Marc Haegeman

Silvy, it's a completely different choreography and except for the final Act with the Grand Pas Hongrois there is very little resemblance with the Konstantin Sergeyev version danced by the Kirov. Moreover, Grigorovich's version for the Bolshoi was made after Nureyev's final version which he staged in Paris in 1983.

The casts for the Paris Opera's "Giselle" in February have been announced on the site of the POB (click on ballets, then Giselle, distributions). Noteworthy is the presence of two eminent guests: Alina Cojocaru who will dance with Manuel Legris, and Svetlana Zakharova dancing with Laurent Hilaire.

Indeed, Amy, the question here is not that Bennets can or cannot run the RB of Flanders, it’s rather what she will do with it and in what degree she is willing or has the means to continue it as a classical troupe with a classical repertoire - which the RB of Flanders is at this moment. Of course, we have to wait until they released her policy plan for the next 5 years, but all seems in place for a turnover into a contemporary company, and we had (as Estelle pointed out) a bit too many examples in the recent past to believe in the contrary.

We already kind of accepted taped music in classical ballet as well, Alexandra, because the Royal Ballet of Flanders hardly ever performs with orchestra. Well, at least we have to accept it. There's no choice and it's only on very special occasions, like the unforgettable Fabre "Swan Lake" that the orchestra (and it is not a bad one) plays for the ballet company. There is an orchestra, but they play for the opera, not for ballet. And as far as the productions are concerned, they have been of the minimal kind for years. In fact, we have been well prepared over the least years - we only missed the finishing touch.

Thanks Viviane, rather worrying news indeed. It is said Bennets will start working with the RB of Flanders this May, rehearsing the company - most appropriately so - for "In The Middle Somewhat Elevated". It is emphasized in the newspapers that Robert Denvers' resignation followed after the government sponsoring for the company was cut down last year.

Now that the casts for the Bolshoi tour in Paris are online http://www.opera-de-paris.fr/0304/fiche_58...u15janvier19h30, bad news is out that Sergei Filin is ill and most likely won't be able to dance in "Swan Lake" - nor indeed in any of the other productions. Belogolovtsev is said to replace him in "La Fille du Pharaon".

Ah, I thought we were talking about what is acceptable or not - but you're basically talking about taste. Both (RB/Ashton and Kirov/Sergeyev) are company-adapted versions of a classic with their merits and flaws, not to mention the fact that years of performing eroded the initial ideas. But I don't see why the current Kirov production would be anywhere less acceptable than the old RB version. Personally I feel much closer to a Russian "Swan Lake" than to an English one (at least the Russians still know how to do the character dances), but that's only a matter of taste again.

Don't know exactly when the happy ending was forced upon. In any case with Sergeyev's staging from 1950 the tragic ending was gone. Funny thing is that Konstantin Sergeyev who now usually gets criticized for having staged a "Swan Lake" with a happy ending, didn't want one. He wanted to follow Tchaikovsky's music, but wasn't allowed to. As Grigorovich found out when he argued that Tchaikovsky called for a tragic ending, the authorities corrected him that even Tchaikovsky could be wrong.

But what do you call an acceptable production of "Swan Lake" then, Ari? The arrangement of the corps in the white acts of the Kirov's production never struck me as being unharmonious - seen from above or from below. Could this have been caused by possible limitations of the stage at the Kennedy Center? Did anyone else notice this too? Siegfried doesn't die in Vinogradov's version, but he is left alone by Odette who disappears with the swans. It's true the last act is a total mess and nobody seems to remember exactly what's going on. In a review Alastair Macaulay picked on the absurd Vinogradov choreography for the black (or burgundy) and white swans in the final scene, where the whites hit the upbeat and the blacks the downbeat - "as if 'you say potato, and I say potahto' had reached Swan Lake" he joked .

I understand your disappointment, Hans, about the non-star casting, but it is a fact that this has been the case for years with them. The only difference is that when a few years ago they still could offer their biggest names in the major ballet centres (because that difference was being made), even that became a treasurable rarity now .

Thanks for the review, Ari. Could you possibly say what you mean with "unattractive arrangements of the swans"? Why is it so puzzling that this version has survived into the new century? Why wouldn't it have survived? And do you really think that Vinogradov's version was an improvement over the Sergeyev? How so? Funny, but you are the first person I met who seemed to like that one .

Quite, the children as swan maidens were still there in the last run of the RB production. It's too vague to be specific about it, but I always wondered if that "authentic version" would be such an improvement and if it would make "Swan Lake" as popular as it became now? (Do we really need that Benno person and everything ?? ) There is also more or less of an attempt to recreate the original White Act in Neumeier's otherwise dutifully adventurous version. (I know you are dying to see the Fabre version, Leigh :grinning: )

