yudi

Yes, here it is: The Plisetskaya Head-Kick

I feel so sorry for her.

Actually, I saw iPhone-camera, DC flashing, ..., all over the theater from Orchestra to the Fourth Ring during the curtain calls after every show. Logically and lawfully, I don't see the reason not to allow the audiences to take pictures before and after the performances. Maybe, the costume designs are copyrighted? The ushers at David Koch treat people differently. When I took the pictures after Krysanova & Hallberg's S.W., I tried different settings on my camera to get good results. Had few trying, an usher behind me told me FRIENDLY: no more. ... OK, I put my camera in my bag. For Smirnova & Chudin's S.W., I observed that the usher lady standing nearby door looked very harsh and intolerant. I didn't bother to take my camera out at all. When I walked out the theater, I saw and heard that usher and a big man, tall and fat, yelling and fighting loudly for shooting during the curtain calls. After the performance of Krysanova and Chudin's D.Q., I run to a location in the front so that no usher could reach me easily and I took quite few pictures.

Thanks! About swan's arms. Every time when I saw Krysanova dancing, either on stage or in YouTube, I would think of that Maya Plisetskaya had said: I have bigger hands, so I dance not only using my arms, but also my hands. Krysanova has very beautiful arms and long hands. She dances with expressive and fluid arm and hand movements. When I watched Smirnova dancing in S.W. I also paid attention to her "swan arms". She certainly has different style of arm movements, pretty much like some of other Mariinsky swans, e.g., Lopatkina. But, her arms are too boney, elbow joints are too big. Sometimes I feel very funny and uncomfortable to look at them that swan wings are not supposed to be so skeletal. I truely hope that ballerinas should not be getting too skinny.

The three Swan Lakes: 7/19/2014 2:00:00 PM Anna Nikulina Artem Ovcharenko 7/19/2014 8:00:00 PM Ekaterina Krysanova David Hallberg 7/20/2014 2:00:00 PM Olga Smirnova Semyon Chudin Nikulina and Ovcharenko both young and tender, and in relatively petty sizes. On stage they looked like pure teenage Princess and Prince. In Act II , there was a scene that Odette and Siegfried were in the center, surrounded by 24 'bigger' swans which tutus ruffling synchronously. What a fairytale scene! I could not see the same visual effects in Smirnova and Chudin's S.W., because I was completely attracted by two of them, trying to figured out why some people say Smirnova is a ballet prodigy, and paid no attention to the corps simultaneously. In Act II when Smirnova just came out to meet Chudin, I suddenly had delusion that they were dancing in the Diamonds. When Smirnova moved her head, neck, back, arms, bending her up body, she looked almost the same as in Diamonds. Moreover, Smirnova is a more sophisticated sad swan in S.W., other than a happy swan in Diamonds, she has more complex face expression for her Odette/Odile. Smirnova is a very beautiful and competent swan, though, she is not as virtuoso as Krysanova. I found Smirnova is an intrinsic dancer, that I mean, when she dances, her body moves and communicates with the music, but not audience. Probably, that is why some people think she is "cold". As I wrote earliear : Krysanova was spectacular as Odette/Odile. Her fouette sequence with straight hight leg, multiples, wings/arms brandish, plus the straight traveling from the back to the front of the stage, all in breathtaking speed, made a very strong aggressive and forceful Odile. After her impressive fouette, the applause burst out like thunder. I don;t know what was happening about Zakharova and Hallberg's S.W. during the opening night. Also, frankly speaking, I could not tell what is the chemistry between partners. When Hallberg danced with Krysanova, he was a very sweat, warm and careful Prince, he and Krysanova danced the PDD in act II very beautifully, very moving, which made me tearing and crying. Their S.W. is the best among S.W.s I saw in theaters ever. Ok, for the boys. They were all very good. They all did light and high jeté, stable and beautiful Pirouettes, having handsome and graceful stage manner. Was there some difference? Chudin is more serious and earnest, Hallberg more natural and genuine, Ovcharenko more pure and boyish.

I didn't take picture during any performance.

I just finished my 10 days of "Mad about Bolshoi" NYC trip. From July 19-27 I watched 3 S.W.s, 3 D.Q.s and 2 Spartacus. Although I can only describe very few ballet techniques and performance skills, I enjoyed all the shows so much, getting so excited that I failed to sleep some night during the trip. I would like to post some of my impressions and thoughts, though immature, even ignorant, however, I have been benefited from your discussion all the time, I am hoping to get more educated. Here are some pictures I took during my Bolshoi week. To take the pictures in the David Koch Theater, I had to play guerrilla game with the service ladies, and not very successful.

