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I suppose Gennadi is having his Corella moment. Being new to management, he's not going to know all about ways to avoid p.r. and personnel mishaps. It's going to be hard in the beginning. I find it interesting that the dancers characterize the changes as being very "traditional" classical ballet - Atlanta doesn't do traditional! - or something like that. "…we were versatile enough to go from contemporary to classical. This turn to pure classical is not what we were told would happen" - I have to wonder what this "pure" classicism could be. My guess at what is really happening is that the Board and Nedvigin are visualizing a company in the mold of MCB, or SFB and ABT. They are thinking big (and I hope they have the funds to actually make a go of it). And the current "versatile" dancers are not deemed to be of the necessary technical and artistic level - 'poetry and personality' aside. EDIT: regarding Sandik's question - the one thing Gennadi has, is many friends at SFB. At the very least I think he could bring in guests to fill roles for short periods of time, and that would at least give Atlanta a sense of the type of dancers he is looking for (and the audience could see some top-tier performers).

I hear Thatcher's Ghost in the Machine received a standing ovation on opening night - that's some great news. Sasha congratulating Myles: https://www.instagram.com/p/BSh8NwuDIr-/?taken-by=sashadesola Dores André posted this quote from Myles on her Instagram page: '“I feel grateful for this bubble I live in,” Thatcher says. He says he is deeply troubled by the new administration’s failure to display what he considers, “fundamental human respect for people – especially people with disabilities, transgender people, and women.” Among Thatcher’s friends, many of whom are also artists, he says “the anger is palpable.” Together they’ve marched on the streets. “I have privilege,” he says. “I will never know the struggles of minorities. It’s important for me to know when to speak up, but also when not to, because I can’t presume to know these struggles. But I can be an ally; I can do my part to be supportive.” @mylesthatcher you are my hero.' https://www.instagram.com/p/BShmsR0hLte/?taken-by=doresandre

Young Men, a World War I-inspired feature-length dance film commemorating the Great War’s centennial, comes to Great Performances Friday, April 7 at 9PM on PBS. Young Men was filmed on location in Northern France with the BalletBoyz dance company. http://video.kpbs.org/video/2365973461/

Erik Tomasson photo from (presumably) the dress rehearsal of Kochetkova and Walsh

Yeah Terez! Thanks very much for this report. Frantziskonis and Czardas (or Csardas) are correct spellings. I'm past faulting Masha, or anyone else, for their nature-given build. That's life. One definitely has a preference for a particular look in a particular role or ballet, but there's not much benefit to belaboring the point. The biggest heroes always end up being the people who overcome all the "supposed to be like this" scenarios, and make their own way in life. There's a number of heroes in this company, and we're lucky to have them.

Bob Dylan finally accepts Nobel prize in literature at private ceremony in Stockholm https://www.theguardian.com/music/2017/apr/02/bob-dylan-finally-accepts-nobel-prize-in-literature-at-private-ceremony-in-stockholm I doubt he cares about the prize money, but if he completed his "lecture" requirement, the money could be donated to whatever cause Dylan wished to support (if indeed there is one). But he's not a man of the Establishment, even after years of "success". Coincidentally, I have of late been reading some early New Yorker articles, and interviews with Dylan (such as the controversial Nat Hentoff interview on behalf of Playboy magazine). Dylan's behavior actually makes perfect sense when compared to his past remarks and behavior - for better or worse, he hasn't changed all that much.

Thank you for this information, Lilia75. It is good to hear the perspective of a ballet-goer in Italy. In English, or at least in American English, "struggle" can be used in a very general sense to mean: "strive to achieve or attain something in the face of difficulty or resistance" OR "make one's way with difficulty" "Struggle" doesn't only refer to personal fighting or combat. I hope that makes sense. I have a feeling that Bolle would make an excellent Artistic Director, but directing a company is so different from dancing as a soloist. Nonetheless, Artistic Director seems like an inevitable career choice for Bolle.

