Michael

When did the dancers' last contract with the company expire? If, as it seems, there was a period when the dancers kept showing up despite having no contract at all, you can see how extraordinarily insecure and unstable this period has been over there.

It's perhaps not that important what Nijinsky was like and I think I'd fine tune my thought that the Rose is not a demi character role -- The type of dancer may not be what is important as much as that the dancer, who portrays the embodiment of a romantic and quasi-erotic dream, be a performer who can create such a reverie. You are right, there are many ways that could be approached. To answer Oberon, of all the recent NYCB dancers I can think of, the one I would have wanted to see try this role would have been Igor Zelensky. Off topic, but as more and more time passes I feel more and more how much City Ballet lost when he departed. (Come to think of it, he and Meunier would have been a wonderful cast and I would love to see Monique dance it now at ABT).

Gala Opening, 10/21 The Gala was an extremely mixed bill: the debut of the revival of Spectre de la Rose; the Nocturne from the revival of Les Sylphides (the full revival debuts tonight); pas de deuxs from Swan Lake and Le Corsaire; a Dying Swan from Irina Dvorovenko; Robbins’ Other Dances performed by Angel Corella and Alexandra Ferri; and a full length performance of Sinfonietta (Jiri Kilian). It was hard to see what held this all together as a program. After Spectre de la Rose, Kevin McKenzie delivered some extended remarks which showed that he is an extremely “nice guy” who displays an amazing amount of good nature combined with an equal amount of aesthetic confusion. (“Michael Fokine was the William Forsythe of his day”). This combination of good will and aesthetic confusion could be said to be an image of where the company is as a whole. Extremely briefly, some program notes which omit much: The revival of Fokine’s Spectre de la Rose featured Herman Cornejo and Xiomara Reyes. The sets and costumes are attractive 2d Empire. The piece was beautifully played by the orchestra but compromised fundamentally by its casting. Neither Cornejo nor Reyes is a very lyrical dancer, particularly in the way they use their upper bodies. But this ballet demands a lyric romanticism above all things. This is to take nothing away from either dancer. Cornejo is Puckish and dynamic, he jumps and turns explosively. Reyes foot work is elegant and delicate, her balancees are extremely musical. She moves well. But the character of the Rose is not that of Puck in Midsummer Night’s Dream. The qualities involvede are completely different. The Rose is not a demi character role and Cornejo is essentially a great demi character dancer. Neither Cornejo nor Reyes was able to convey what they needed to in this ballet. I cannot imagine that Ethan Stiefel will be better next week. The excerpted Nocturne from Les Sylphides (with Julie Kent, and a surprisingly good Maria Ricetto) was somewhat better. This received quite a lukewarm reception from the audience, however – The audience then woke up big time for the pas de deuxs and, in defense of the somewhat bizarre combination of programming, this gives you an idea of what this company is up against. A gala that came to life for the fouettes. Paloma Herrera and Marcello Gomes in the Black Swan pas de deux were particularly impressive and received a corresponding response. Herrera, once considered dramatically flat, has a new amplitude in her upper body. The highlight of the evening was Angel Corella and Alessandra Ferri in the Robbins. I have never seen Corella better, he has just that dramatic presence, that ability to exploit his very physical nature and to fill the stage that the Robbins demands and his wonderful performance was able to carry Ferri along, despite the obvious physical restrictions and weaknesses, particularly in her gorgeous feet, at this point in her long career. Sinfonietta is much heat and little light. David Hallberg and Marcello Gomes, in those big turning jumps side by side, were magnificent, though. Stella Abrera also gave a warm and fine performance, one whose subtle amplitude would have been well beyond her just a couple of years ago. In all, it is hard not to feel an air of crisis and instability about this company at the moment. The evening resembled, to a frightening degree, one of those “20th Century Stars” Galas picked up for the evening, instead of the work of a coherent ongoing institution. Without a permanent home, having lost major sponsors, its Board somewhat isolated and in transition, financially unstable from week to week, having cancelled recent tours – there is much, very much to worry about. We in the audience and the dancers in the company need a strong and vital ABT. It would be impossible for me to imagine the ballet scene in America, or indeed the World without them. We have taken this company for granted but it also needs to focus its vision and to clean house, especially where the finances and the foundation and vision of the company are concerned – both the physical foundation (as in where they perform, perhaps they should have accepted the Ken Centers overtures two years ago), the financial foundation (they should not have so lightly and nastily blown off Movado – how do you expect to attract new sponsorship when you treat the old benefactors in this way?) and the aesthetic vision (as in McKenzie’s lack of taste) underlying the entire enterprise.

