Jack Reed

I wonder whether their Balanchine will look as vital as PNB's Jewels did in Seattle in October.

"The rep" for this program or for this season? We have three Balanchines this season all together. (Plus his The Nutcracker, which I'm not too proud to admit I sometimes take for granted.) I'm not well acquainted with the details of Morphoses repertory, other than that it was mostly fresh-made on those dancers, right? And I'd like to go on record as not being opposed to the work of living choreographers; it's just that my experience with them has more often been disappointing than with some older artists who have passed from the scene personally, whether their art has or not. The current ones often seem to be chasing after concepts, like current cultural trends or fashions in dance, and I happen to enjoy most dancing that offers the appearance that the dancers are doing what the music tells them to do. What it tells them right now. Balanchine and some others build in that possibility. (Although it's still possible to rehearse his ballets to the point of perfect routine. Or routine perfection? That tends to bore me, either way you put it.) "Others" including, not incidentally, Mr. Wheeldon sometimes, whose Polyphonia I watched my usual way, to see how the dancers heard their music, gave me a good time last season. Maybe it's both that we miss Villella's programming to some extent and we miss the style of the dancing under his direction. (Polyphonia seemed to me the best - most freshly - danced item on that program last season. For me, the others suffered from what bothers Levin; in my words, smooth clarity and not so much "blood.") Villella put on programs that didn't draw me, like the Petipa "Don Q" or his own ballroom project or a couple of Jimmy Gamonet's ballets I'd rather forget. If Levin seems mixed up, I think it's because she has lots to say in a short review, contrasting the old MCB and the new - she regrets the loss of urgency, edge and power in "Movements" (as she calls it; we called it "Symphony Three" back in the day, when "Movements" denoted a different ballet, FWIW), criticizing the newer smoothness in that and Sinatra, while praising the benefits of the company's precision and clarity in Mercuric Tidings. She's writing about two companies with the same name.

I plan to see this program in Ft. Lauderdale next month. Symphony in Three Movements is the main draw, so I was delighted to read how much you liked it, writer. (Have you seen MCB's promo clip of that from five years ago? I wonder how what you just saw compared, for energy and attack and vigor and vitality and so on, with that?) We're in agreement about the less satisfactory programing at MCB currently. If you live in Chicago as I do, you already have a good reason to visit Florida in the wintertime, but I've always planned my winter breaks according to the MCB repertory, making as many as four trips one season several years ago. But this season and last I had to look hard to find one that I thought would do. I like the other two items, too, but this program doesn't "make sense" - they don't go together. Under Villella there was "modern" sometimes, but usually one Taylor or something between two ballets - real ballets - and one program with one full-length ballet - Giselle or the Petipa Don Quixote, for example - usually at the end of the season. (Conventionally we don't count The Nutcracker in these discussions of season repertory, although I consider Balanchine's among his best and among the best "full-lengths" to be seen anywhere.) So, yeah, why? What goes into the decisions? As Cristian implies, MCB's new artistic director has her own interests and tastes, different from her predecessor, Edward Villella, and her programing will reflect that. (Also the way the dancers dance, it's starting to look to me, and to Jordan Levin, the Miami Herald's estimable critic, and a credit to one of the country's better newspapers, IMO.) How different remains to be seen. What was "normal for Miami" is a little hard to pin down, and a little beside the point, too. But I also gather marketing - what marketers think - may enter into it more than it used to. I'm not privy to the decision-making, but I gather some say, "They have to put on what we can sell," and, "We want newbies," - this is not just in the context of MCB - and if they don't think they can sell what people with some developed tastes and preferences like to see, we're not going to see as much of it offered. (As far as I can see, marketers aren't ballet fans, don't look at it from the "consumer" point of view, and sometimes they act as though they don't want us "oldbies" in there.) (Some MCB publicity pictures I've seen don't cheer me up, either.)