Since nobody seems to have seen Russian performances or dancers worth remembering :grinning: , I will start myself. A performance I cherish most of all is a Kirov Ballet "Swan Lake" from this summer in Austria with Daria Pavlenko, Igor Kolb and Ilya Kuznetsov. It was one of those nights where everything cooked and I haven’t seen Pavlenko and Kolb together in better doing than on that occasion. We had them together again in the same ballet in London, but the inspiration of the earlier performance wasn’t really there. For my money Pavlenko stands out as the most rewarding Kirov ballerina of this moment. Although the London tour didn’t really deliver the goods in her case, as she came down with a kidney infection at the beginning of the season and still danced "La Bayadère" and "Swan Lake" the following weeks, her performances as Nikiya were still head and shoulders above what the company currently has to offer. Covent Garden had moreover a second chance to see her in better shape as a guest artist with the Royal Ballet, when she danced Nikiya as a replacement of Darcey Bussell. I would like to single out Leonid Sarafanov as one of the most interesting new faces of the Mariinsky. Still far too young for his own good and thrown in about everything they have in store, but definitely a promising talent. His best moment was as one of the boys in "Etudes". Among the Mariinsky newcomers I would also mention Olesya Novikova (a pupil of Galina Kekisheva) who danced a remarkable debut as Kitri last Summer, while with Evgenia Obraztsova they seem to have an interesting soubrette again. At the bottom end must be the Mariinsky's efforts to come to terms with Diaghilev's heritage - their shocking takes on "Le Sacre du printemps" and "Les Noces" or how a great company can loose itself by not taking its audiences serious.

What were your favourite Russian performances, productions and dancers of the past year? (I guess it is fair to open up this thread to include the two major Russian companies, Bolshoi and Mariinsky, and performing in Russia and abroad.) And of course other Russian companies can be covered as well.

Good idea from Leigh to open a thread for the London and the Copenhagen scene; here you can post about your absolute highs and lows of the year in Paris - performances, productions, dancers?

Well, Londoners will be able to say more about this, but I wouldn't think so, there is a public for both I guess, depending of the performing venue (Covent Garden, Sadler's Wells). But it is still a fact that London has a strong tradition of performing "Romeo and Juliet", so in any case it's going to be tough to sell that new "Romeo" to the London audiences.

That's right, koshka, since a few years Elena Vorontosova is working with the corps de ballet. In fact as a prominent member of the corps she appears in almost every video of the Kirov. In the "Sleeping Beauty" video with Kolpakova and Berezhnoi she dances Coulante in the Prologue. One should never despair Alexandra

Thanks for the link, coda. Alexei Ratmansky made it quite clear in interviews that it is also his goal to preserve the classical tradition of the Bolshoi. He hopes to give the company some new works (i.e. creations and ballets they hadn't danced before), but emphasized that with their busy schedule there is very little time for novelties. Ratmansky also thinks of reviving some of the old Soviet works like Laurencia, Red Poppy and Flames of Paris.

Maximova is coaching at the Bolshoi since 1998. Her most famous pupil is Svetlana Lunkina.

Thank you, Inga, for posting about this rewarding experience. No matter what the critics think and write, it's their own thing and you definitely belong to the old romantics and conservatives :rolleyes: . Yet what I don't buy is that some of the reviewers represent it as if this is not only what the Bolshoi needs, but also what will save it and present the new beginning for the company.... Come again, what new beginning?

Exactly, as Coda pointed out, Kunakova is currently coaching at the Mariinsky.

Interesting points KBFan-turned-into-Cygnet. However, I don't quite follow your confidence in Valery Gergiev, while you condemn Makhar Vaziev. What the Kirov badly needs in my opinion is a ballet person who can run the company with sufficient autonomy to give it an artistic profile viable in the 21st century. With Gergiev in charge one cannot be further away from that and if Vazievs policy in the last 8 or 9 years has to be considered a failure, than Gergiev is for a large part to blame by denying Vaziev that autonomy. I don't believe either that Eifman or an invasion of the European choreographers (controversial for anybody who still cares for classical ballet) you mention could in any way be a solution for the Mariinsky. Let's not forget that in the last years they had plenty of "new" choreography (Balanchine, Nijinska, MacMillan, Neumeier, Ratmansky, Simonov...), and as it seems far too much for their own good already. I would suggest to give them the time to digest what they acquired, let them really become "the home of Balanchine", and let them work on their own magnificent heritage (it's rich, but delicate enough so it needs attention), instead of producing yet another doubtful escapade in novelty. Finally, it's beyond me why anybody with an "iconoclastic" stage persona would be more suited for the Bolshoi Ballet than for the Mariinsky, and I really don't get your comparison of Zakharova with Volochkova.

Vladimir Vasiliev is still very much alive, active and kicking in Moscow and around, producing ballet with various companies and groups. One of his more recent projects include the Galina Ulanova Foundation, which he presides and will present a Gala in homage of the great ballerina with international stars at the Bolshoi Theatre on May 16, 2004.

Thanks for posting that, Jane. The new Romeo and Juliet in London ? - sounds unreal, but could be fun

"Antipathy" is much too strong a word, Thalictum. Rivalry is more appropriate. Besides, Inga's point is that the Kirov Ballet generates a lot less of attention and praise than it used to, take in the mid-nineties. And for reasons described above. It is also the case in London, where the critics really cannot be accused of an anti-Kirov tradition: the embarrassingly unprepared new productions, the absence of many of the established stars, some really poor performances during last's summer season in Covent Garden raised more than a few eyebrows. As Jane Simpson summed it up in her review for Dance View: "It won't take much more of this sort of thing to have us thinking that the Kirov is taking us for a ride." Nothing of this is really new, but it has become a bit too obvious in the last years. Finally, nobody will question the quality of the dancers (indeed, given the circumstances in which they perform, only for that they would deserve our admiration), it's the way they are treated which has to be reconsidered.