I wonder, though, why that body type is such a star-vehicle type today? It's got to be partly cultural, something to do with the changing image of female beauty in society generally. You could say that Balanchine's choreography in particular requires this type, particulary for roles he made on Farrell. But the vogue for tall women dancers, whose waists -- instead of dividing their bodies equally in two -- are set high on their bodies, with the legs appearing proportionally longer, goes far beyond that choreography, that choreographer, his particular company, or even American companies in general. Diana Vishneyva's proportions, for example, are of this modern type, and there was once no bigger contemporary star in Russian Ballet. In prior discussions this emploi was termed "neo Classical" or "semi-character classique", indicating the institutionalization, almost, of the body type. It certainly is a good thing for a talented young woman dancer, these days, to be of those proportions.

It is amazing how well that tall, long legged body type tends to play and stand out. And how much it seems to be required at the moment. Look at how quickly Maria Kowroski was brought to the first rank at NYCB. And Michelle Wiles over at ABT.

Thank you for that one Dirac.

Gosh it's a difficult topic to address. Shooting from the Hip, which is the only way I can reply to this: Some of Wheeldon's recent work, particulary Shambards, resembles Martins' work a good deal. Re Martins himself there are several points. In no particular order -- 1. At times it looks like he has more than a little contempt or ambivilance for the classical tradition. At best, you might call it a love/hate relationship with both the Classical style of the Danish Academy and with the Balanchine Cannon he was force fed in NY and which he has been forced to do obeisance to thereafter. Examples of this would be his "Eight Easy Pieces" and "Eight More," which rather cruelly lampoon classicism and undermine the very thing they portray. It is possible to poke fun at things without cruelty, but that's not in his palette. 2. He is often also facile and trite. An examples would be the recent work, "Hallelujah Junction," two backlit pianos on stage, dancers doing his signature stepless step in front, all just a little bit too easy, a glittery surface with nothing much underneath. 3. Much of his work looks like it's been dashed off too quickly, often as a piece d'occasion. There are sometimes wonderful passages but it all needs a good edit -- but he's quite incapable of editing himself. An example is "Harmonielehre." There are what seem to be hours of tripe, then the blond girls come out barefoot in a luminous moment under a star spangled sky and it's suddenly to die for. Then just as aimlessly it ends and we are back to make work stuff to occupy the musical space. 4. Ultimately, the problem is often a lack of taste. See "Thou Swell," his Richard Rogers ballet which sets out to evoke the Art Deco era and ends up evoking a bad Bar Mitzvah at a catering hall circa 1975. Or "Chichester Pslams", so extremely ambitious yet resembling a bad day at the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. Makes you think he could choreograph the Miss America Contest. But he's very complex. It's a huge body of work and this barely scratches the surface.

Congratulations Carrie Riggins. Since Bizet 4th movement is not marked as a debut for her, anyone remember where and when she danced this before?

I'm glad to hear he's active at something. "Activity" is not a word which comes to mind when one thinks of Nilas Martins' dancing.

Two thoughts -- First, I was struck by how brilliantly Ashton uses the ballet vocabulary to convey dramatic action in a sort of heiroglyph form and I thought that the description of Cojocaru's manege of interlaced chainee and piquee turns, while "infelicitous" as Leigh said, was getting at that. Other more basic examples would be the use of the simple relevee, when Cinderella goes to her mother's portrait and raises her arms to it while on point in Act I, to express her simple emotional attitude. A ballet motion given full and perfect dramatic meaning. Or Cinderella's first dance with the broom, with its repeated ballonnees with a flexed foot, imitating what the dancing master had done, etc. Ashton is amazing in this way, no choreographer whom I know has ever expressed dramatic meaning in such a pure way by, as it were, embodying it in the use of the classical lexicon. So in all, I think Accocella was getting at a most central point. Second, that her attribution of this to the fact that Ashton came to the ballet late is purely intuitive on her part. It's an interesting stab to connect that as causation for this trait. But personally, I'm not sure and how could anyone be sure? (It was, though, from the writer's point of view, an interesting seguay, or device, to include that bit of biography in the article, and to transition to her analysis of that prime quality in his work).