Good point. If memory serves, Mischa led the tribute to another dancer with whom that was much less of a problem: Fred Astaire. Balcony? (The fourth balcony?) I caught that too. Back in the day - the day of Balanchine and Kirstein - the top-of-the-house prices were kept low enough that people of modest means could see nearly every show from up there, lots of them young. There was a theory that some would develop into supporters of some substance eventually, but in the meantime there were those who descended to the Promenade at intermission to help identify the corps girls - sitting downstairs, I had worked it out to an uncertainty of four names, just seeing multiple performances and studying the program, but there were those from up there who knew everybody in the company. And to straighten out which version of Serenade we had just seen - some sequences would be substituted, or a part would be divided up differently among multiple dancers, so that one fan claimed to have added up fourteen permutations or combinations of these adjustments. That was the Old Audience. That was what Arlene Croce called "our civilization". Nearly everything seems to have changed, not that I'm there much anymore. Isn't the basic reason that NYCB just doesn't have the drawing power it did? Tickets are expensive too, owing to the lack of the former subsidies. It's not all NYCB's fault. It's everywhere, no? But in the day, there they were, "Patty" McBride, as we used to call her affectionately, among them. (Her 1978 Coppelia, with Helgi Tomasson and staged by Danilova and Balanchine, was broadcast on Live from Lincoln Center, BTW, so everybody watch for that. Until it turns up, in 1979 she danced the pas de deux from Harlequinade with Baryshnikov and a bunch of kids from SAB at the White House, and it's on You-know-where, with the East Room chandelier overhead!)

Don't tell us you didn't record it, then? Ouch! But the clip of her and Mischa in Mr. B's Harlequinade pas de deux down the column on the right on that YouTube page must cheer you up! With the White House East Room chandelier for extra fun! Agh? Urk. I haven't seen that performance for a while, maybe since 1979. Thank you, emilienne, and Happy New Year anyway! To you, and to everyone here!

The taping would have taken place on the 5th and 6th of December, to be precise, for those tracking dancer availability. And having only just seen the broadcast myself, without replaying my recording of it, I remember the clips of her were the high points for me. They were too short! (And better shot than the performers at the Honors were, IMO, but that's what happens.) As to sandik's question, there were a number of hard-to-read dancer's names for the Tom Hanks tribute in the fast-moving credit roll at the end, but I don't think what they did was included.

Very interesting. Keeping in mind the decentralized nature of PBS described above, when that happens at a local affiliate, can other affiliates pick up that material?

A good question, and not one I have a solid answer to, but friends in other cities and I used to wonder years ago why the main Chicago PBS station would often show Dance in America days later than in New York, for example, and I remember picking up here (in Chicago) that later show dates - not necessarily in the middle of the night - were indeed cheaper. And presumably, continuing this kind of thinking, it may well be that those PBS stations that aren't carrying this at all don't carry it because they don't perceive it's the kind of thing that pays off when they ask for money. How they decide what their audience will pay for isn't clear to me, though, except for advertising the sale of DVD's of the program just broadcast. If you want to understand why or why not, then, as the old saying goes, "Follow the money."

Last season, she turned up (as Balanchine's Sugar Plum Fairy) in Ballet Chicago's "Nut." BC is a very good school, maybe near the level of the groups already mentioned here, and their Nutcracker is musical enough to be worth this Chicagoan's attention, but oh, my, what a surprise that was! Pity she and SFB - or ABT, for that matter - weren't a good fit, or whatever. Based on what little I saw of her here, I'd think she'd be an asset anywhere. This dancer's on the move in more ways than usual.

Here in Chicago, it's getting one showing - at 12:00 noon on Sunday! Lunchtime, but in daytime! (On their second sub-channel though, in standard definition, not HD.) Thinking to alert friends in south Florida, I couldn't find any broadcasts to tip them off about, and in West Palm Beach and Naples, it's at 3:00 AM. It used to be, many years ago, that Live from Lincoln Center was prime time material. Apparently, things went downhill gradually: PBS discovered that So there we are. (?)

