California

The company just sent out to its e-mail list links to two reviews of the Balanchine program last weekend:

http://www.losangelesballet.org/html/news_reviews.htm

Here is the LA Times Blog review

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/culturemon...ne-program.html. . .

The print edition of the LA Times gave very prominent placement to this review today (Tuesday, 2/23): a beautiful, color photo of Serenade on the top half of the front page of the entertainment section, with the full review at the top left of p. 3 in that section.

No review (that I can find) in the UCLA Daily Bruin nor the Long Beach Press-Telegram nor the OC Register, but perhaps that's more forgiveable.

More casting changes were just announced in the LA Times:

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/culturemon...formances-.html

Alexandrova won't make the trip, due to a family emergency. She'll be replaced by Marianna Ryzhkina, dancing with Mikhail Lobukhin

. . . My buddy and I are going friday night. Is it bad form to take binoculars to a ballet performance?

You see plenty of people with opera glasses. I don't imagine anybody would be bothered by binoculars. But OCPAC-Segerstrom has great sightlines and views from anywhere in the house -- it's one of my favorite theaters for dance. You probably won't need the binoculars.

. . . Kudos to LA Ballet for doing Kammermusik No. 2, which as far as I can tell is rarely performed. It's certainly a palate cleanser between the two Tchaikovskys!

Neary, in her remarks before the performance, said this was the first principal role that Balanchine created on her. (Von Aroldingen was the other lead.) She said they first worked out the opening duet for the two women in unison. Then Balanchine kept speeding it up and finally said, okay, now the second woman (Neary) will do this a half beat after the first. It makes for a dizzying -- and dazzling -- fugue-like display. The calibre of the principal dancing was just first-rate at UCLA. Enormous credit has to go to Neary for making this work, both in recruiting dancers and coaching them in these demanding roles.

I couldn't remember ever seeing this ballet, but it's worth seeing again, if you have the opportunity. The 8-man all-male corps is one oddity -- no female corps at all. The male choreography is filled with what I call -- respectfully -- "goofball" every day movements that Balanchine could incorporate so masterfully. Some reminded me of the "goofball" patterns for the corps in the last movement of Stravinsky Violin Concerto (some of which are out-of-frame on the video in the Dance in America series).

Here's the info on the NYCB site: http://www.nycballet.com/company/rep.html?rep=107

The LA Ballet's Balanchine program at UCLA this weekend was quite wonderful: Serenade, Kammermusik No. 2, Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 2. I'm disappointed that the LA Times did not publish a review (although they reviewed a performance by the Trockaderos in Long Beach...). I also can't find any reviews in the UCLA student newspaper or the Orange County Register. (This is a sad commentary on the state of dance criticism in this country, but I'll leave that for another day.)

Co-Artistic Director Colleen Neary started the program with remarks before the curtain about her experiences performing with NYCB in these works, and she staged them here on behalf of the Balanchine Trust. The program this weekend was at the Freud Playhouse at UCLA, a great theater for dance with 586 seats, all with great sightlines. I'd estimate that about 80% of the house was full.

If you're in the area, it's a program worth seeing in Glendale next Saturday, 2/27 or in Redondo, Saturday, 3/6. They use recorded music, and there were a few shaky moments in some of the partnering, but any serious Balanchine lover will relish these performances, especially in a region of the country where opportunities to see anything by Balanchine are few and far between.

The company's website: http://www.losangelesballet.org/

I'd love to hear from other Ballet Talkers who saw the UCLA performances.

"Baryshnikov by Seliger" is a new site with HD video and still photographs of Baryshnikov at the Baryshnikov Arts Center. It appears to be part of a promotion of Nikon cameras:

http://nikonusa.com/d3s/

He's also featured in a new Louis Vitton photo shoot by Annie Leibovitz. Previews are available now, with the full release February 11:

http://tmagazine.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/01...-louis-vuitton/

does the scheduling look odd to anyone else? perhaps its because there are so many new ballets which are unknown quantities, but the combinations seem very strange.

Mixing a new piece with some tried-and-true favorites makes it less risky, so perhaps that is their rationale.

What I like about the schedule is that an out-of-town visitor can see a lot of different ballets in 4-6 days, so it's attractive from that viewpoint. It's more difficult to see several different programs at ABT during a short visit from long distances.