Upon consideration, the trouble with the Pdd portion of the Royal's 1st Ashton program was that all of the pas's were more or less presented as vehicles to showcase the virtuosity of the pairs of star dancers cast in them -- This was, I think, a matter of intentional presentation, i.e., that was the way they were danced, framed, conducted, billed -- but also, IMO, this is also something implicit in the form -- And that's an interesting point. Isn't it difficult to see such excerpted pas de deuxs otherwise, whether Ashton or not? Each excerpted pas is, by nature, an out of context, hugely dramatic moment for the principal dancers in each ballet it is taken from -- It plugs right into the post-Soviet Ice Skating aesthetic and nearly invites the audience to react to the spotlit principal dancers more than would be usual in a full dramatic offering. We live in a Starstruck Age and I very much doubt that the general run of the audience can see them as other than Star vehicles. What's particularly interesting is that Ashton is very subtle in his dramatic climaxes and never loses sight of his characters and of the dramatic situation -- This could, of course, have been the point -- but really, I think it's at best an after the fact rationalization. What the Royal was really doing there was throwing some red meat to the Ice-Skating-Aesthetic audience, showcasing its stars, and by the way pandering to the lowest common denominator of contemporary ballet taste. Why not? Interesting debate there.

Flexibility can be of at least two kinds, and maybe more. In the back and in the amount of extension available with legs, from the hips. Some dancers have one without the other (Carla Korbes, for example -- long extension from the hips but quite stiff in the back, or Rachel Rutherford who is the exact opposite, much more flexibility in her back than at the hip). There are also some dancers who are just hyperextended in every joint -- Janie Taylor, for example. There is probably a golden mean (Alina Cojocaru, for example, back flexible yet still strong, big extension but able to restrain it). Too much flexibility can be a problem for a classical dancer -- It means that when they turn out at the hip they've got to stop somewhere arbitrarily, if there is too much turn out you cannot pliee worth a damn; it means also that the dancer must stop her or his extension in arabesque before their body naturally restrains their movement, less they demonstrate the curse of La Guillem. A back which is too flexible will also lack some corresponding strength and stability. Flexibility in both back or in extension is more necessary in some roles than in others. Cinderella's deep back bend in the recently here performed Act II is so extremely important to that role -- I cannot imagine a performance being as satisfying if the danceuse did not have a deeply flexible back, as Cojocaru has. Your example of Xiomara Reyes is a very good illustration of the trade offs -- in her Fille Mal Gardee, the Act II pas de deux after the lovers are united, a series of deep back bends after lifts where the male principal wafts the Ballerina from one side to the other, was an exposing moment for her as you are right, Canbelto, she does not appear to have a very flexible back. Yet she was wonderful in the role as an entirety and her dramatic gifts, compact balance, stability and speed lent itself very very well to other choreographic elements in the same role.