I also opted for the Link Light Rail up from SeaTac, and I think I would do so again. I use the local affiliate of GO Airport Shuttle here in Chicago which sometimes improvises a round-about route, depending where the passengers on board that time are going (and sometimes depending whether one of their vehicles has broken down somewhere). While it picks me up and drops me off at my door, I'm a little more relaxed on a regularly scheduled train because of its greater predictability, though I could share the popular dislike of the high fare on the Monorail in comparison with other transportation. The passengers on my (mid-day) trips on it were mostly tourists, I think, and the operating personnel were well prepared for us. Speaking of which: After being told at Taylor that they don't serve coffee (in Seattle?), I was startled to look up from my oyster stew to see my server hurrying down the sidewalk outside with a styrofoam cup of take-away coffee in his hand, which he then put down on my table with a smile. (Turns out there's a specialist coffee shop on the next corner.) Seattle seems to be more like that than the City of the Big Shoulders, Hog Butcher to the World, where I live.

As it happened, I was quite comfortable at the Mediterranean Inn the first weekend in October. The front desk said it was pretty full, but I found my second-floor inside court room, away from the elevators, very quiet. The second floor had a couple of advantages - near a stairwell, I could dispense with the elevator, except when I had luggage to manage, and it's the bottom of the court, which has got planters in it as well as a skylight over the lobby, so there was a modest view. There's some on-line discussion about hearing other guests on the court when everyone has their window open in warm weather, but it was mild when I was there and though I opened up in the morning, and I could see other windows open too, I heard no one. (The free Starbucks Wi-Fi in the business center, just over the restaurant, worked fine for my needs.) I can imagine coming back to see PNB and staying here again. Among the restaurants in the area, at Boat Street Cafe one evening I had some heavenly pate, and black cod like chiffon - chiffon which flaked a little, actually being fish - and at brunch the tomato soup was unassertive and composed. Another evening the sushi at Shiro's was even finer than that at Shiki; everything had clear and delicate flavors, including their miso soup and the chawanmushi, a warm egg custard, both with pieces of seafood mixed in. At Taylor Shellfish, the oyster stew was worth going back for, but the baked Oysters Marco was too complicated. (I didn't get on with raw oysters years ago, so I didn't venture this time.) Likewise my meal at 10 Mercer seemed to me like someone was trying too hard to be contemporary or something, sorry. Collections Cafe, next to the Chihuly garden and museum, was more enjoyably innovative. And as for the Space Needle, the round top of it kept reminding me ominously of those flying saucers the evil aliens used to show up in in the cheap science-fiction movies I saw as a kid (only to get blasted to smithereens by the US Air Force), and it gave me the creeps low there in the sky over my neighborhood. So, seeing how clear the weather was, I decided it was time to go and make friends with the saucer people. It's a touristy spot, and the prices are about 600 feet high too, but everything was done well, starting with the accurate wait time I was given when I just walked in; the food was pretty good - better than some I had on the ground - the server was even better, and the scenery! Mountains with snow, mountains without, the Sound on one side, the Lakes on the other. (Disclosure: I'm from Flatland, aka the Midwest, and I may be more easily impressed by this than some...) And gradually changing, as the restaurant revolves once every 47 minutes. Getting around on the buses was easier than Helene's remark led me to think: Although my map - "Downtown Seattle Plus" - had some mistakes, it gave me the gist of how the routes shift as you go from Belltown to Queen Anne, and the bus stops themselves have basic information like the route number, the main streets followed, the direction, and some idea of the frequency of service, so I got to and especially from my favorite restaurants - back up the hill - without a problem. And as for getting between the Monorail and the hotel, I'd say the path along the north side of the Key Arena is a lot easier than along the south side of it.

