sandik

I would be happy if they performed the Tudor they have.

David Vaughan has a great section about Fille in his Ashton book, with some excellent discussion about props. I love the entire book, but that section is particularly fine.

I'm glad to hear that someone is performing the Tharp. I agree that it was certainly tailor-made for Baryshnikov, not just his skills and performing style, but his personae as well -- like the solo in Push Comes to Shove, it seems to comment on his public image. Despite that specificity, though, it's a wonderful tour de force piece, and is a good example of Tharp's ability to layer astonishing dancing with topical commentary.

I'm always interested in how dances can be interpreted/perceived differently depending on the artists' intentions or the general situation. When PNB did SL here this autumn, I definitely felt that Kaori Nakamura danced the second act duet as a tragic event, almost as if she knew this relationship was doomed, while Olivier Wevers as her partner was practically giddy with excitement. She was like the Marschalin in Rosenkavalier -- already looking back on the moment while she experiences it.

This isn't adulatory, but it's an important memory for me, so I'd like to include it in the birthday thread. I saw RN during one of his "... and Friends" tours, and yes, his technique was considerably eroded by that time, but his desire to perform and his love of dancing were still powerful. He was doing Apollo, and instead of a ballet about a young god, he showed us the intensity of an ageing one. In the group section after the solos, when the three muses are sitting stage right, and lift their legs in series up to Apollo's hand, the sequence usually reads as the god taming the muses -- he commands and they obey. This time around, instead of a classical port de bras, N embraced their legs, gathering them to his chest almost as if he was trying to keep them from escaping, trying to keep his connection to dancing. Rather than learning to command his world and master his skills, this Apollo was taking leave of his realm and mourning his departure. The ending tableau was less about ascending to the heavens as it was about leaving the earth, leaving the ground that we dance on. I have to say that this interpretation is primarily my perspective on what I saw, but when I spoke with my companion that evening, she had a very similar reaction. It was an astonishing performance of the work, and a powerful experience in the theater.

Only five? Yikes! 1 - Karsavina, definitely. 2 - Ballet Comique de la Reine, or any of the big court ballets. 3 - Laban's movement choir "Vom Tauwind und der Neuen Freude" (The Spring Wind and the New Joy) which was scheduled to be performed in conjunction with the 1936 Olympics but was cancelled by Goebbels after a dress rehearsal. 4- The premiere of Sacre du Printemps 5 - Hanya Holm's Trend or Doris Humphrey's complete New Dance (they were both Bennington events, so can I list them together?) My personal view of the afterlife is that, if I'm a good girl in the here and now, later on I get to see anything I missed, and if I really like it, I get to learn to dance it!

Lately I've seen more and more theaters (including the rennovated McCaw Hall in Seattle) supply booster seats -- at 5'3" I've thought about getting one for me!

I don't think that Bargreen is implying that Kent Stowell and Francia Russell have been timid in their artistic direction of the company, but that they have been in their jobs for over 25 years, which is several generations in the life of a ballet company. They have had specific goals and specific strategies to acheive those goals -- they've accomplished a great deal during their tenure. But every choice to do something is a choice not to do something else -- there are choreographers and styles that are not represented in the current company (for various reasons) and with this change in directors the board/community needs to think about what other possibilities there might be.

Gray had a good relationship with On the Boards, a Seattle presenter, and so we saw him here often, fairly early in his career. I have very fond memories of his work, particularly "Interviewing the Audience." He was like a surreal version of Dick Cavett, both commenting on the bizarre nature of our "15 minutes of fame" and lovingly participating in it. His death saddens me immenesly, particularly since he didn't seem to see any other possibilities.

Dance/USA frequently tracks this kind of information and the coverage it receives.

This animated film has been open for quite some time, and may already have passed your area, but it's worth seeking out, if only for its campy opening sequence of a 1920's cabaret show including versions of Josephine Baker and a Fred Astaire whose tap shoes transform into sharks, and consume their owner.

In my part of the world, Patricia Barker of Pacific Northwest Ballet is a blond. Thinking more generally, and historically, Makarova was blond, Ulanova was blond, and I think Riabouchinska was blond.