I knew the story that Tchaikovsky didn;t like the very first version of ballet Swan Lake. I always wondering if Tchaikovsky would like this Grigorovich's version of Swan Lake. Over all, IMHO, G's Swan Lake is a depressing production. The sad ending is OK for me, I don;t really have preference for happy endings of S.W. However, the opening scene is also gloomy. It is about a dismal indoor crowning ceremony, but not a happy outdoor party in a bright garden, e.g., in the Mariinsky's S.W.. The whole scene design of G's S.W. makes it repressing. The main color tone in Act 1 & 3 are gray-yellow and brown, that makes the stage sets and costumes look like cultural relic excavated from deep earth. The big heavy curtain hanging down from stage top compels the stage being stifled. I, sort of, like G's choreography for character dances in Act 3: one bride, a leading ballerina, dances with supporting corp dancers. Bolshoi has so many excellent dancers, this choreography gives more chances for more solo dancers to make bloody show off their talents. Is it wonderful?!

I completely agree with that. Last night Krysanova was spectacular as Odette/Odile. Her fouette sequence with straight hight leg, multiples, wings/arms brandish, plus the straight traveling from the back to the front of the stage, all in breathtaking speed, made a very strong aggressive and forceful Odile. After her impressive fouette, the applause burst out like thunder. I saw her doing this last year in London, but the applause was not so crazy like last night. Americans are indeed more wild than the Europeans. I have seen on YouTube in D.Q. Krysanova's turns and steps were so fast that the conductor would try to catch her. Last night she did it again. However, her Odette Adagio was very slow, even slower than normal in any others Swan Lake. In the Adagio her whole body singed in a warm and sad tone, the music slowly flow through her body. She made me cry! Conductor Sorokin seemed to be moved also. The music just sounded very unusually beautiful, slow and soft. That was another breathtaking moment. The whole theater was quiet, stunned. One thing I would like to mention, I found that all Odiles, Krysanova, Olga Smirnova and Nikulina did the fouette in a traveling way, going from the back to front of the stage, as Zakharova. I guess the choreographer made this on purpose. At lease, it makes sense to me that Odile is making an offensive and provocative approach. I have heard that the stage of Bolshoi has a slope, the back is 1 meter higher than the front, which many dancers love and take advantage to make Grand jeté jumping cross down the floor higher and lighter. I don;t know if the David Koch Hall has the same slope-stage. If not, doing the same traveling-down fouette could be challenging for Bolshoi ballerinas.

I also just came back from the matinee Swan Lake with Nikulina and Ovcharenko. I actually liked it. Nikulina was a tender, sad, shy and shaky Odette, different from others. Over all, their performace made my blood run to my face and head, though, not moved me. I am an ordinary ballet goer, cannot make comments as you, who have years of professional experience in dancing or reviewing ballet. The impression I hade over for this performance was good. I guess the Russians would think: ge, the Americans are sooooo picky! I will see Swan Lakes of tonight and tomorrow. After comparing, I could learn more; hope so.

Good! Looking forward to seeing Rodkin as Espada in D.Q. Although he is one of the fastest rising stars whom Bolshoi is trying very hard to push & promote, and to sell, I feel disappointed for Bolshoi not to send their best Espada, Murcuriev, in the tour. Last summer I missed Alexandrova and Zakharova because of injuries. Hope it would not happed again this year.

Don't they tell the casting for Espada, a toreador in Don Quixote? I am very happy to see that Krysanova would perform in all three ballets, especially in Swan Lake and Don Quixote. Krysanova has the most beautiful and expressive arms and hands among Bolshoi ballerinas. I was lucky to buy a returned ticket to see Krysanova and Skvortsov dancing in Swan Lake last year. I love their performances very much. Although Skvortsov would not come to New York this year, to see David Hallberg dancing with Krysanova in S.W. may not be bad at all. Krysanova is simply the best Kitri in Bolshoi now. She seems to do all the difficult jumping and turning effortlessly. It would be very interesting to see how Chudin's Basil going. From what I saw in YouTube, Chudin is proudly holding a long neck straight all time, looking like there is a stick on his back and neck. That didn;t bother me when I saw him dancing in Diamonds last year. I was very impressed by his graceful jumping. I hope to see in D.Q. his neck & back would be more flexible.

I saw a complete record of Ratmancky's Cinderella for Mariinsky on YouTube: D. Vishneva as Cinderella, Y. Kondaurova as Stepmother, V. Shklyarov as Prince. Vishneva & Kondaurova both are absolutely amazing! There is a close-up shot of Vishneva's face expression in Act I, vivid and moving. She is a such believable Cinderella. Kondaurova's Stepmother is gorgeous! She is so exciting & funny that she made me laughing from beging to the end.