Speaking of Holowchuk's many roles, she had three of them all in the evening programs, which was the cast again this afternoon (Sunday November 30), as Brett van Sickle was out: She led the "pas de neuf" so clearly again that, thanks also in part to the fine playing of the Kennedy Center Opera House Orchestra under Scott Speck, I heard rhythmic complications in her music there I didn't remember hearing attending previous stagings, elsewhere, of this Swan Lake; she danced Monumentum/Movements very ably again, like it was just right for her; and she was a third, totally different figure yet again in the loony female lead in The Concert. I can't speak to Ms. Farrell's rankings; she goes her way with everything, and that's fine with me. No, that's great with me. Power to her. The run is over now, leaving me wanting four more performances - well, maybe not of The Concert, seeing which has left me uncertain whether I will ever again be able to attend a piano recital, and actually, not of Monumentum/Movements - I want eight more of that, because while there are things going on there you can hardly miss, there are things you can hardly get, and I'd like to try some more. Places where I don't hear it well enough to see how the dancing relates, or something. So, for the record, Michael Cook substituted for Ian Grosh in Monumentum/Movements this afternoon, having previously performed it with Natalia Magnicaballi, and Ian Grosh, originally cast in it, took over for Brett van Sickle in Allegro Brillante, with Paolo Hartley reprising her very fine and "complete" performance in this, only suffering in one or two instants apparently by difficulties in the partnering, likely owing to the short notice for the shuffling of the casting. And with Hartley so cast, Magnicaballi treated us to a third performance of her beautiful Odette, with Michael Cook. Remember that old show biz maxim? "Leave 'em wanting more!"

I'm looking forward to the broadcast, and having attended Workshop this year, I'd like to mention for whatever additional interest it my have, that, despite the credit in the program rg posts above, this short version of Swan Lake turned out to be different from the Balanchine version NYCB presented apparently beginning in 1951 and developed by him over the years into the mid-70s when I began to see it there and subsequently when it was revived by MCB a few years ago and, mostly, currently here in Washington, DC by TSFB, (where however, Ms. Farrell has reverted the "Valse Bluette" of my day to the "Four Cygnets" Balanchine had already replaced by then). Maybe Mme. Danilova chose an earlier version in Balanchine's series for Kistler's debut in 1980. Maybe she chose one from her earlier experience. I'm just curious. At any rate, it's something different.

Thanks for recalling that detail, kfw. I don't think it was in Hartley's performance. Magnicaballi is quite capable of filling things like that in; I remember in Slaughter how during the police raid of the speakeasy, she's run downstage left, glancing around at the action she's about to leave, with movement that says, "We've got to get out of here!" With her intelligence, she can point up some drama without overdoing. Wonderful. Yes, we all agree the company looks to be at a high point. (Too bad there's no Millennium Stage video to share with a wider audience.)

Saturday afternoon, November 29, brought Paola Hartley, like Natalia Magnicaballi, of Ballet Arizona, into the role of Odette, with Brett van Sickle as Prince Siegfried; unlike Magnicaballi, who is beautiful standing still, Hartley is less favored physically and must move beautifully, musically, to be a pleasure to watch: She did, and she was! Magnicaballi led Monumentum/Movements this afternoon, and her luxurious luminosity worked in it, though seeing Holowchuk's more simple, unadorned realization again in the evening, I'm not sure I don't prefer it. (This may be a little troupe but they offer an abundance of riches.) Audra Johnson, in corps roles otherwise, provided another enjoyable surprise this afternoon, in addition to Hartley's Odette, by stepping into Allegro Brillante and giving a very musical performance of the role, with van Sickle. The evening's cast was much like Friday evening's, but the performances were even better, Magnicaballi's Odette even more beautiful (and a tad slower, I think), Monumentum/Movements more sure and clear, and The Concert had picked up some details a friend had missed opening night.