It’s an odd program in so far as it includes that series of four Pas de Deuxs as the middle “Act” between two more weighty works – Scenes de Ballet opening the evening and Marguerite and Armand closing it. On Thursday night, “Scenes de Ballet,” which I saw for the first time, got a satisfying and committed performance from Miyako Yoshida and Ivan Putrov -- particularly a lyrical and perfumed one from Yoshida. With the Ballet as a whole appearing as a surprisingly “Classical” (in the sense of opposite of “Modernist” – still the Modern is there, in particular, in the Formalism or Abstraction of the work) response to Stravinsky’s music, appearing to me to relate, in its spare and lyrical style, to the Ashton of Symphonic Variations. Guillem and Murru then closed the evening with a moving dramatic rendition of the Dame aux Camellias story. Murru certainly has gained great dramatic weight and technical authority since he was here two summers ago in Guillem’s Giselle. He was surprise number one of the evening for me. Surprise number two was how completely Guillem effaced her more spectacle-oriented-Ballerina-qualities in the dramatic requirements of her role. I think I remember that this ballet was made on Nureyev and Fonteyn? If so, that would explain why there is so much bravura dancing for the Ballerino (all of those passionate, long extensions and similarly passionate turns into extended arabesques) while the Ballerina gets no such technical fireworks but instead is required to deliver an intense dramatic quality, adapted to Fonteyn in her twilight years. A role which was a gift for Sylvie Guillem, as I said, as it forced her to suppress the “Sylvie” of the shrieking fans in favor of her character, which she did very well. She had an older, slightly “Used” look to her tonight, the look to her whole body being that which you often see in dancers red and blistered feet when they unwind the tape, which I thought real and which suited her very well. If it wasn’t real, if it was artifice, then that is only so much the more impressive. Paradoxically, this – a night completely without two o’clock penchees – is the night when I thought most she was a star. But in between -- What terribly trashy tripe and not even danced well. With the exception of Tamara Rojo in the Ondine Pas de Deux (very sexy in her diaphanous costume, a dancer with great dramatic weight, hauntingly dark in her beauty and with an amazingly strong classical technique to match, instantaneously quick with her feet) the entire middle portion of the program was such as to make you think you were not at an Ashton Celebration at all, but instead at one of those cheesy “Gala of the Stars,” or “Stars of the Twenty First Century” affairs, and not a terribly good one at that. Darcey Bussell appeared stiff at the waist and mannered; Marianela Nunez appeared a dancer of general technical weakness, ready to fall forward, and only rescued by her partner from doing so, at every other balance in arabesque; Mara Galeazzi and Mssr. Samodurov working very hard indeed at their Voices of Spring. Etc. And Ondine itself is an excerpt so brief and attenuated as to make you wonder how such a thing can be put on the stage at all. They kiss, they embrace, he or she dies -- It takes about a minute. I imagine Direction thought this was the way to please the fans of each of these dancers, and the fans of the “Royal Ballet” itself. There was and is, however, nothing particularly Ashtonian about this portion of the program. It was not representative, taken out of context at it was. And it was not well danced in any case. I thus think it did the Ashton program a disservice – and it certainly did one to this audience member’s viewing pleasure – to present this series of Gala Pas's as the middle third of the program.

That speaks volumes because it really is not possible. The best bet is to get rid of Herb's base of support on the current SPAC Board and then get rid of him. A year to do this in. Happy Hunting.

Is it not possible that City Ballet (or some people there) is as ambivalent as the SPAC Board about the Saratoga relationship? After all, a thousand seats a night for about twenty nights is but a million dollars in a Saratoga season. City Ballet has people on its Board who could easily write a tax deductible check for that without blinking or thinking -- For various reasons, primarily tax planning or foundation requirements, money has to be given away. If things have come to this pass, it's not only SPAC's responsibility. Both parties seem to be involved in some brinksmanship here and, if the "next season is the last one" thing holds, it will also be because NYCB has decided that things have a cost and that this one is only worth so much.

Interesting. And re Violin Concerto, by the way, Ansanelli had an absolutely brilliant performance on the final Sunday of the Season. With La Sylve not being far behind. Sebastien Marcovici and Nikolai Hubbe were their partners.

Thinking it over this week, it came to me what was wrong with Andrea Quinn's tempos in Theme and Variations -- Not only were the allegro variations too fast -- but the pas de deux was also much too slow. The super fast allegro you can live with. If the dancers keep up so much the better. But slowing the pas de deux down is a more serious problem because it takes the sparkle and pop right out of the Ballet. Hugo Fiorato in these final years could be infuriating too at times -- But it seems that in the Themes I remember best, the pas de deux was let to flow along at a fairly brisk pace that let the Ballerina show a very strong legato flow. It was definetely not what you would strictly call an adagio tempo, clearly something faster. I have no idea what the signature in the score literally calls for, but I think it's better danced at a faster pace. It's very beautiful when you let it move like that. Andrea Quinn takes it to the opposite extreme.

The issues which Gottlieb airs are not affected in any way, however, by the "Russian Emigre" remark. No one can argue that Robert Gottlieb, or the others who object, would have liked this any better had Eifman not been Russian or a large part of the audience not been so. As for the remark, Gottlieb's complete sentence is: "When the commission was announced, there was a lot of speculation about Martins' motives: an attempt to attract the Russian Emigre audience that, with its cigarettes and cellphones, flocks to the City Center to appplaud Eifman's efforts there? An attempt to flatter the NY Times, which is so greatly responsible for his success?" An unhappy and an extreme choice of phrases on RG's part, to be sure and a club given to those who disagree with his views. Not the first time he has mis-stepped in the heat of his intellectual passions. But it doesn't alter the seriousness of the issues he raises.