Like horses do? In a hunt? Just playing 's advocate here. I have no legitimate knowledge of this. Thinking over this again, I guess the image of a chase is probably the most accurate -- the trailing leg catches up, but it never overtakes the leading leg. Tally-ho!

Seattle didn't really aquire an actual "skyscraper" until the mid-60's, a typical black box based on the Seagram's Building. We have always called it "the box that the Space Needle came in." It's interesting to read these comments and compare them to our own experience here with a rennovated hall. I was very familiar with the deficits that remodel was supposed to mend, and for the most part, it's been successful. It doesn't sounds like this job was as extensive -- how long was the house closed?

Think of it like a gallop, where the trailing leg catches up to the leading leg, only in time for the leading leg to shoot forward again. In a chasse, the trailing leg 'appears' to push the leading leg out (though we know that the trailing leg is actually the primary weight-bearing leg as the leading leg slides on the floor)

Please, don't stop there!

Off the top of my head, Raven Wilkinson performed with one of the Ballet Russe companies, and Janet Collins with the Met Opera Ballet -- would need to look up which was first, though I think it might have been Wilkinson. If I remember correctly, Wilkinson used to make a joke out of the BR tradition of "ghosting" in hotel rooms (a dancer would rent a room for one, and then stuff in as many other people as he/she could to get the rates down) -- something to the effect that she was a very black ghost. That's if you're just discussing ballet. Lester Horton ran an integrated company in LA in the 50's -- it's often referred to as "the first" or "one of the first," but again, I'd need to look it up to be sure.

I agree about Murray, though I'm hoping that he'll search out more roles like this now that he's taken the plunge. I think the last Oscar dance "spectacular" I saw was made by Debbie Allen, but that's a distinction without a difference in many ways. I just wish that they'd had a choreography award during the heydey of the Hollywood musical. Film choreography is a challenge, and I still love to pull out my Busby Berkley and Hermes Pan tapes...

What a treat. I love Karsavina and am always glad to see images of her, but it was the picture of Koslov as Bluebird that just stunned me. On first look the wings seemed too much, but then I thought about the series of cabrioles, and how the extensions on his arms would affect the line of his upper body as he travelled -- amazing!

Thanks -- I'll scamper over there!

There have been links to several published reviews of this show, but I don't remember seeing many comments from Ballet Alert denizens -- has anyone seen this, and what did you think?

Many thanks! Mulling this topic over again I started thinking about the emphasis Massine placed on character dancing, and how many roles he created using that material. Those skills seem undervalued today, so that when we do get a ballet that asks dancers to make distinctions between different national dances, it often turns into mush.

Massine's influence on the development of ballet in the US was really at its peak in the 50's, when so many Ballet Russe alumni were leading schools and performance ensembles across the country. It's been eclipsed for several years by Balanchine's more athletic American style, but if you go back and look at Dance Magazines from the 50's and 60's, I think you might be surprised at the number of Boutique Fantasque and Gaite Parisienne knockoffs there were. I was sorry to have missed the Joffrey revival of that symphonic work (I've scared the name out of myself...) -- I've read so much about it and mulled over the photos, but would love to see something move. I think the emphasis on character in Massine's work might do well today -- there's a section of the dance audience that responds to those kinds of elements -- but the cultural references (especially in things like Gaite) would be difficult for a literal-minded audience.

We have the Ronald Hynd staging at Pacific Northwest Ballet, so our SB is firmly in the English tradition (which posed some challenges for the company when it was first set). This production has six subsidiary fairies (Beauty, Temperament, Purity, Joy, Wit, and Generosity) so Lilac is centered in the "group photo" moments. She is very much the lead fairy, directs traffic, deals directly with the court as well as with Carabosse. She has the lion's share of the mime, and does some mild flying as well. She gets that lovely, sweeping waltz in the prologue (and some killer releves to go with it) -- it's my favorite music in the ballet Ariana Lallone frequently dances Lilac (as a tall woman, she often gets "powerful" roles, like Hippolyta in Midsummer) and does very well with it. Nice gravitas, good mime, and great wand waving (I'm not being flippant -- many dancers do an awful job with a wand).

Are you sure it's the Balanchine? I seem to remember something by Roland Petit (?) by that title.