I'm curious to see what NYCB schedules for Saratoga in July. I'm guessing they will stay with the two-week season again due to the tough economy. Does anybody know when that schedule is typically posted?

The spring 2010 schedule is appearing this morning on the NYCB web site under subscriptions, and it appear they are slowly filling in the calendar section.

Subscriptions for spring 2010 go on sale tomorrow, February 1, according to the most recent press release: http://www.nycballet.com/news/press/pr01-12-10.html

I'm not finding the spring schedule anywhere on the NYCB site. Have subscribers been told anything, perhaps by e-mail, U.S. Mail, or a restricted portion of the web site?

This web site has quite a bit of information about the music:

http://theballetbag.wordpress.com/2009/11/27/les-patineurs/

"The music for Les Patineurs was arranged by Constant Lambert who orchestrated different selections from Meyerbeer’s Le Prophete together with the aria “Bel Cavalier” from L’Etoile du Nord."

The ABT home page in the upper-left is listing April 14-18 in Chicago:

http://www.abt.org/

Dates are also listed under "ABT on Tour."

Click "performances" and then "full calendar" to see the repertory and dates.

My parents owned a betamax in the late 70's because I told them it had the better quality, but we could only record programs off-air, since the networks weren't releasing videos for home sale (see above.) I also bought the original vhs releases of the Makarova/Nagy SL (an Emmy-winning "Live from Lincoln Center" broadcast--did I ever cheer that win when I saw the Emmy broadcast!, but mostly because stupid network tv finally noticed artsy PBS), and the Makarova/Baryshnikov "Giselle" (which also won an Emmy--ditto hoorays from me)--my staff discount helped. But now can't get my old vcr to play them! And vcr's are getting hard to find.

I worried that VHS tapes I taped for personal use off the air in the 80s and 90s would deteriorate, so I bought a Sony VHS/DVD recorder that easily transfers VHS to DVD. I have model RDR-VX500, and I think they still sell a slightly newer version of that. Commercial tapes sold after about 1990 have pirate protections in them, so you can't copy those to DVD on a machine like this. Interestingly, I discovered that some of the old ballet tapes from the 80s (e.g., the Makarova/Baryshnikov Giselle) don't have those pirate protections in them - but let me stress that copying from VHS to DVD is strictly limited to personal use for tapes made off the air under the current copyright law.

My advice: if you have an old VHS tape that's been re-issued on DVD, buy the commercial DVD to be sure you have it for the future. You can still find VCR players, but they're likely to disappear in the coming years.

Totally agree about Gelsey/Misha's T&V--the first time I ever saw T&V and what has always "stuck" in my head ever since. Also the first film I ever wanted to watch, the first time I went to the NYPL Perf.Arts! (That day, I also watched the Balanchine Trust/Archive (?) of Alicia Alonso teaching T&V to a very young Paloma Herrera & Angel Corella. What a brilliant artist Mme Alonso is/was, I've never learned so much in such a short time.)

The Alonso tape was made by the George Balanchine Foundation, as part of its Video Archives project. You'll see the one with Alonso coaching Paloma Herrera and Angel Corella in T&V on the list. It was taped in 1998.

http://www.balanchine.org/balanchine/03/gb...ves_videos.html

I don't believe these were ever released for commercial sale, but they have been distributed for educational use. They list 70 educational libraries around the world where they can be viewed:

http://www.balanchine.org/balanchine/03/gb..._libraries.html

I know for a fact, however, that this list is not complete. My campus of the California State University has them and it's not on the list, so you might check your local colleges/universities for access.

Ok, so there is a Makarova one. Thanks very much everyone for finding that. I will be purchasing it. The Ferri/Murru one is out of bounds because of the outrageous price. But now, the ones I'm really interested in seeing in the role (if they have been released, of course) are Margot Fonteyn and Ekaterina Maximova. If anyone could shed some light whether they're available in any shape or form, I would be very thankful.