Musagete is probably no worse as a Ballet, or as choreography than half a dozen other things I've seen lately on that same stage, including Martins' recent "Chichester Psalms" (which aimed much higher and fell much lower) and last year's "Thou Swell" (which resembled Richard Rogers as presented at a Long Island Bar Mitzvah) The questions about Musagete, and what is fueling the emotional nature of the response, are not really questions of choreography or of drama at all, but instead are issues of whether this was proper and fitting and yes, even respectful of the memories of George Balanchine and Tanaquil Leclerq. It is not a question of "respect" for Balanchine's choreography, but of "respect" for the man himself. This was not the Joffrey Ballet or any other Company that presented this. It is the very Company that he Built and which offered Tanaquil Leclerq a sort of State Funeral last year which commissioned this work for the centennial of his birth, and presented this particular portrait of both him and of Tanaquil on this stage. This raises questions, as I said, quite apart from "was it good theater" or "was it good choreography" or "what do the critics say?" Personally I don't know the answer to these questions. But there are plenty of people around here who danced for Balanchine; who knew and loved Tanaquil; who worked for or around the company and the School, and there are plenty of audience members too, for all of whom his memory and these institutions are cherished and sacred . . . Was this Ballet appropriate with respect to this institution and his memory? There have been plenty of stinker Ballets here over the past years, plenty during Balanchine's reign itself, but none of them have raised this question. Everyone will answer it for himself or herself as a matter of personal taste and conscience. But in some ways I think it's the people who knew him best -- his dancers, coadjutors and friends -- who would have the most to say. And they aren't talking, at least in print.

Heavy handed as it is, the Apollo analogy implicit in the title, Musagete, shouldn't be lost. Three Ballerinas, Three Pas de Deux, Three Muses -- Wendy must therefore be at least in part a dancer. I seriously doubt that Eifman takes what he himself says very seriously.

I am a dissenting voice as to this. By disagreeing I do not mean to say that I am right or that anyone else is wrong. But I have to say that, while I thought the Elegie of Tschai Suite was very well performed this weekend in all three performances by Steven Hanna and Carla Korbes; and while Bouder and De Luz were wonderful in the Scherzo in both Matinees and Tinsley and Gold were very fine Friday night -- I thought Theme quite flat and strangely quiet in all three performances. And while I wasn’t there Wednesday night for Wendy’s Theme, by all reliable reports that was even worse, with Wendy taking a bad spill towards the end and the corps de ballet being quite unrehearsed that evening. I don’t think Angel Corella should have been cast opposite Miranda Weese. He’s not only too small for her. He neither moves on a big enough a scale for her, nor has the necessary muscle to handle her, particularly in the lifts, where the impression was one of strain – Corella laboring very hard to lift her for a moment before rather quickly and somewhat abruptly putting her down. But even more seriously, as a partner Corella restricted Weese’s ability to move large and to cut loose and just dance. Besides the great pas de deux, there is a good deal of tandem dancing in Theme for the principal couple side by side, as well as choreography in which the boy catches up with the girl and just sweeps her along. Watching these passages this weekend, one came to appreciate the big scale on which the NYCB men partner in this area. The result of matching Corella’s rather small style of partnering with Weese’s need for a big, strong partner in these passages was, perhaps predictably, a series of very cautious and small performances on her part. She seemed, like a pro, to reduce herself to what was possible. She also seemed to enjoy and to relate to Corella (perhaps a little more than he related to her). What you had was, therefore, a series of Themes with a good deal of perfume at moments, Themes in which the quiet passages for Miranda and the other girls were quite regal and beautiful. But one expects so much more from a Theme by this particular Ballerina. In his own two to three Bravura variations, Corella earned a great deal of applause but I really thought he seemed very sloppy with his feet, never really getting around on one of his double tours and faking it, and I also thought that he was often a little tilted towards stage left and involuntarily moving in that direction as the series of tours progressed. His brisee line, further, is not very brisee. He is a very handsome, a very winning dancer with a wonderful stage personality. On the other hand, he seems to have absolutely no pliee at the moment, even less than usual. He never has had much of a pliee to begin with, I’m quite familiar with him at ABT, but whatever he had has positively disappeared, particularly when coming down to the floor from his jumps. His pliee makes De Luz’s look positively deep and weighty. As for Miranda on her own in the open floor, I’ve seen her dance her first variation in Theme much better in the past. All three days, that devilishly fast and tricky first solo with its super quick batterie, alternated with air turns in pas de chat where the Ballerina lands spotting to the corner, before another instantaneous quick escape into beats with one extended leg, were muddy and slurred, something you rarely see from Miranda Weese, whose gift it is usually to show each motion in a complex enchainement very clearly. On Friday I thought it was Andrea Quinn’s impossible tempo (and to be sure Quinn conducted Theme inconsistently and poorly all weekend) which was to blame, but this variation did not improve much over the two matinees. Saturday’s was her best in this regard. Her second big solo, however – the one after the quiet bit with the girls, when she is left alone on stage and the music picks up into a fast little march, with the Ballerina finally launching into a diagonal of big flying pas de chats, landing in and escaping from fifth position for each phrase, was as usual unbelievably brilliant -- I also have seen Theme dozens of times over a score of years, and no one I know dances, has ever danced, or I think will ever dance that particular variation as well as she does. Bravo once again. So Theme this year, performed for the first time in Three Seasons, was better than the last time around, which people will remember as a very difficult season when there was no experienced Ballerina to cast in Miranda’s absence, but no more than that. Mainly I think because I was expecting so much more -- Theme is, as Mary Cargill once put it, one of the Sacred Ballets, and Weese’s Theme has been sublime in the past -- I was disappointed. But as the audience reaction was quite positive, I’m pretty sure I am in a minority as to the disappointment, with the principals today receiving an ABT-like ovation at the end, and Miranda even being tossed two bouquets. She looked delighted.