The Suzanne Farrell Ballet began its 2014 Kennedy Center season in the Opera House Friday evening, November 28th, with a lovely performance of Balanchine's half-hour distillation of Swan Lake. On the "About" tab for the season, Ms. Farrell quotes Alastair Macaulay's observation that Balanchine's short staging is nevertheless truer to the themes of the original than some others we see. (Her Notes from the Ballet are also worth reading.) I look forward to his observations about these particular performances, but meanwhile I'll try to say a few things. The very strong cast was led by Natalia Magnicaballi and Michael Cook, and while there were moments when I might have liked stronger attack from him, she made me glad I had made the trip (from Chicago) to see this: Creamy yet large and clear, but sharp and staccato when called for (in the Coda, near the end, with the swans lined up along the sides), and then again large flowing and clear in the same section, she was the multidimensional fantastic and fascinating creature who had stunned Siegfried early on, interposing her own body to protect the evil Rotbart from Siegfried's attempted crossbow shot. Not showing off, but showing off her dances. Beautiful to the point of exciting, quietly exciting. The swans - 24 of them, the original number, not supplemented as in the early years after Balanchine's passing, when, in black to boot, they clotted the stage less visibly at NYCB - were always visible, individually and in their constantly-changing patterns, and vital, even though the tempos here were a bit easy. Even, speaking of sections, in the old "Four Swans" number, possibly the last whole remainder of Ivanov's work before Balanchine replaced it with his lovely "Valse Bluette": I had seen this number danced stiffly by other companies, and although I prefer to see the "Bluette" I found the individuality and freshness these four brought to it made it the rendition I prefer. Indeed, it's that freshness and presence that helps to make this whole staging such a rewarding experience. For the record, the "Four Swans" came on as the sixth number, immediately following the "Pas de Deux"; then the "pas de neuf", ably led by Elisabeth Holowchuk; and then, the "Valse Bluette" being omitted, Odette's variation, solo this time, without the four girls I noted in the mid '70s. After intermission, Monumentum/Movements, which looked if not quite so clear as it needs to - part of this pair of spare ballets is its sense of open spaces between what's there, on stage and in the music we hear - it looked like a very good beginning toward a full realization of those qualities. Holowchuk, rather poker-faced and dry here, nicely contrasted her lovely swan role before. Then, a company premiere, Allegro Brillante, set to the unfinished first movement of Tchaikovsky's unfinished Third Piano Concerto. Like the music, it gets a little thin after the exposition, but no less allegro nor brillante for that, and except for a couple of stiffly "correct" moments, well energized with enlarging clarity by Paola Hartley and Brett van Sickle and the ensemble of four couples. After the second intermission, Robbins's The Concert. Some ask why? With such a short season and so many ballets to present. But humor was one of Robbins's fortes - not that Mr. B. couldn't joke - and as someone who saw the ballet when it was new pointed out, the gags still work. And there's a great variety of them - not to omit mention of the "Mistake Waltz" - this ballet is where the term originated. And not least: Performances are not only for us, but for them, the dancers, too. This troupe does have Slaughter on Tenth Avenue in its repertory, but these dancers don't do a lot of comedy, and I can't begrudge them the experience. And I was glad for the experience of Holowchuk in yet another role as the slightly loony music lover originated (I think) by Allegra Kent.* (The Concert was staged by Kipling Houston.) *No, in 1956 it was Tanaquil LeClercq, no less. Somebody pretty remarkable, anyway.

And now that I've taken the time to watch them, I can report that they yield several clues about casting. Casting for the current season, 28-30 November 2014? Time to start another thread for that.

Especially in the absence of a Millennium Stage Preview performance of TSFB this year, I thought it would be useful to summarize all in one place for handy reference what we've figured out on this thread so far about who's dancing what (especially if I can link to this post from the page on the Kennedy Center web site where the video plays). I've included the moment in time in the video, shown at the left end of the progress bar under the window where the video plays, when each dance begins to help with the identification, and you may be able to navigate back and forth through the video as it plays by nudging the button in the progress bar left or right with your cursor: Mozartiana excerpts [00:10] i. Preghiera ["Prayer"] Natalia Magnicaballi, four girls [4:40] iii. Menuet four solo women [8:43] Kristen Gallagher, ballet mistress for the Suzanne Farrell Ballet Episodes excerpts: [10:13] from First Movement Valerie Tellment, Ian Grosh [15:56] pas de deux from the Third Movement Elisabeth Holowchuk with Kirk Henning [18:48] Kristen Gallagher introduces Apollo Apollo excerpts: [19:35] iii. variation, Terpsichore Natalia Magnicaballi [21:36] iv. variation, Apollo Michael Cook [24:05] pas de deux of Terpsichore and Apollo Natalia Magnicaballi with Michael Cook [28:40] Kristen Gallagher introduces Agon Agon excerpt: ii. pas de trois Ian Grosh, Valerie Tellment, Kirk Henning [29:32] bransle simple [30:46] bransle double [32:24] Kristen Gallagher introduces the remainder of TSFB's 2013 season [36:22] Pas de Dix excerpt: Natalia Magnicaballi with Michael Cook Amy Brandt with Jesse Campbell, Alison Basford with Ian Grosh, Miriam Ernest with Oliver Swan-Jackson, Katie Gibson with Ted Seymour Edited to update the address in the link to the page where the video plays in accordance with changes on the Kennedy Center web site.