Ever since her world premiere in 1964, the National Ballet of China has presented about 2000 performances of the ballet The Red Detachment that has still retained the record as the hottest Red ballet in China. (The hottest White ballet is Swan Lake, as you all know.) To celebrate the 50 anniversary of her debut, the NBC made a plan to take a major nationwide tour of The Red Detachment, and all performances would take places in Poly Theaters. Including shows in Beijing and her "hometown" Hainan early this year, the NBC is totally to give 50 performances of The Red Detachment in 2014. At the same time the NBC would perform John Neumeier's ballet THE LITTLE MERMAID along the tour. 2014/5/21—22，Shenzhen，《The Red Detachment》 2014/5/25—26，Chongqin，《The Little Mermaid》 2014/5/28—29，Chongqin，《The Red Detachment》 2014/6/01—02，Wuhan，《The Little Mermaid》 2014/6/04—05，Wuhan，《The Red Detachment》 2014/6/08，Wenzhou -《The Red Detachment》 2014/6/10—11，Ningbo -《The Red Detachment》 2014/6/14—15，Wuxi -《The Red Detachment》 2014/6/17，Taizhou -《The Red Detachment》 2014/6/20，Kunming -《The Red Detachment》 2014/6/22，Hefei -《The Red Detachment》 2014/6/25—26，Qingdao -《The Red Detachment》

Thank you for your wonderful report and review! "I've been tooting the horn for Krysanova and Skvortsov" to my friends living in D.C., who are scientists and engineers like me. I pushed them to go to see this ballet and told them: the best performing team - Krysanova and Skvortsov; the super star team - Zakharova and Halberg; the new star team - Nikulina and Ovcharenko. They doubted: you really know that? I am going to send your writing to them and say: I told you so!

On the second night, May 16th, 2014, a very young ballerina Qiu Yunting made her successful debut as Kitri, her partner is a principle of NBC Sheng Shidong. Qiu Yunting was awarded with Golden Prize for Junior Group of Classical Ballet in the Beijing International Ballet Competition 2013, and also offered with Bolshoi Theatre Internship Award. Last year I saw her performance in D.Q. as a Pride Maid, very impressed! She has slender figure, stable technique and intense passion. Especially, she is very calm on stage, natural and unrestrained. Though, she is only 18 years old, she looks very confident, not scared of anything on stage. Like the another Chinese ballerina Like Cao Shuci, they both were trained in the Beijing Ballet Academy. If they would have chances to work on more challenging roles, to dance more on international stages, they could soon be super stars. Photographer: Wang Chongwei (摄影：王崇玮) There is a video, in which she is dancing Kitri's Variation: Yunting Qiu - 2013 Selections - Classical variation on YouTube:

In the evening of May 15th, 2014 the dancers from the National Ballet of China and the Paris Opera Ballet present ballet Don Quixote (Rudolf Nureyev version) together in the famous Centennial Memorial Hall of Peking University. This performance is one of programs for the event to celebrate the 50 anniversary of establishing China & France diplomatic relations. The stars of the evening were the prima ballerina of NBC, Zhang Jian as Kitri and the principle of POB, Karl Paquette, as Basilio. Photographer: Han Jun (摄影：韩军) 10 years ago Zhang Jian and Karl Paquette were dancing together in ballet Sylvia performed in the same theater. Early this year, they performed PDD in Carmen at the Paris Garnier theatre as dancing parterres again. In an interview Karl said: "I feel very excited and happy to parter with Zhang Jian again. She is an excellent dancer with exquisite technique, appealing sensibility and artistry. I am very honored to have this chance to work with her and NBC. Basilio's personality is in line with me, I am very fond of this very difficult role. Maybe, this is my last chance to dance as Basilio. I hope that Chinese audiences will enjoy our show." Photographer: Han Jun (摄影：韩军) We are very sure the audiences' responses in that evening have not disappointed Karl. The theater hall was 95% filled with young and energetic ballet goers. From the first moment when Karl Paquette holding his guitar showed up on the stage, till the last minute when the PDD was finished, The audiences were enchanted by their dazzling technique and passionate performance, the applauses and cheering were almost non-stop. Zhang Jian and Karl Paquette brought the house down. The other dancers casted this evening are Don Quixote: Dong Jingsheng Sancho Panza: Chen Yi Espada, a toreador: Sun RuiChen Street Dancer & Mercedes: Lu Na Friends to Kitri: Wang Ye & Wang Chen Cupid: Wang Qi The Queen of the Dryads: Liu Xuechen More photos from this performance are available at the NBC's website: http://www.ballet.org.cn/news_detail/newsId=7714f800-f380-4941-bab8-1cef5088ee49.html

