nanushka

Patrick Frenette has been quite a prolific and often excellent backstage photographer this year. It's been great to see his work scattered across various IG accounts.

He's also really grown as a dancer in just a few years. When he started with the corps he sometimes stood out in the wrong way, and now he almost always stands out in the right way.

It makes sense now that she seemed so moved by the demanded second curtain call, and that JW let her come out first for a solo bow.

I still feel so sad that we'll never see her dance that again.

4 hours ago, fondoffouettes said:

She responded to someone in the comments section who asked for clarification and made it pretty clear that she won't be dancing the role again at the Met. 

If you zoom in btw you can see the bouquet thrown from the audience in midair!

2 minutes ago, Drew said:

 I loved Kirkland beyond anything I could ever put into words.

I really REALLY wish there were more good video of her. I cherish and download everything I've found.

50 minutes ago, canbelto said:

Whalen has been with the company since 2002, so yes, she is pretty senior in the corps ranks.

Ah yes I see, thanks.

i don't think I've noticed her on stage at all this season, now that I think of it.

14 minutes ago, canbelto said:

Per Luciana Paris's instagram, longtime corps member Jennifer Whalen is retiring. 

Are we sure this means retiring? Unlike with Part, I don't see anything specific here. I didn't think Whalen was on the older end of the spectrum?

27 minutes ago, CTballetfan said:

Thank you so much for the correction! The running times on the synopsis on the ABT webpage is incorrect then. I feel better and look forward to the performance.

I don't think it's incorrect; I think it's just that the initial one-movement piece had the same title so there are two different listings for the piece. They often list different versions under the same title in their rep listings. Perhaps the only way in which their website could be described as "comprehensive."

1 minute ago, fondoffouettes said:

I'm heartsick.

Me too. Is she quietly retiring? I can't imagine that she'd drop this role if she's continuing with the company.

23 minutes ago, Jane Simpson said:

 

In his book The Diaghilev Ballet in London, C.W.Beaumont describes the changes Diaghilev made to the original, including:

 

"...Diaghilev refused to permit Prince Charming and Princess Aurora to dance to a certain boisterous melody which occurs after the grand pas de deux. this melody was certainly not suited to a classical pas de deux, and Nijinska used it for a character number, "Innocent Ivan and his Brothers," based on Russian folk dance measures..."

 

Also the RB's 75th anniversary book, by Alexander Bland, talks of the changes made to the 1921 version for the RB's 1939 production, including "The coda to the grand pas de deux was rescued from the Three Ivans, to whom it had rather incongruously been allotted".

 

So that sounds to me as if there was no coda in the 1921 version.

It certainly sounds from those sources like Nijinska/Diaghilev's Three Ivans danced to the PDD coda, as shown in the above video. But then there's this, in ABT's June/July Playbill article "A Tchaikovsky Spectacular":

Ratmansky's 2015 production of The Sleeping Beauty proved revelatory, outlining the subtle complexity of Petipa's choreography, matched to Tchaikovsky's music. This season, Ratmansky's staging of the third act, Aurora's Wedding, includes divertissements by Bronislava Nijinska created for Diaghilev's Ballets Russes 1921 production of The Sleeping Princess. The Nijinska dances comprise the Porcelain Trio, for two women dancers and one man, and the Three Ivans. For contemporary audiences, the music for these supplementary dances may bring a shock of recognition: Nijinska set the Porcelain Trio to the Chinese Dance from The Nutcracker and the Three Ivans to the spirited Russian Dance. "Aurora's Wedding is a fresh and interesting combination," acknowledges Ratmansky.

18 minutes ago, canbelto said:

Actually this lecture by Doug Fullington shows that Balanchine did remember/recreate many of the steps:

 

Yes, some of Balanchine's most famous quotes are notoriously untrustworthy. Like many artists he was a master of image projection.

39 minutes ago, vipa said:

Acocella says it better than I, in the same New Yorker piece I cited before.  She comments on the Ratmansky project of recreating "Les Millions d'Arelequin." She writes  "Balanchine, who had danced the ballet in Russia as a boy, also revisited it. But he didn't reproduce the original steps - Who remembers them, he said. Instead, he reimagined Petipa's creation as a new piece, "Harlequinade, " with at least two marvelous roles. I have faith that the steps he created out of his idea of the old ones are as interesting as the original and  better suited to modern audiences and dancers."

Balanchine was a great choreographer –– one of the greatest –– but so was Petipa. How can we know until we compare, based on whatever evidence Ratmansky can dig up? And won't it be interesting to do so?

Ratmansky has a passion for the archives, while Balanchine most assuredly did not. ("Who remembers them?" is so Balanchine.) Every artist has his or her method. Ratmansky has his ups and downs, as did Balanchine. He's earned my trust to do his thing. Sometimes it'll pay off, and sometimes it won't. But I'll be curious to see the results, no matter what.