Bobbi you are right to note that, the ovation was prolonged, loud and Standing in the orchestra. With the loudest, most vocal standing ovations being reserved for Boris himself, at least one solo curtain call for "The Master," "Bravo Maestro!", and for Robert Tewsley, the sole solo bow (at the end) I've seen by a dancer at the State Theater in years, if ever. Eifman has a public that regards him thus (which, being a matter of taste, is their right) and which filled the theater last night. The same very Hot response to Theme and Variations, in fact, which got a rousing reception. What goes around comes around. As for the difference in the audience, two new ones for me -- a gentleman in front of me who actually made three cell phone calls DURING Musagete, and a couple next to me who began checking their programs and conducting a loud and continuous conversation in Russian throughout the entire Polonaise at the end of T & V. What the Hell -- They paid the same money I did.

Theme had the look of a dress rehearsal. Both the corps de ballet in disarray and the air that Corella and Weese had had little, if any, chance to rehearse this. I trust it might get better the next two days. Miranda seemed to lead him through the partnering in the second half . . . "This is the way I want to dance it." He became visibly confused, in two of his variations, between the the ABT version of the choreography and that he was dancing. But the real vilain of Theme was Andrea Quinn. Last night is the first time I have really, grievously missed Hugo Fiorato. (I have a bad feeling about this -- having seen Maurice Kaplow conduct an entire evening on Tuesday -- who in Hell is going to replace Hugo?). It was not only that Quinn set some of the tempos unreasonably, unbelievably fast, but she set them inconsistently. After a measured opening Theme that had everyone comfortable, she suddenly jerks the orchestra into 5th gear (pops the clutch, as it were) during Miranda's first variation and then you're stuck with that racing tempo which distorts the sound of the music even. Weese, of all dancers, is very comfortable with fast tempi, but found herself behind. No one could have kept up. For the rest of the night both she and Corella had this way of looking at Quinn. When they got to set themselves at the beginning of a variation, and Quinn would take her cue from them a little bit, it worked. When they had to wait for and then catch up with what she did, heaven help them. Korbes played the Elegie very "dramatique," very emotionally, seeming to plead with Hanna for her emotional life. I thought the dramatic reading interesting and acceptable. Carla (who is extremely pliable in the hips) does not have a particuraly flexible back, however, and this is a role which requires repeated and very deep back bends. At least once on her knees at the end; and twice when she was spun directly from a deep arabesque into very deep kneeling back bends, with the Poet holding both her arms from behind, the choreography was very exposing for her. Not her strongest moments and choreographic climaxes which were missed. Rachel Rutherford, further, simply does not move well enough to perform that Waltz the way it should be. You want someone who can really move through those repeated balancees, but Rachel is a little stiff right now and tries to make up for it by being luscious in her upper body. If I were King for a day, I'd consider Teresa Reichlen for the Elegie and Korbes for the Waltz. Or Alexandra Ansanelli in Elegie, where she would have both the flexibility in the back and where the role would suit her unconventional and unclassical lines, the Elegie being very forgiving in that direction. It is not really about Classical line, that Elegie. But this is fine tuning and look, I'll take Carla in the role forever. The Scherzo was beautifully performed. Both by the principals, Tinsley and Gold (though he is a little small for her) and the corps de ballet of the taller girls who can really move and dance. Sterling Hyltin, Genevieve Labean, Katie Bergstrom, Georgina Pascagouin, etc. Wendy's pas de deux (and then pas de trois) as Mourka the Cat in Musagete was the best thing about that piece. It is almost scary how inventive that choreography is for her, Eifman taking Wheeldon's Polyphonia one better as to Wendy's pliability (can you imagine any other ways to lift a dancer? At one point, the