The Makarova/Baryshnikov Giselle was a "Live from Lincoln Center" production on June 2, 1977, before most people owned VCRs. The Betamax had been introduced, but it was prohitively expensive. It was released on VHS in 1988, but I don't believe it was ever released on DVD. I can't find it on any of the commercial sites selling VHS/DVDs. You'll probably have to look at e-Bay or Amazon re-sellers for a used copy.

I heard that the long delays in releasing these TV shows was mainly because it didn't occur to people in the 1970s that there would be a VHS/DVD market someday, so they had to go back and get releases from everybody involved in the production. The delay in releasing the July 1976 "Baryshnikov at Wolf Trap" performance (which was also shown on PBS that fall before anybody had VCRs) was reportedly because Kirkland refused. Her statement at the end about anorexia was reportedly part of her requirement for the release. Even then, it's not the complete performance. The live Wolf Trap performances included the first movement of Push Comes to Shove, with Tcherkassky and van Hamel (the original cast), but that wasn't included on the VHS/DVD.

The PBS show I have most wanted to get was Theme and Variations with Baryshnikov/Kirkland, from "Live from Lincoln Center" in 1978. You can see it at the NYPL Performing Arts Library at Lincoln Center, but it's never been released for public sales. I hope someday they'll find a way to release that commercially. It's priceless!

This isn't a list obviously, but a Makarova Giselle WAS released officially or commercially, one could say, some years ago. It's based on an ABT production with Baryshnikov. Currently it's out of print but commercial VHS copies are available on Ebay or from Amazon merchants.

For example:

http://www.amazon.com/Adam-Giselle-VHS-Mik...v/dp/6303100791

Certainly there are many others, a good method would be to use the "search amazon" window at the top of the page .

In addition to Amazon.com, other sites stock several versions of Giselle:

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/

http://www.kultur.com/

http://www.moviesunlimited.com/

http://www.cduniverse.com/

http://www.tower.com/

I'm sure there are more...

The schedule for the Vail Dance Festival won't be announced until February 1, 2010, but I just received a fund-raising letter in U.S. Mail that has some programming information - in order of their listing:

*Chinese dance company, Beijing Dance/LDTX

*Paul Taylor Dance Company - celebrating his 80th birthday

*Pacific Northwest Ballet - with choreography of Tharp, Robbins, Balanchine, among others

*"Dance for 2010" - mixed bill with accessible seats at $20 for the auditorium and $10 for lawn

*Two different "International Evenings of Dance" with Wendy Whelan, Daniil Smikin, Tiler Peck, Robert Fairchild, Carla Korbes, Matthew Rushing, oaquin de Lux, Herman Corneo, and others

*Tango show - Romper El Piso (Break the Floor) by Natalia Hills and Gabriel Misse.

The schedule will be anounced on their site:

http://www.vaildance.org/

Gia Kourlas lists the dates for a Ratmansky premiere at NYCB in spring 2010 under her "best of 2010":

http://newyork.timeout.com/articles/dance/...-of-2009/3.html

"Alexei Ratmansky

His dance card is full! Along with a premiere for New York City Ballet (May 5, 8, 9 and 12), Ratmansky will choreograph a new Nutcracker for American Ballet Theatre, where he is artist in residence, to premiere at BAM (Dec 23)."

Any idea where this was announced? The spring 2010 schedule isn't available yet at the NYCB or Lincoln Center site - or is it? What appears to be the most recent press release (from last August) doesn't include any dates of specific performances either:

http://www.nycballet.com/news/press/pr08-12-09.html

Have any of the NY critics received an advance schedule?

The Slovak Ministry of Culture seems to spend most of its money supporting the country's major arts groups -- ballet, theatre, opera, symphony. Locals I knew at the University see these art groups as an important part of their national heritage.

The beautiful new opera house is located on the site of the Nazi's Apollo gas refinery, which was bombed by the western Allies before the Red Army invaded from the east. The Communists wanted to build an opera house on the site as far back as the 1950s, but couldn't find the money. I understand that the funding to build it came largely from Ballymore, an Irish development company, after Slovakia joined the EU in 2004, as a complement to their riverfront development Eurovea (convention center, condos, shopping, hotel). http://www.eurovea.sk/new_en/index.php

The dancers seem most at home in the Petipa repertory (e.g., Swan Lake, Raymonda Variations). Several ballets based on Slovak folk themes seem designed to give the company a distinctive identity and appeal to national pride and were popular with families and children.