While we're on the topic of reconstructions, here are two videos of Carla Fracci recreating the Auroras of, respectively, Olga Spessivtseva and Carlotta Brianza. These are from 1987, when she was 51 years old!

Those balances are better than some we see from ballerinas in their prime these days at ABT.

And she does the thing at the end of the PDD adagio where she rises up completely on pointe –– so beautifully.

6 minutes ago, cubanmiamiboy said:

 

The fish dives were inserted in the London production for Spessivtzeva, as per Danilova's autobio. 

Vikharev had already created his full fledged luxurious reconstruction of the iconic XIX century production. I remember reading that Ratmansky then chose to revive the also iconic London XX century one. What I am not sure about if is two different set of notations exist for this two productions. I must confess I had no idea that the London production had been notated. I thought that ballet notations had stopped after 1917. I believed that Ratmansky's had been a mere recreation using choreographic passages from Vikharev's recon.

I believe that Ratmansky's version is only inspired by the London production in terms of its physical production; in terms of choreography, order of music, etc. it's not based primarily on that production.

29 minutes ago, Natalia said:

If memory serves - and I'm truly working from memory's way from home for a while - the 1921 Three Ivans was danced to the Russian Trepak of Nutcracker & not the SB pdd coda music...so the pdd should be intact. 

 

In 1890 the pdd coda music went to a totally different set of characters altogether...two sets of fairies & their princes? Something that may not have been in the Stepanov notes...so neither Vikharev nor Ratmansky could stage...so we got a much-later Airora/Desire pdd coda.  Back to my beach near Notfolk.. Virginia Beach! Perfect day so far.

Here is some of what Roland John Wiley writes in Tchaikovsky's Ballets about the PDD as recorded in Stepanov's choreographic notation [CN]:

The CN of the pas de quatre of Aurora, Désiré, and the fairies Gold and Sapphire poses the same problem within Act III that the court dances did in Act II––there is little clear description, and the authenticity of what survives is open to question. The dance performed to Tchaikovsky's wonderful duet is only sketched, in a series of alternating poses and lifts of the ballerina with short mimed episodes. ...

...

What happened immediately after the adagio cannot exactly be determined. The libretto refers to all of No. 28 as a pas de quatre; the CN preserves two variants of a 'Dance after the Pas de Deux/Adagio.' Two women, identified in one of the variants as the fairies Gold and Sapphire, perform a dance of about 38 bars in 6/8 time. ...

To this extent the CN agrees with the libretto: the pas de deux Petipa requested of Tchaikovsky was made into a pas de quatre by the addition of a variation for the fairies Gold and Sapphire immediately after the adagio. But to what music did they dance? The variations and the coda are assigned to Aurora and Désiré. ...

...

The coda aims for bravura effect. ... Aurora enters, first with pointe work in a slashing zigzag, then circling in light pirouettes. Désiré comes on and joins her in a combination of pas balloons and arabesque. Both then travel in a diagonal towards rear stage left, with short jumps on the right foot, the left extended to the back en arabesque. Aurora retraces her path alone in a series of turns and runs across the front of the stage to meet Désiré, whom she encircles with pirouettes, coming to rest in a final pose on pointe. 

I really hope they bring back the Act III introduction (Marche). I love that exciting music before the curtain rises and really missed it when Ratmansky's Act III instead began with the Polacca.

I would guess that these changes are just for the "Aurora's Wedding" program and will not be used in the full-length when it returns –– but that's just a guess.

30 minutes ago, Natalia said:

The season brochure clearly states that this version will add the recons of two of Nijinska's 1921's creations: Three Ivans and Porcelain Princess/Mandarin (Chinese).

Thanks, Natalia, I didn't notice that in the brochure. I see on the Met website it says the following:

"Aurora’s Wedding from Ratmansky’s The Sleeping Beauty, including Bronislava Nijinska’s dances of The Three Ivans and Porcelain Trio"

If Nijinska's 3 Ivans danced to the PDD coda, that means the complete PDD may not be danced by Aurora and the Prince. That would be a shame. But Macaulay mentioned two pieces from Nutcracker. Is it possible that Ratmansky is only evoking the spirit of Nijinska's 3 Ivans and in fact using his formerly choreographed Russian dance? (I assume Nijinska's "Porcelain Trio" was to Nutcracker's Chinese dance.)

9 hours ago, fondoffouettes said:

Can anyone recommend a source to learn more about the Ballets Russes' Sleeping Princess and subsequent "Aurora's Wedding"? I'd really like to read more about those productions and understand what exists of Baskt's designs.

I suspect that Tim Scholl's Sleeping Beauty: A Legend in Progress might include at least some discussion of that, though I haven't had a chance to read it.

