sandik

Thank you for doing the research -- I thought for a moment about the celesta (and just now I looked it up on Wikipedia -- they describe it as a "a struck idiophone operated by a keyboard. " -- every field has its specific vocabulary!) and indeed for a moment I thought, "Nutcracker preview!," but for some reason it didn't sound right to me. But I think you'd identified it. But whichever one it was, I think Morris just nailed it with that solo -- it's a fabulous example of the movement and the music inhabiting the same world.

Helene, I will hope you are right, but I'm afraid that I am.

You know, it's not nice to make me laugh like that, and splutter all over the monitor! I thought that Macaulay made some very important points in this essay, particularly about the changes that occur over time, after an artist has stopped producing new work. Bach's importance as a composer waned and then waxed after his death, as far as the general musical population is concerned -- I don't know that time is always the most accurate editor of history, but it's certainly the most inexorable one.

It's occurred to me that, whether people like it or not, they have an intense, visceral response to this work, and that's pretty special in itself. "One Flat Thing" is a highly structured work, but the patterns are very unlike most works in the classical canon, so they're maybe not as visible. I love these kinds of puzzles, but that's me, and might not be someone else. I think this piece makes more sense if you've seen some of the other Forsythe in the rep -- it's more stringent than "In the Middle, Somewhat Elevated" or "Artifact," but you can see a bit of where it comes from in them. I'm afraid that most of those works will not show up in the PNB repertory, unless the company makes a significant change in artistic direction. They still do "Sleeping Beauty," and we get the Stowell/Russell/Petipa "Swan Lake" later this year (and Boal mentioned in a post-show Q&A last year that he's hoping to add the Balanchine Coppelia to the rep) but beyond that I don't think we'll get any of the 19th century full-lengths. Boal's interests lie in more contemporary work -- I don't hold much hope that we'll see the Tudor rep again, much less other stuff. But saying that, I'm looking forward to Jewels again, and to Dances at a Gathering in the spring, so I'm a hopeful girl at heart.

I had to giggle at this -- I've certainly seen many dances, ballet and otherwise, using chairs, and admit that I get a bit edgy when I see another chair on stage. I've been pleasantly surprised by some, but not as many as I could wish. And good thoughts to everyone in So. Cal. right now. We've been having big rains up here in the Northwest (very usual for this time of year) with flooding and mudslides. We're in between systems right now, but I wish I could send some of the moisture your way.

Sorry this is lengthy -- In general I get around 600 words when I review a program, but I have a lot more that 600 words to say about this evening in the theater. A Garden -- The physicality is modest, even in sections that call for large movement it’s not showy stuff. It matches the intimate quality of the score. The work is full of small details, especially in the gestures (arms specifically halfway between side and front, halfway between forward and down, palms turn over, little adjustments), all riding on top of a very clearly defined structure. Morris is sometimes accused of following the structural elements of the score too closely, but that doesn’t feel forced here -- it’s very sympathetic. Dancers look really good here -- Morris likes strong individuals and Carrie Imler is her usual sanguine self, especially in a series of pas de bourees with her head rolling from one side to another. There’s a great close canon duet with Jonathan Poretta and Barry Kerolis, and Benjamin Griffiths just sparkles in an allegro solo to what I think is a glockenspiel. Very like his work as Oberon in Midsummer, he skims across the space with some detailed and intricate footwork. PNB has programmed this as the opening ballet, and it’s a good placement, but I’m afraid that it might be dismissed as an appetizer, when there’s really much more substance than you might see on a first look. I hope that they bring it back soon and give us another chance to see. M-Pulse -- At this point I think Kiyon Gaines has more skill in developing movement than in structuring a whole dance. He’s really working on the details of pointework -- how women actually move through a whole phrase using the shoe, not just stepping up or stepping off. This is often a challenge for men, and I’m thrilled to see that he’s making this much progress. He gets some excellent performances from his cast, especially from Lindsi Dec and Kaori Nakamura, and they seem very excited to do the work. Three Movements -- I’ve never seen anything else by Benjamin Millepied, so I’ve no way of knowing where he is in his development as a choreographer -- if this work is part of a logical sequence or if it’s a step in a different direction, but it’s certainly a handsome work. It has a very ‘real life’ vibe to it from the start, especially in the relationships between dancers. It opens with two men playing around (rather like Fancy Free) and then Sokvannara Sar comes sauntering in, like a swaggering breakdancer. That characterization drops away after a few beats, but it reads really clearly when it’s there. And when Batkhurel Bold and Carla Korbes enter, they have this little hesitation, as if they’d opened a door to a club and weren’t sure if it was their kind of place. The work is full of individual moments -- Seth Orza channeling Patrick Swayze in Road House, William Lin-Yee loping across the stage, Bold rolling his shoulders like a street fighter, Lucien Postlewaite in a playful mood, Maria Chapman looking absolutely beautiful. Like the Morris, I really hope this comes back soon, so I can parse more of it. (one other comparison to the Morris, not as happy -- the women’s costumes for both pieces are very similar -- someone needs to watch out for that kind of stuff) I don’t read any reviews of a program until after I’ve written my own, so it was especially twinge-y to see that one of my colleagues also made a reference to Jerome Robbins work, except that the connections seem particularly strong. One Flat Thing, reproduced -- I know the audiences are still twitchy about this work, especially about the industrial noise score and the aggressively non-balletic movement vocabulary, but this is where the real estate agents get it exactly right when they insist that it’s all about location -- if this was being performed on the Meany Hall series (primarily modern dance) no one would be thinking twice. Peter Boal mentioned in a post-show Q&A that he is really committed to this piece, and is willing to go out on a limb to get people to look at it. That’s pretty obvious, just observing his programming since he got here, but I think it’s very interesting that it’s this work he’s willing to expend his political capital on. I truly like the gymnastic quality of the work, and the exposed feeling of the staging (like other Forsythe, everyone is on stage all the time, “waiting” for their cues to come up). I don’t know that I would have really ‘gotten’ the Antarctic references in the work without having it spelled out for me in the program notes, but it does have a clearly dangerous environment, and if you squint just right you can see the glaciers in Forsythe’s distortions of ballet vocabulary and phrasing.