Unfortunately, these tours have to be planned way in advance, and Neumeier probably thought he was bringing a sure winner - but the "climate" in Washington has changed a lot over the last couple of months.

Thank you, RG - that is definitely the same wire kokoshnik that we see in the later versions. This does make me wonder how companies are acquiring the costume and headpiece design. Or if there is a set of costumes that is constantly being passed among ballet companies. I wouldn't think the original costumes could stand up to all the adjustments needed to get things to fit properly on different dancers.

I'm too far away from DC to guess why Hamburg Ballet wouldn't be selling as well. The production values are high for The Little Mermaid. And the Lera Auerbach music is certainly listenable. It may well be that the DC dance audience is looking for something lighter, and more humorous to pay money for.

Yes, the Neumeier version is strictly adult in its themes: there's the "meta" story involving the mermaid character as stand-in for the "Poet"/writer figure (perhaps Hans Christian Andersen). The Poet (a man) feels unrequited love for the Prince character, and the Mermaid interacts with the Prince as a substitute for the Poet. (San Francisco is obviously not going to have any issues with a reference to homosexuality, but DC?) The Mermaid goes through a physically torturous transformation to be on the land with the Prince, but she is ultimately rebuffed, and this is emotionally shattering for the Mermaid (and the Poet overseeing this narrative). The final scene depicts the Poet achieving immortality through his Mermaid character - they are bound together for all eternity. I've only seen the SFB version, with Yuan Yuan Tan - and this is considered to be one of her seminal roles. The physical/emotional struggles of the Mermaid can be difficult to watch. I would say the effect is quite similar to watching Tan in Possokhov's RAkU - not for the faint of heart. Most of the audience probably feels like having a good stiff drink afterwards. ;)

What have you heard/read? The review of the Hamburg Ballet in DC is positive (not surprising, I suppose - they are a very good company). I wonder if DC isn't the right place right now, for this particular production.

Wow, the entire opening Chinese Conjurer solo from Parade. How great is that? Gary Chryst is tremendous in this role: the opening leaps/ his ballon, is impressive. The rest of the choreography is not nearly as interesting, imo. I would swear, though, that there is a color version of much of this same footage.

Here's the official statement on Vanessa and Davit - "Farewell Performance for Principal Dancers Davit Karapetyan and Vanessa Zahorian: The April 15, 7 pm performance of Swan Lake will be a special Farewell Performance for Principal Dancers (and married couple) Davit Karapetyan and Vanessa Zahorian, who will dance the leading roles. Added to the program will be a video tribute to both dancers." Interesting that Von Rothbart will be a young man - they're not casting the principal characters for this, so far.

LOL For the record, I'd be happy to see even the short statements such as, "I went, and had a nice time." Many thousands of people go to see SFB each season, but we don't get much in the way of written responses. I'm sure many audience members may not be confident in their writing skills, or don't like the idea of having their words hanging about on the forum for years, but I don't think those things prove to be worth worrying about. There are far worse things in the world - this should be one of the fun things to do.

Yes, it is indeed "dark" and emotionally wrenching. I don't really see TLM as being appropriate for a 10 year old, imo. The themes explored are not themes of childhood, but adulthood. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k27lDDj07Z4&list=RDk27lDDj07Z4&spfreload=10#t=3 "From the Director's Perspective" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zI3Huw6jkzs&spfreload=10 And a trailer of the Hamburg Ballet's version - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zxtpRpXkmE

Thank you Mme. Hermine - though difficult to hear, I enjoyed that first humorous story about Vaganova.

Nice work - interesting how many 'artists' decided to depict recognizable things, and how many used only abstract linework.