For me, someone who began watching NYCB regularly with a weekend of Jewels in January 1973, the fun pretty much went out of their Balanchine in Spring 1986, and I've rarely watched the company since. I've just seen PNB's weekend, too, and I also think Saturday evening's Rubies leads led the best performance of the four. I agree about Korbes; saw her Diamonds both times, and consider her really, really something. (Pity about her retirement, but that comes with the territory, and, after all, it can't take away we've already got from her.) As for Emeralds, speaking of retirements, Mr. B. made something of a kluge out of that when Verdy retired in 1977; maybe that is contributing to your perplexity. People say, they have to do it like the Trust tells them to, but I wonder if the Joffrey Ballet still gets away with mixing up new and old parts of Square Dance in their original costumes - Western dress for the old parts, plain gray for the two new ones. Fortunately, TSFB still puts on the original Apollo (when they can afford to put on anything).

Jewels program October 2 and 3, 2014 In general they seem a little careful with these, showing clear, clean and at times rather lovely performances in which you can continuously delight in the sensitive and perceptive way the choreography responds to and comments on the music, but for all that it does look a little "prepared" and mild, not that I want anybody to look insecure or confused, but freshness is less evident than I'd like, though more than with POB or Mariinski. Yes. Better than them. But not Villella's MCB. The soloists and principals sometimes do achieve more of the illusion that they're dancing how what they're hearing now conveys to them; this came and went in Carrie Imler's Rubies demi on Thursday, where she also got the timing but not* entirely the pose of that startling upside-down face near the end of the first movement, one of the more eye-popping bits in a ballet seemingly largely constructed casually to pop eyes that's disappeared over the years. But spontaneity can go to excess, and I felt Jahna Frantziskonis and Matthew Renko had a great time somewhat obscuring what's set, on Friday, and I was happier with Lesley Rausch and Jerome Tisserand on Thursday. Not everyone agrees, as I hope we will see, for the benefit of the discussion. But I liked Carla Korbes and Laura Tisserand enough better in Emeralds on Friday than Margaret Mullin and Elizabeth Murphy on Thursday that I wondered whether moving up from Row S to Row M could have made all the difference until I saw the rest of the program. It hadn't, as Rubies showed, and M is the place for this spectator. (Price Suddarth was distinguished by a joyous demeanor, if not by the loft some casts give the Emeralds pas de trois, and I look forward to seeing him in more exposed roles, as well as to a little more altitude from the well-matched three dancers.) The excellence of these two early variations meant that the rest of the ballet ran a bit downhill from there toward the end, however. Friday evening Imler led Diamonds a little remotely but with considerable finish, and the (large) ensemble particularly distinguished itself here. I think sitting in Row M helped, too. I can always quibble: The theater lacks good acoustics, at least in the center of the orchestra seats, so that the conclusion of the last movement of Tchaikovsky's Suite No. 3, the finale of Balanchine's Theme and Variations, played pretty fast before the dancing program as a celebration of the PNB orchestra's 25th year, was a blurry piece for drums and brass with something else for winds and strings possibly related going on, even though the excellent Emil de Cou led it; the music for the ballet program itself was much more clearly balanced but sounded a lot like it was being played in another room. More steeply raked up rows in the center orchestra might have helped with this as well as with the sight lines; and the seat-labeling system, where there are three identically-lettered and numbered seats across the hall, distinguished one from another only by the section, "Orchestra 1" being the center, "Orchestra 2" and "Orchestra 3" being the two side sections, may have contributed to the ticket-computer's confusion to the point of assigning me and another person to the same seat in Row M in Orchestra 1. (Other theaters use seat numbers 100 and above for the center, with odd-numbered and even-numbered seats in the opposite side sections.) *I omitted this word originally

Thanks for the clarification, sandik. Not to mention, for the original post, as well!