Their Serenade premiered in fall 2007, the first time any Balanchine had been performed in the country. John Clifford and Patricia Barker set the piece. The performances sold out quickly and were quite an event in Bratislava. The dancers are not familiar with Balanchine and will need time to get comfortable with the style, but I see that the Tchaikovsky pas de deux was added to the repertory this year.

I loved Warhol, a full-evening ballet by their director Mário Radačovský, a Slovak who danced with Les Grand Ballets Canadiens in Montreal and also with Kylian's Netherlands Dans Theatre. (Kylian is Czech, of course, and a local hero in Slovakia.) Warhol is great fun for American audiences. Warhol's parents are from Slovakia and he is something of a national hero -- statues, exhibits, posters. But the Slovak dance audience didn't seem to grasp the pop culture elements of Warhol's life in America (paparazzi, Studio 54, soup cans) and it wasn't an audience favorite. My favorite segment was the Dancing Marilyn's, with the corps in that billowy white dress we know from the movies.

A small, but significant, thing I noticed at performances was the presence of as many young boys as young girls in the audience. Ballet does not seem to have any stigma there for men. The company has several child-oriented ballets that show the male dancers in very athletic roles that the kids seemed to love. Snow White and the Seven Racers had a male corps racing through the aisles on tiny bikes chasing the witch, with little kids loving every minute. Whatever works!

If you're travelling in central Europe, the Slovak National Ballet is worth a visit. I had the great privilege of seeing almost all their productions from September 2007 - January 2008 while I was teaching in Bratislava on a Fulbright.

Their English-language web site is here:

http://www.snd.sk/?program-8

They perform in two beautiful theatres. The historic opera house in the center of town was designed by the same architect who designed the Vienna State Opera House. The new opera house a few blocks down on the Danube is stunning.

Bratislava is an easy one-hour train ride from the Vienna south (Sudbanhof) station. You can buy a RT ticket that comes with a travel pass for the Bratislava tram system for under 10 Euros

Tickets are embarrassingly cheap: 4-16 Euros (about $6-24 at today's exchange rate): http://www.snd.sk/?ballet-5

These people have the classical arts in their bloodstream and you will be delighted at the calibre of the productions and the dancers.

OCPAC's on-line magazine, with an article about the Bolshoi's Don Q, just arrived by e-mail, although it doesn't seem to have any information readers of this site don't already know:

http://www.ocpac.org/revue/0110/revue-0110...oi-Don%20Q.html

I got an e-mail today for early purchase of tickets to the OCPAC Bolshoi. These e-mails seem to go to everybody who has ever bought a ticket to dance at OCPAC, as I haven't purchased anything there this season, nor am I a subscriber, nor a member of OCPAC. Tickets to the general public go on sale Sunday, January 10.

Prices are $24-121. I love their on-line seat selection. You can choose exactly what you want from a diagram, see a video showing your view, and change your mind repeatedly. Huge areas of the theatre are already sold out; I'm guessing those are subscribers, as public sales haven't yet started.

Thanks for the information. So it wasn't just my confusion in trying to use their on-line ticket ordering. I'm thinking of stopping by the theatre on my way to the Bolshoi Don Q next month so I can see for myself what seats they have. This is a major drawback in their ordering system, and it surprises me.

The full-length Don Quixote March 20-21 looks very interesting, especially with the two ABT principals. But one frustration with the Barclay Theatre's on-line ticket ordering is that you don't know which seat they are assigning to you. A nice diagram on the site shows where all the seat numbers are, but you don't seem to have an option to decline a particular seat and ask them to search for another before you make an actual purchase, which is now common for on-line ordering.

Am I missing something in the on-line ordering? Or is this just open seating?

Also, they show a different price for students and seniors -- but never define "senior." Is it 60? 62? 65? 65+?

Thanks for any insight you can give me on this.

The print brochure for the spring season at BAC just arrived. Tickets for this gala are priced "from $1500" and include dinner with the artists.

Here's the program:

http://www.bacnyc.org/index.php/events/per.../JRT021610-Gala

Otherwise, googling is turning up no other performances in 2010. If others discover something, please pass it along.