pherank

As I was reading the article I kept thinking, "define corroborate, please". There were witnesses to a few of these occurrences. And that's always the tricky part in a legal proceeding - finding reliable, believable (by a jury) witnesses. It's always a problem when the interviewer betrays a bias.

I don't think this was linked to before: NYCB dancing Symphony in C with Allegra Kent (1973) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fn1ZVGp0plc Oh the joys of dancing on a concrete floor. ;)

Excellent sleuthing, Sandik - I think you may be right.

SFB just sent out an email reminder about their upcoming 2/17/2018 (Saturday) 5:00pm Panel Discussion. Ballet Talk: Distinctly SF: A Panel Discussion on New Work in San Francisco "Join us Saturday, February 17 for a lively 60-minute panel discussion about the legacy of new work in San Francisco featuring representatives from SF’s dance scene and current and former artists of the Company. Oh, and have a complimentary glass of wine with guests and speakers while you’re there! Tickets are selling fast, so hurry and get yours today!" https://www.sfballet.org/season/events/ballet-talk-sfb-0227/options

Sasha De Sola mentioned on Instagram that four short dance films highlighting four of the festival ballets will be released on February 28th:

Welcome, Vinson. Did you ever get a response from anyone? That's an interesting question - If film stock still exists, it's hard to know who would own the rights. I wonder if you should first start with the estate of the film's director? Excelsior (1913) Luca Comerio, Director Enrico Biancifiori, Ballet staging Luigi Manzotti, Choreographer

Missed the "Balanchine's Guys" Live Stream? Watch It Here http://www.pointemagazine.com/balanchines-guys-live-stream-2532183371.html?utm_campaign=RebelMouse&socialux=facebook&share_id=3288651&utm_medium=social&utm_content=Pointe&utm_source=facebook OK, so this does not work for me using Firefox (the video simply doesn't appear embeded in the page). It works using the Apple Safari browser. I just tested with Google Chrome and the embedded video did appear after a delay of a couple seconds. The video should appear after the 1st paragraph, ending with "(There's a bit of a sound delay, but it's well worth the watch!)".

Mathilde Froustey's comments on the upcoming Programs 2 and 3: "Working on three ballets at the same time gives me the amazing opportunity to explore different, sometimes even opposite, sides of my personality and of my vision of women. In the next two weeks I’ll be feminine and (hopefully) graceful in Serenade, playful but strong in Paganini. I will also be Hedda Gabler, beautiful but dying under her frustrations and her maliciousness, stuck in a life she hates in Ibsen’s House. I feel very close to all those women, like them I don’t fit in boxes: I’m not feminine, not masculine, I’m not strong and not fragile. And the opposite." https://www.instagram.com/p/Be-7sqGnIgZ/?taken-by=lapetitefrench_

Madison Keesler showing off costumes and the stage set with Megan Amanda Ehrlich, Lizzy Powell, Jahna Frantziskonis, Lonnie Weeks and Thamires Chuvas: https://www.instagram.com/p/Be993QUhUqa/?taken-by=madisonkeesler

I'm not surprised that Yuan Yuan is now dancing (since she was absent from the Sleeping Beauty casts), but I am surprised that Sofiane is not appearing in Rodeo so far. Are we seeing 2nd, 3rd casts due to multiple injuries? Or is the idea that the '1st cast' has already been seen at the Opening Gala, so they get shoved to a later date?

Yes, they've managed to botch it up - but that happens often enough with these Facebook streams. First of all, the live stream advertisement should appear at the top of their Facebook main page content. No one should have to hunt around to find the live stream. And clicking on the video controls should begin the streaming (and the video controls should actually work). There could be a separate link to the "theater" page with the Facebook app, but the basic video stream should be available right up front to users.

I just checked the above link and it opens for me so I'm not sure what to say other than to refresh this Forum page and try the link again.

Just appeared: https://www.facebook.com/ndi.alum/videos/vb.1304346562/10211330404638239/?type=3&theater

Nor for me yet. I've never liked the Facebook streams - they're just not as easy to work with as the YouTube streams. The controls are never self-evident, and the user often has to know to keep refreshing the page when there's an issue.

NOTE: the actual advertisement says that this takes place at 7:10pm, not 7:00pm.

Thanks for the Sleeping Beauty report, Quiggin. I don't have a problem with most of Bauer's personal opinions, except for the basic premise that she needs to award 1 to 5 stars to a ballet production. And in this case, she thinks the SB production only merits 2 stars which is essentially recommending that the people stay away - why pay money for a "largely joyless and wholly unsatisfying" production? And that's where I have to think, is she serious? First of all, is her impression generally matched by the rest of the audience? If not, she needs to make that apparent. And is it best for the general public not to see SFB's Sleeping Beauty? That just strikes me as utter nonsense (along with "star" ratings and "thumbs up/down" ratings in general). Visual rating systems are always problematic - and the issues are different with each type (whether a grade scale or a simple recommended/not recommended system). Bauer tries to balance her discussion by calling out individual dancers and mostly praising their performances. But in her estimation, the dance performances are not nearly as important to the production as the costumes and stagings that she doesn't like. So the scale tips considerably towards the negative, I get that, though I don't actually agree with her estimation. Perhaps Romantic era ballets like Sleeping Beauty are the exception, but I always weight choreography and actual dancing above stagings when I am viewing a ballet. And my experience has been that a balanced discussion of the positive and negative aspects of a performance is useful enough to get potential audience members interested. I guess I should just be happy that Bauer's not using an emoji rating. ;) It would be very interesting to hear audience feedback about this program (and each program) describing whether or not they enjoyed the show, AND what its 'objective worth' was as an art performance. (When the audience survey is given makes a difference in the answers received too, so nothing's really easy.)

