nanushka

The Times reports some additional details: The dancers will receive raises with their promotions but, like the rest of the company, are not being paid the same as they would be in a normal season. Like all performing arts organizations, American Ballet Theater has seen its ticket revenue flatline since mid-March. The company estimates that it will lose $20 million as a result of canceling its spring and fall seasons as well as six planned tours. “Despite the financial challenges we are facing, it is important that we recognize the artistry and leadership of the dancers who are now being promoted,” Kelly Ryan, a company spokeswoman, said in an email. There have been salary reductions across the company, Ms. Ryan said, and dancers are being paid six salaried weeks, compared with 10 weeks last year. The dancers are also receiving expanded supplementary unemployment benefits. To help ease its financial pain, the company has received money from the federal Paycheck Protection Program and established a crisis relief fund to help its dancers, pianists, production crew and other staff. And this: The company is unable to rehearse or train in its New York rehearsal space, but it has figured out an alternative way to create commissions that can be viewed online. This month, its dancers will form several “ballet bubbles” by traveling outside New York City to rehearse and train while in isolation with some of their fellow company members.

I love Lane’s dancing and will be very disappointed if indeed she’s left or did not have her contract renewed (and very upset if it’s the latter). But with a principal roster including Forster, Shevchenko, Trenary, Brandt, Cornejo, Murphy et al, ABT will still be a draw for me, whatever my complaints (and they are many) about management.

I too am disappointed by the excerpts. Those programs of excerpts were the low points of an otherwise really satisfying spring digital season.

If she did, I'm surprised her Instagram profile still says "Principal Dancer with @abtofficial." I'd assume that if this were a planned choice she'd have at least discreetly removed that, since she's fairly active on there. But of course it could have been just an oversight.

It's another double issue, so there's a lot. Highlights listed on the spine: Balanchine at City Center, J. Stafford, M. Champion, Kirstein at MoMA, É. Platel, Classical Russes, J. Reilly, F. Ashton, Yuriko, Degas's Dancers, L. Chétouane, Bugaku, P. Lang, Victoria's Drawings, C. Dumais-Lvowski, Swedish Explorers. Haven't had a chance to read much yet, beyond skimming a few of the reviews.

I received the final (Spring-Summer 2020) issue of Ballet Review today. A letter enclosed states, in part, the following: At the second elision are three additional paragraphs detailing Hoshino's life and accomplishments.

Thanks, @Helene, will definitely check those out. I’ve loved listening to the 2003 La Juive with Shicoff et al through Met On Demand.

If you notice anything on the site that you’ve seen and particularly recommend, please let us know! Definitely a lot here.

Wow, thanks so much for the tip, @Kathleen O'Connell! I'm Chromecasting to my TV right now and starting to explore these offerings.

Thanks so much, @Helene. Hopefully it'll work now. Have a good evening.

I'm no longer getting notifications (at the top of the site page, at the bell icon) on the topics I follow. Under "Notification Settings," the only choice under "Followed Content" now seems to be email. I prefer not to get email notifications, though. Is it still possible to get the notifications here on the site? Thanks!

Exactly. I fear it is precisely such opinions that ignorantly perpetuate the destructiveness of a virus such as this.

That seems more realistic and workable than this: These aren't highly paid professional athletes, after all, who would be sufficiently compensated to make it worth suspending the rest of their lives for the duration of a season.

The physical properties of particles haven’t changed much in those 100 years, apparently. Masks seem to still work pretty well.

You can also just click on the title bar of the video box, at least in my browsers, and it takes you right to the site or app.

Indeed! The male lead looked quite impressive in this act. (I haven't watched the other two.) While I'm grateful the company has released this video, I'd love to see more of him in higher-quality recordings (e.g. more close-ups, etc.).

The email @volcanohunter quoted above makes it sound like you’d need to become a member (lowest level is Friend, $100) in order to get access. But it’s definitely a confusing setup.

Even if they were going to hold firm on the minimum $100 donation to become a member — why not spread the word on that? Surely there are some current non-members out there who could be motivated to donate in part by the opportunity to see Ferri, Bolle, Cornejo and Murphy in that video.

Seriously, what the $&*%? Totally out of step, and totally oblivious to the potential power of digital content. It's as if the modern world has been twisting their arm and they're saying, "Well, ok, but we're only going to do the new way if we can do it the old way." Just, why? (I know, I know, one answer could be: they "couldn't" get all stakeholders to agree otherwise. To which I say: they didn't make it happen, as so many others now have.)

Yeah, I don't see any reason why they couldn't advertise this pretty aggressively, at least in select forums. Many longtime fans of ABT, Ferri, Bolle, Cornejo and/or Murphy would be delighted to know about this and perhaps make a donation in order to get access to that video. That may not be "selling admission," but it's no different from any other performing arts institution making such access contingent on a donation. There are so few opportunities to see ABT performances on video. I shouldn't be surprised anymore by anything ABT's marketing staff does (or, more often, doesn't do), but if they don't find a way to get the word out about this more broadly, I think it would be a sign of serious mismanagement.

Has anyone seen the Kaufmann recital? $20 feels high to me for recital streams, though it sounds like the quality should be good. I wonder if they wouldn't end up making more in the end if they charged $10-15 each, though. I can't help thinking, "But it's just a recital..." Why charge approximately the same as for a live HD transmission of a staged opera, with movie-theater sound?

I think it would be extraordinarily inappropriate if Kent were to make such an accusation, at least publicly. It is unlikely that she could "know" where she got it. Even if one has been obviously exposed on a particular occasion, there will almost always have been other possible exposures that occurred in the period when the virus was contracted. If Bronczek was irresponsible in hosting the event, so too was anyone who chose to attend.

This definitely sounds exciting. Thanks for the heads-up, @Ashton Fan.

Many of us have been staying mostly at home even without any symptoms for much of the past 4 months — not only for fear of contracting the virus, but also because asymptomatic spread does indeed seem possible. Until there is a treatment and/or vaccine widely available, I would hope that anyone with potentially COVID-related symptoms would either stay isolated or, at the very least, pretty strictly minimize contact with others. That's the reality of living through a pandemic, unfortunately.

Well, there are certainly numerous diseases that do act like that. For obvious reasons, asymptomatic spread gives a virus an evolutionary advantage. Is there strong evidence that diseases similar to SARS-CoV-2 do not act like that? This particular virus may be new, with relatively few studies (or even "studies"), but it's part of a group of related viruses that have been studied more broadly.