I was just reading the Hanna Wellbye review of ENB, which includes statements such as, "This is a sensible furrow for Tamara Rojo to plough when presenting 20th-century choreography in the English ballet market: the two Royal companies (London and Birmingham) have the Ashton/MacMillan British heritage repertoire more or less stitched up between them, and American greats like Balanchine and Robbins are – for both practical and stylistic reasons – probably still out of the company's reach in its current form. But by offering this European repertoire, Rojo opens herself up to the risk that her company might not perform it as well as their iconic originators on the Continent did (a particular danger in the case of Forsythe and Bausch), and to the potential hostility of London audiences, who have not always taken well to European choreographers like van Manen and Kylián." This reminded me again of the long-running issues British critics have had with Balanchine ballets. There just seems to be a cultural preference for certain approaches, themes and aesthetics, and Balanchine's works are not, to them, British. Speaking in general terms, the British character does not naturally gravitate towards Balanchine movements/aesthetics. Ironic that his choreography and techniques came to be regarded as so American, given that Balanchine came from Imperial Russia. But he and Danilova both quickly came to love the characteristics of American culture. Also ironic that Balanchine's American nemesis, writer John Martin, talked up American homegrown ballet, but really seemed to be stuck in a very Anglo-American aesthetic - emphasis on the Anglo part. From an article on Ashton that relates to this situation: "…when Kirstein invited Ashton to choreograph for the fledgling New York City Ballet in 1950 -- the result was the extraordinary "Illuminations," which, at the time, the New York critics loved and the British pundits disdained." "It's not easy to summarize Ashton's genius, but perhaps the citation for his Dance Magazine Award of 1970 gets to the heart of the matter: "A choreographer who rounds the corners of classic austerity with a romanticism so tender and so completely British in its good manners that we all proudly deem it international." [Uhhhh, no. "A romanticism so tender and so completely British in its good manners" would not be the part that makes it International. And I'm guessing an English writer made that statement.] "John Martin, who told him, as Ashton has recounted, that there was no place for classical ballet in the United States, which was at least close to the truth at the time. And so, the very year that Balanchine made his first ballet ("Serenade") for the company he and Kirstein had formed here, Ashton returned to England for good." [Thanks goes to John Martin for all his "helping" in building American ballet. I think Balanchine was happy with the way things turned out.] https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/style/1984/12/02/an-ashton-sampler/f87c3695-aa81-4faf-ac83-31d9118e598a/?utm_term=.5f5bea59f7a2

Cliché and stereotyping as the American way? At least the description makes me want to see what the production was like.

Terez, you get the gold star for seeing so many performances this year. I think that's great. But we're going to force you to tell us what you think about the program once you've seen it. ;) The video style definitely packages things in a manner similar to "In the Countenance of Kings", and the music falls roughly within the same category as the earlier Sufjan Stevens music. The video is speaking to a particular audience, imo - teenagers through thirty somethings that only come to the ballet once in a blue moon. But whether Thatcher's ballet actually has the same feel as the video presentation, that's the question.

Mathilde's arm dance, at Sensorium 2017: https://www.instagram.com/p/BR8zr0dline/?taken-by=lapetitefrench_

The Georgiadis-designed tutu is a stunner, and the headdress is also quite nice. I actually prefer the kokoshnik myself (because I just like the kokoshnik look - not because it is more appropriate - it is not). The wire kokoshnik must have been a pain to affix and dance with though. My understanding is that "Andrew" is a correct translation of the Slavic "Andrei" into English. But Andrei would not be the Hungarian name (Andrej? André?) Here's Elisabeth Platel as Raymonda in the Georgiadis costume:

I'm reviving this thread to point people to the very informative Conversations on Ballet interview with Alastair Macaulay regarding the history of Serenade. This is a very in-depth discussion, with lots of technical bits, but I think fans of this Balanchine ballet will find it to be very worthwhile. http://conversationsondancepod.com/2017/01/23/30-alastair-macaulay-nyt-chief-dance-critic-on-balanchines-serenade/ 'For the past 30 years Alastair has been researching George Balanchine’s Serenade and has recently complied his work into a Symposium at the New York Public Library entitled “Balanchine’s Serenade: An Evening of Films, Commentary, and Memories.”'

Here, btw, is the promo video for Sensorium 2017. It would be great to hear from anyone that took part in the event.