The Festival Director, Nigel Redden, was director of the NEA dance program for five years in the 1980s, so I would have thought he would understand the importance of casting announcements in ballet (even if he perhaps doesn't approve of the obsession...). I would have guessed, e.g., that a lot of people would like to know when Hallberg is dancing, so they can compare his performances with Bolshoi and ABT. I thought the Bolshoi did decent job for their London tour of last year. Not only they published the casting before selling tickets to public, but also they made excellent replacements in Swan Lake, the Flames of Paris and Jewels, after their big stars Maria Alexandrova and Alexander Volchkov got injured. However, this year for their HD broadcasting of Lost Illusions, Bolshoi did screw up again. The organizers and promoters for Bolshoi's London tour seem to be much more experienced than the NY festival organizers. I have read some reports about how demanding Mr. & Mrs Victor and Lilian Hochhauser were on programs and castings. Thank you so much, Mr. & Mrs Hochhauser, for your wonderful job! Otherwise, I would not have the chance to see the BEST ballet performances in Bolshoi's The Flames of Paris. I have a doubt that Bolshoi may want to bring in some outside dancers to join their tour, but the deals have not been made. The management of Bolshoi have to deal with too many great dancers and too much inside politics. I just hope they would not mess things up. I have bought tickets for SW, DQ and Spartacus for myself, and for my friends, lots of tickets, anyway!

Thank you for all of your responses, especially diane and Stage Right for your own experiences. I studied this topic more last weekend by searching for information, watching video clips and listening to the record. But I need more time to understand how "modern dance punches the dancer;s body", and "switching from one to the other makes you fight with your body", because I have had no any dance training, even no one dancing class, which makes me hard to understand the physical impact of modern dancing to a dancer's body. From my observation, in modern ballet the dancers often bend, stretch and twist their bodies a lot, occasionally to extreme and limit, which could make me feel uncomfortable sometimes. Is that really good for dancers? Maybe, it is necessary to have such extreme expression for extreme psycho and emotion? BTW, when I was searching for more modern ballet videos on YouTube, I found Svetlana Lunkina's channel, her own channel! Svetlana Lun'kina - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7_uDNBJ8bZJXLTxs_CkfFA I hope she is happier now.

Last weekend I found an article "A Conversation with Kirill Melnikov" by Marc Haegeman: http://www.danceview.org/interviews/melnikov.htm In this interview K. Melnikov talked about his dancing experience from Kirov Ballet to Europe, from classical to modern. I am particularly interested in his opinion on "switching from one to the other makes you fight with your body," which is very new to me. Could someone give me some examples to illustrate his point? I am wondering if or not his experience is also applies to other ballet dancers?

Thank you very much for the information! Here is another picture of Joelle Mazet, taken in 2011, when she taught at the Guangzhou (Canton) Ballet Theater, China. Also, during 2007 & 2009, she was invited to teach ballet and French folk dance in Beijing Dance Academy. More pictures of her teaching at The National Ballet of China can be found at http://www.ballet.org.cn/news_detail/newsId=044c089f-3e94-4733-a8aa-29d72075693e.html On the page they say: Joelle Mazet is a renowned French Ballet School instructor. She has been teaching French School of ballet classes around the world. During the visit to the National Ballet of China, she would teach the dancers and interns in a join-project co-sponsored by the NBC and the Beijing Dance Academy, and take part in rehearsal works for some repertoires of the NBC. Thank you everyone in the forum!

Do you all think the Bolshoi's modern ballets would not sell well to the western? They were putting The Golden Age in HD broadcast schedule of last season, then canceled and replaced it. I was hoping to see it in the coming season. I also like to see a new composition of dancers for The Bright Stream. I saw the complete ballet The Golden Age (2007) on youtube, I like it very much. It is mostly about the love story of Boris and Rita - no need to think about Soviet, and blah, blah, … There are many innovative movements in four duets danced by Boris & Rita, very beautiful. I love to see them on HD screen. I feel very disappointed there is no major modern ballets from Bolshoi in their next season's HD broadcasting. Even no more Ratmansky's ballet?!

NO The Golden Age, still not ready?

FINANCIAL TIMES (on-line) has published a reviewing article Lady of the Camellias, Bolshoi Theatre, Moscow By Laura Cappelle She gives ★★★★★ for See: http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/2/dc3b2460-b406-11e3-a102-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2x5zKgndZ It would be very interesting to know how the Russian audiences thought about this ballet.

Frankly speaking, I think Krysanova would be too shining on the stage as Prudence so that she would overshadow most Marguerites, except if Marguerite was performed by D. Vishneva. Krysanova has been in a Star Gala Tour, A.D. Manuel Legris, in France & Belgium from 1st to 21st of March. http://balletalert.invisionzone.com/index.php?/topic/38279-star-gala-tour-ad-manuel-legris-in-france-belgium/ Actually, Merkuriev was scheduled to be in the tour also. Obviously, someone pulled him back for Lady of the Camellias. I am sure he would be happy to dance as Monsieur Duval for challenging, although, IMO, Zakharova as Marguerite, Merkuriev - Armand, (Krysanova, Tikhomirova) - (Manon, Prudence) , Skvortsov - Monsieur Duval and the rest of Premiere casting could be the best Bolshoi star team for this ballet.