Ostensibly a review SFB's Opening Night Gala performances, this article is perhaps more concerned with the question: "What is ballet now?" Stars and Stripes San Francisco Ballet's Gala night --Rachel Howard https://www.fjordreview.com/san-francisco-ballet-gala-2018/?utm_source=Fjord+Review "[Justin Peck's Rodeo] Here we have a re-visioning of the music made famous by Agnes de Mille’s 1942 narrative ballet about a tough ranch girl finding true love because she finally puts on a dress. But here the story and the setting and the cowboy swagger are all jettisoned. In their place: pure, beautiful, ensemble male dancing. Lyrical dancing, often using steps typically reserved for women, like arabesque with arms held, “Giselle”-style, in third position—but never campy dancing. And a solo woman—the commanding, joyous Sofiane Sylve on Thursday night—who is not an object of lust so much as an inspiring spiritual presence: A woman who, as partnered by the tender dignity incarnate of Carlo di Lanno, is treated with equality and allowed to exercise her agency, warmly but assertively flinging di Lanno’s hand off her hip before enfolding him in a loving embrace." "Ripening talents like Stahl’s give me confidence that SF Ballet will give a new works panoply of value to the dance world come April, even if more than half the commissions (a conservative estimate of failure for a new works festival) prove passing fancies or duds on arrival."

Thanks Dreamer, I missed that comment. It definitely looked to be a much younger version of Masha. ;)

Mathilde Froustey shows us the process of affixing Aurora's blonde wig: "How to become a married blond princess ... thank you so much to my hair fairy [Erica Villanueva] for the great time spent together during those two shows ! All the amazing people who work backstage during the show specially dressers and hair dressers are so important for the artists. We are sharing together emotions stress and happiness and they are taking care of us at our most vulnerable moments." https://www.instagram.com/p/Beu3MvbH2Vl/?taken-by=lapetitefrench_ Maria Kochetkova dancing in Sleeping Beauty (it isn't clear when this was taped though): https://www.instagram.com/p/BeuBzoLBukU/?taken-by=balletrusse

Prince Desiree (Angelo Greco) begins his day: (Another Diego Cruz video production)

Here' a couple stage shots that provide a good view of the sumptuous costumes: the top one shows Sarah Van Patten as the Lilac Fairy, and the bottom one Sasha De Silva as Aurora. Claudia Bauer thought SVP's tutu appeared "garish in a color as translucent as lavender tea". I personally don't have a problem with 'jewel tones' (which tend to be deep, saturated or opaque color), as opposed to pastels, and washed-out colors (which I suppose some people would say is more 'feminine'). But the palette is fairly dark which isn't going to appeal to everyone. Closeup of one of the Sleeping Beauty tutus - worn by Emma Rubinowitz:

I came upon this advertisement by accident - former SFB soloist Rebecca Elana Roberts teaches yoga and dance in Sebastopol (Sonoma County) https://www.ifonly.com/health-and-wellness/product/67293/private-yoga-and-ballet-lesson-with-former-san-francisco-ballet-ballerina

Yes, sorry I should have mentioned that - a lot of these short videos originate with Froustey or Kochetkova since they post constantly to their Instagram pages. The scary part is definitely when Helimets tries to raise himself back up from the floor - very hard on the back and not really safe 'exercise', but Tit executes the movement in as safe a manner as he can muster. If the poster is "lapetitefrench_" then that is Froustey, and "balletrusse" is Kochetkova.

Tiit Helimets appreciation day: https://www.instagram.com/p/Beqt8penywN/?taken-by=lapetitefrench_ (It's a workout for the woman being held aloft too - takes lots of muscle to hold that pose)

The character and characteristics of ballet are ever in flux. Always. The same sort of lament has been heard in NYCB circles every since Balanchine, and Robbins, passed away: that the old techniques aren't being transmitted to the dancers in the correct manner (meaning, "in the way I remember it"); that the dancers don't understand the moods and inflections of the original performances, etc. (and in many cases there are no films to document what went on). But the physiques of the dancers are different now to some extent too. And at the same time that aging balletomanes or former dancers complain about the manner in which the roles or steps are performed they concede that the young dancers of today can do things physically that were never possible in the past (many of them being far more 'athletic', or flexible, or versatile, than NYCB dancers of the 1950s, for example). How much of this is real, and how much is imagined, I can't say, but present day ballet choreography and narratives definitely emphasize different things from decades-old ballets, not to mention Romantic era story ballets. And the young dancers have to work with what is in the current repertoire - they don't have a personal reference to Petipa-era ballet. When Balanchine and Danilova both passed away there was virtually no one in the U.S. left who had any memory of ballet at the Mariinsky in the time of the last Tsar. It was all gone for ever. On the 'glass half full' side of things: everything one doesn't like about ballet today will eventually be replaced - utterly and completely. ;)