pas de deux becomes a pas de trois and Hanna, on his back, partners her in layouts above him by supporting her with his two feet, Tewsley, also on his back, passing her to Hanna with HIS feet -- it sounds worse than it looks, or does it?). After that, it was a descent into purer and purer Hokum. No one who has seen much of Eifman would be surprised by Musagete. In retrospect, it is just what you would have expected. A big problem is that when Eifman purports to choreograph faux or fausse Balanchine . . . -- and there is a great deal of that, the structure of Musagete has the corps de ballet performing fausse Balanchine while the Balanchine character wanders about the stage choreographing and correcting it, while falling in love or in lust with his danseuses, and/or leading battalions of his men in various masses of steps, all of this then being interwoven with scenes in which the Balanchine character collapses in despair, writhing on a chair on casters, which an attendant shoves around the stage for particularly despairing gestures, or writhing upon a collapsed Ballet Barre after failing to consummate himself upon his Elusive Muse, Maria as Suzanne (thank God it wasn't Darci, though I'm sure she's always wanted to play Suzanne), the Barre only momentarily juxaposed upon his body in the same way Don Q's lance is used in Eifman's Don Q -- He just doesn't do Fausse Balanchine very well at all. In fact, it just looks bad, not even like Bad Balanchine, but just plain Bad. If you've seen Eifman's Don Q, it bears the same relation to Balanchine as Eifman's sudden flashes back and forth to scenes in the Petipa version do to Petipa. Alexandra Ansanelli did splendidly, I thought, and gave herself 150% to what was given her, coming out of it all with as little mauvais odeur attached to her as possible. As did Robert Tewsley. A tour de force in the sense of feat of strength. I can't imagine there was a great deal of competition for these parts, not exactly a line forming, although they led to great ovations and were, in a sense, star vehicles. It was just to put the dancers in a quandry. Be a star but be in bad taste. Tess Reichlen had a wonderful evening, though. He put her out front in almost everything and gosh did she look good, after looking just as good in the Elegie of Tschai Suite # 3.

I don't know that it's true that Peter's recent roles for women or recent pas de deuxs are all for Heather Watts clones -- In Stabat Mater, and in the Ballet done to the Strauss songs last year (what was the name) and in a bunch of others one could mention there is a good deal of rather moonstruck and sentimentally very soft material. His recent and extensive work on Janie Taylor also seems to me to have had a quality drawn very much from her rather unique, not to say strange persona.

The following probably has few specific conclusions germane to the discussion, but I think this statement is much much much too narrow in its context, though not in its conclusions. I'd start much wider out and back. The reason we make Art is on the Anthropological Level. Humankind (woman-mankind) is the Animal Which Makes Art. This more than anything else is the thing that distinguishes us from all other species. (Yes, Birds will take tinsel to make brightly colored nests, and this bears a relationship to our activities but it's not on our scale). I doubt there has ever been a culture without its Art. You could call it an Anthropological "Need" but even that demeans it. When you do things basic and instinctive to your kind, you don't do them so much out of "Need" as out of your very Nature. Art is a Necessity of Human Nature. That says nothing, of course, about the very specific and culturally determined ways in which that Nature is manifested in any given instance. That is the level at which Art starts to fulfill a particular culturally determined "Need." When you have a surfeit of things that meet your "Needs," you can start to call them "Wants." "I Want this or that to meet this Need." Now, having wandered so far afield, I wonder what is left of the original topic? Flipsy, I would love to see (I want and need to see) some contemporary pas de deuxs which go somewhere beyond bump and grind (Martins), or grind and strangle (the recent Wheeldon), or swoon and embrace (choose what recent work you will -- see Sean Lavery's Romeo and Juliet pas de deux next week, in fact).