I think there's an important place in the ballet world for the type of work that Ratmansky is doing and has done. It's not the only type of work that I want to see, but it's work that I view as valuable and important.

Ballet is a paradox. On the one hand, it is an art that is so much about adherence to tradition. (Even those aspects and artists that have departed from tradition have still been defined by it.) And yet, on the other hand, it is an art in which we have such a fragile hold on tradition and the past. For the most part, we have only a history of subsequent performances, lost as soon as finished, and a history of direct relationships between teacher and student, and their student, and their student, etc. Ballet is not truly preserved in museums or in libraries. The past is all-important and yet nearly all lost. Video (from the portion of ballet history for which it exists) and scholarship and personal testimonies and other records capture only fragments of that past. A production such as Ratmansky's Sleeping Beauty puts us back in fuller contact with that past. It sends ripples into the rest of the dancers' work, into the audiences' perceptions of others things they see. I think it's important, for ballet as an art, that such work is done.

That said, I do sympathize with those who don't actually want to pay to see the result, or who wish that their home company's scarce resources of time, money, energy and calendar space weren't the ones being expended on it (the NIMBY! sentiment). Personally, I haven't loved all of Ratmansky's reconstruction work, though overall I do really love his Sleeping Beauty. But even when I haven't loved the result, I've persisted in thinking the work is important.

As for Acocella's comment––well, this work requires a passion and commitment that Ratmansky clearly has, and if it's going to go anywhere it also requires a skill for execution that he has as well. I think he's right for the job, and it's a job that deserves to be done. I'd join her in wishing there were a second, identically gifted Ratmansky who could focus on "mak[ing] thrilling modern ballets to modern music." But at least the one we've got still does some of that.

2 minutes ago, ABT Fan said:

It's an excerpt from his SB. 

 

What info are you looking for?

The article seems to suggest it's not simply Act III of the SB we've seen the last two years. What are the "two dances added (to 'Nutcracker' music) in 1921"? The SB reconstruction followed closely the structure of the St. P original, in terms of music and dances, while using the later Bakst designs.

Does anyone have info about the "Aurora's Wedding" that is coming to ABT in two weeks? The NYT article that will appear in Sunday's paper mentions the following:

"His [Ratmansky's] new 'Aurora’s Wedding' contains two dances added (to 'Nutcracker' music) in 1921."

3 minutes ago, abatt said:

They have denied Part certain roles, presumably because finding a partner willing to lift her would be problematic.  All of the Tatiana's in this and prior runs are waif-like, and Part simply is not. That may explain why she has also never done Giselle, R&J or Manon, to name a few.

 

The lifts in Onegin are killers. 

All the more reason to bring in someone like Fabrice Calmels!

2 hours ago, alexL said:

For DonQ everyone hit their 32 fouettes except Misty. Same thing for Le Corsaire-everyone hit 32 except Seo. Usually Boylston does it without a problem(she travels a bit on stage but she does finish all 32) when she isn't injured and she was fine in DonQ so I cut her some slack for saving her ankle in SL. Unlike Seo and Copeland I know she will do 32 fouettes in next year's SL. She better fix her jerky port de bras though. 

Not to sound overly harsh, but Boylston had the most unattractive arms I've ever seen on a turning dancer during her Don Q fouettés –– they looked like crab claws!

48 minutes ago, vipa said:

I am weighing in as a person who never liked the ballet. It could be, nanushka, that it's just not your thing. I am not much of a full length story ballet fan unless there is a lot of dancing. This ballet has a lot of drama but as CTballetfan wrote, not a lot of memorable dancing. If dancing is what you are looking for skip it. If you are looking for drama and intensity, expressed with partnering and acting go for it. I'm sure Abrera and Sterns will do a good job.

Yeah, I think I may just skip it, then. Stearns is at his best, in my opinion, when he's actually dancing. It's all the rest of the time that he just comes across as kind of a blank. I imagine he'd do well as the aloof Onegin in the first half –– although, as I recall, even then there's the bedroom dream scene where he's meant to be giving her more. Although I do have a fondness for the full-length story ballets and not only the "pure dance" works (I love ABT and NYCB about equally these days), I'm definitely in it first and foremost for the real dancing.

Thanks, all, for the input!

8 minutes ago, abatt said:

You may know this already, but the Onegin ballet does not use the music from the Onegin opera.

Yes, I recall that, though I see in ABT's repertory listings that it is arranged from Tchaikovsky. Anything particularly noteworthy?

Thanks, Mazurka and kbarber. I've never read the Pushkin, but I do love the Tchaikovsky opera. I'm not a fan of Stearns precisely because he's so often dramatically inert –– but unfortunately that's the only time I can go! I do love Abrera, though.