Yes, yes, and yes. This is exactly how it struck me, in January 1973, when I first saw her do this - her hand began; she regarded the hand, her head far "up," for an instant, to see what it would do; and the movement spread over her, down her body, and as the music spun, she turned. Exactly; but of course. As the French say. (This is sometimes still called "The Spinner," the translation of Faure''s title, La fileuse, relating in some way to the drama he wrote this suite to accompany. You can just about hear the wheel spinning.) But, what magic! But now I'm in the awkward position of disagreeing with Peter Boal: I think the original ending, the ensemble that is now the second number from the end, is a much brighter, upbeat conclusion than the slow, dark, and somber one the ballet has ended with since Verdy's retirement, when Mr. B. added it. (Indeed, Faure''s title for its music translates as, "The Death of Melisande". It's a dirge.)

Most of my tickets are bought and paid for by now, but for the possible benefit of someone reading here, here are some further thoughts: After looking at the images of the seating in McCaw Hall (or is it Brotman Auditorium?), I thought it looked a lot like the New York State Theater at Lincoln Center, with its flat main floor and distant balconies, where I sat hundreds of times from 1973 through 1986, and I've been using that experience as my point of reference. In those days I alternated between the 14th Row in the Orchestra seats and the first row or two in the First or Second "Ring" (as the balconies there are still called), depending to some extent on the repertory - the 14th row was a good distance, but still a little low; and while the front of the lower Rings were a good height, they were pretty far. But I've realized that the 14th row in McCaw Hall may not be nearly as far from the stage as the 14th row was in the New York State Theater - possibly 70% as far, or closer - because, first, MCH has - it looks like - conventional rows with a depth of 30", like most theaters where the Orchestra is divided by aisles into two or three sections across the auditorium, while the NYST had true continental seating - no aisles dividing the rows, just at the sides - with 39" depth (as the rows in the Koch theater still have today, IIRC); and because, second, the orchestra pit in MCH may be - is? - conventionally smaller from front to back than the NYST was, having been said to have been unusually big originally, in my day (and even bigger today). This comparison leads me to reinterpret Helene's suggestions about sitting farther back, for instance, especially for the first visit of several, though my conviction, born of experience, that I'm happiest right on the center-line persists. I hope this may be helpful.

I would have thanked you all for the superb discussion of hotels, restaurants, and transportation here sooner if I hadn't been so busy applying what I've been learning from it, but in the end I've booked one of those three hotels near the intersection of Queen Anne and Mercer. But traveling with my 24" rolling suiter and a carry-on piggy-backed on it doesn't seem right for a local or Rapid Transit bus, and so, having studied Helene's post above in connection with the maps on the SEA-TAC web site, I favor the Link Light Rail, but maybe not the uphill trek to the hotel from the Seattle Center Monorail terminal. Would this or the Westlake Terminal be the better bet for finding a taxi mid-day? (Both arriving and leaving, on weekdays.) No taxi ranks? Hail one on the street, or call? Getting around by bus when unencumbered by luggage appeals, though, except that King County Metro Transit offers limited route-map coverage. (A - paper! - map titled "Downtown Seattle Plus," in its 12th edition, seems pretty good, though, except for the inevitable mistakes, like showing a bus route on Mercer passing McCaw Hall.) Otherwise, my logistics look good. I expect another one of us BA!-ers to show up, plus, an architect friend from Vancouver will see the Sunday matinee. Looks like so many good choices for restaurants I may miss a meal trying to decide! Have any of you tried Boat Street Cafe? Oh: Where would be a good shop for a cotton raincoat? I could do with a replacement, if I have the time. Seems like the place for it.