Unfortunately, I don't think they have plans to film this for public consumption. At one point, I thought it might be a Balanchine Foundation project, but it looks like not. And yes, I think it's going to be fantastic. (not to rub it in if you can't be there...)

Don't get me started on "theme programs" -- I understand their appeal to marketing departments, but they can make for some very strange combinations.

Just looked up Talmadge, who made at least 2 talkies, but I think you may mean Norma Shearer for Idiot's Delight. I may try to find these early Talmadge talkies, though, to see what she did sound like. There are 'New York Nights' and 'Dubarry Woman of Passion', but I've never heard anything about these. Oh, my ears are red, red, red! You're absolutely right.

Thinking about it, I'm not sure I've ever heard Talmadge's "real" voice. What I've heard of her (Idiot's Delight, mostly) is really plummy.

Oh my. Still, you never know. Directors use all kinds of themes for program planning now.

I just read through this thread, and so am replying to old stuff... Because everybody wants to be upper-class English, therefore the enthusiasm for more practice is greater even though one is still Wallis Simpson underneath. For the same reasons that when people talk about past lives, they're always princesses and noblemen instead of laundresses and hod carriers? Another example of a awful accent (or actually a spot-on use of a grating accent): Jean Hagen as Lina Lamont in Singing in the Rain. Her nails-on-a-chalkboard voice as the silent screen star is stunning, and makes her painful attempts at an upper class accent even more amazing. In real life, she had a lovely speaking and singing voice -- indeed, when Debbie Reynolds is supposed to be dubbing her voice, it's actually Hagen we hear.

And didn't he do a Jeeves and Wooster series with Stephen Fry? I didn't watch House at the beginning, but have been dipping into the reruns on USA and am really enjoying it.

Slightly off-topic -- miliosr, I'm sorry to hear that you were disapponted in the Lubovitch show. I've had such mixed responses to his work. Some things, like North Star or Concerto Six Twenty-Two, really seem like seminal works -- they illustrate a particular time and a particular approach to dance, while others just leave me cold. We see them here in February -- could you tell us please what you saw them dance?

Thanks Helene for getting this up -- I'm looking forward to the program, particularly the Morris and the Forsythe. I was at a showing for the Seattle Dance Project this afternoon and heard Heidi Vierthaler (hope this is the right spelling -- I'm too lazy to check it right now) speak (she's making a work for their January show). She worked with Forsythe as he made the shift from Ballet F to his own company and had lots to say about his working practices -- I want to watch One Flat Thing with her comments in mind.

thanks so much for the link -- I've enjoyed Brown's work when I've seen it, but it didn't always cross my desktop. The site is lovely, though not really a quick read. I'm not sure I would want to have to watch all the photos load over and over again.

Thanks so much for the links!

As recently as 10 years ago, Seattle audiences (arts overall, not specifically dance) trended towards subscriptions rather than single tickets. That has changed since then -- the last statistics I heard were that single tickets were up and that subscriptions were down, especially full season subscriptions. To be fair, many of the organizations that offer subscriptions have been increasing the number and variety of packages in the last few years, so a certain amount of shifting is expected, but the trend to single tickets in an interesting one. Opening nights are generally good, other evenings more variable. Matinees are better in the winter than the early autumn or spring (competition with outdoor activities) Meany Hall, which presents a modern/world dance lineup at a university-based theater, has been doing very well the last few years, with some sold-out houses (capacity around 2000) I don't think the capacity of the room is quite that large, but the sessions are very well attended and sometimes I learn things there that I don't find from any other source. Those numbers seem about right from where I sit too.

The Ailey company commissioned a special film for its recent anniversary, and they showed it before the program while on tour. It was full of historical footage and still shots as well as interviews, and was very well done. It wasn't keyed to a particular work on the program (though as you might imagine it had a lot of Revelations material in it), so perhaps isn't exactly what you're thinking of here, but I felt it complimented the performance. Perhaps the difference is in the original scale -- Astaire and Hayward were meant to be seen on a movie screen, in a 'larger than life' context,' while other films might not.

I wish I were seeing Agon this weekend.

Oh dear, this is not good. I always cringe when a print publication dies.

PBS ran a version of his Our Town on its Masterpiece Theater series, and you can, if you wish, buy the DVD here

I like the notation on the last of the Farrell DVDs -- "ovations for Suzanne Farrell (14 min.)"

Casting for the second week is out as well here Some changes, but probably the most interesting one is Jonathan Poretta in the Martynov -- it's a very tricky part, and when I watched Charlie Hodges in rehearsal (a fantastic dancer) I thought "I bet that will be Poretta soon."

And since we get Dances at a Gathering later this year that's a comparison to think about.