023/11/08/interview-national-ballet-principal-dancer-piotr-stanczyk-talks-retirement/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)&mc_cid=029782462c&mc_eid=170c6ba80f He's clearly a very thoughtful man.

I find Austen's pairings interesting, because she makes it abundantly clear when she thinks that couples are badly matched and, aside from when women are forthright that they've chosen to marry fools for their security, even when they are opposites, like Louisa Musgrove and Captain Benwick.