apollosmuse

Interestingly, she was always on a 1-year contract w/ BRB (http://dancetabs.com/2015/06/birmingham-royal-ballet-promotions-leavers-and-starters-june-2015/). 

She's been dealing with an injury as well: 

I do wish she'd find a place to settle down and grow as an artist (full disclosure: I used to take open class with her often in the Bay Area and she's a lovely dancer and person). I wonder if the plan is to take this year off and audition in the spring. 

Similarly, I'm somewhat confused by Juliet Doherty's remaining in AZ and on the competition/Instagram circuit after her successes w/ SFBS and the Stroman "Little Dancer" show and wonder if these girls are really making a decent living outside the confines of a traditional company through sponsorships etc. 

1 hour ago, PeggyTulle said:

 

I thought that was Ellen Hummel...?

Very likely! I just remembered a petite brunette  the livestream is archived and available if anyone wants to double-check! 

Casting for rep shows will appear on the individual rep's page--if you go to a rep's page and scroll down, you'll see "Casting" on the left. There is not, however, a clear place on the "Tours" page where casting will appear--I wonder if they'll make a change for that at some point. (Personally, I find the new website confusing to navigate, at best). 

SVP was rehearsing step sisters in the World Ballet Day lifestream, with Lauren Strongin as the mother and (I think) Jahna Frantziskonis as the other sister. Masha was rehearsing the lead. 

PNB dancers usually know about promotions several months in advance (this is not true at all companies, but PNB tends to announce internally when contracts are renewed)--it's just a surprise for us audience members  I do love that PNB does on-stage announcements though; it's a nice moment of recognition for the dancers and a way for Peter Boal to say a few things about each of them in a public venue.

Congratulations to Angelica Generosa and Matthew Renko on their promotions to soloist and Benjamin Griffiths on his promotion to principal!

Excited to see these dancers continue to be featured this year

Definite French emphasis for the year between Averty and Herrault, who also trained at the Paris Opera. Herrault has been the coach of Beatriz Stix-Brunell, Skylar Brandt, Aran Bell, and Meaghan Hinkis. 

I was at Next Step last night (as well as the studio rehearsal on Tuesday) and it was a really lovely evening for the students and the young choreographers. For me, the most choreographically interesting pieces were Miles Pertl's and Kile Davis's.

Pertl's was clearly influenced by his time in Europe working w/ choreographers at Stuttgart and the Het National. It used lots of floor work; seemed to be drawing on the dancers' own improvisations; and created some interesting vocabulary.

Davis's was fiendishly hard and used groupings/composition in interesting and complex ways. Definitely the most sophisticated of the evening's pieces. There were many bobbles by the dancers, but they were clearly hoping/wishing/praying their way through sections. I remember Katita Waldo once saying in an interview that with most ballets, you know you you can do them in the studio, so there's no reason not to believe fully that you can do it on stage--if something goes wrong, it's a fluke--but that Forsythe's Vertiginous is one of the very few ballets that you just don't know if you'll be able to do it on any given day, either in the studio or on stage! This was one of those ballets. Tricky partnering; complex footwork; fast, multiple turns. I applaud all the dancers for putting it out there, even if it didn't always work!

Standout dancers were Erika Crawford, Bella Ureta, Madison Abeo, and Kuu Sakuragi.

I unfortunately left my program in a bar after the performance, so if someone has one/is going to the school show today and can fill in where some of the other PDs are going, that would be great, but this is what I have from memory and I'll also include links if available online.

Madison Abeo--PNB Apprentice (https://www.instagram.com/p/BDMx7YDIfb6/?taken-by=mad_rayn)

Bella Ureta--BB II

Helena Thordal-Christensen--LA Ballet (losangelesballet.org/helena-thordal-christense…)--She's Colleen Neary's daughter

Claire Barrington--Alberta Ballet II

Clay Murray--BB II (https://www.instagram.com/p/BD6kJ-ZIE1Q/?taken-by=claymurray)

Kate Wallich will be working with Whim W'Him dancers, Kiyon Gaines with PNB dancers, and Wevers with PNB PDs. There was a small preview a couple weeks ago that I discussed on my blog: https://apolloswaywardmuse.com/2016/05/25/sculptured-dance-summer-at-sam-rehearsal/. It looked like it's gearing up to be a great event!

Looks like a good number of new faces and promotions this year!

From SFB's Facebook:

**Breaking News** Announcing six promotions, five new Company members, and five apprentices for the 2017 Season! Carlo Di Lanno has been promoted to Principal Dancer. Francisco Mungamba, Julia Rowe, Wei Wang, and WanTing Zhao have been promoted to Soloist. Blake Kessler has been promoted to Corps de Ballet. Angelo Greco joins as a Soloist and Aaron Robison as a Principal Dancer. New members of the Corps de Ballet include Ludmila Bizalion, Elizabeth Mateer, and Natasha Sheehan. Alexandre Cagnat, Shené Lazarus, Davide Occhipinti, Nathaniel Remez, and Isabella Walsh of the SF Ballet School Trainee Program have been promoted to the rank of Apprentice.

More details in the PR: https://www.sfballet.org/about/media_center/press_releases/dancer_announcement17

None of the promotions seem very surprising to me--all people who seemed to be in line for promotion.

A few interesting things to note in the new hires though:

• Ludmila Bizalion (formerly known as Ludmila Campos) is returning after stints with Royal Ballet of Flanders, Hong Kong Ballet, Diablo Ballet, and Smuin
• Natasha Sheehan (the trainee who performed at the Gala) is hired straight into the corps
• Only one apprentice from 2015-2016 is joining the company--the website has already been updated, so I'm not sure off the top of my head who the other apprentices were/where they're going. Does anybody have more info?

For me, comparing casting issues at NYCB and ABT is an apples to oranges situation.

The no- advance -casting rule works very fine at NYCB because they do rep shows, with 3 or more ballets presented on a single night. On any given night you are likely to see numerous different principals. Even if you get 2 or 3 principals you dislike, you will also get at least as many that you adore on that same program.

With ABT the situation is completely different. They are presenting full length ballets where you are watching only 2 (sometimees 3, but rarely more than that) people dance the lead roles for a 2 1/2 hour production. I will always buy my NYCB tixs without knowing any casting, but I would never buy ABT tickets in advance without knowing casting for this reason. ABT is well aware of this, and that is why they publish the spring casting in October. Otherwise, they would never be able to bank large amounts of advance payments for subscriptions and single ticket orders months before the curtain ever rises at the Met.

Though, for what it's worth, SFB and PNB, for example, only post casting 1-2 weeks ahead, even for their full-lengths. People still seem to buy tickets (and the company sometimes gets a little boost right at the end if some exciting casting gets posted!). ABT's policy of posting casting 6 months in advance is quite rare, at least in the US and, based exactly on the kinds of rehearsal schedules discussed above, is really risky. People get injured and there will be changes; it's just inevitable with the intensity of a compressed season.

Hmmm mostly SFB in the 90s/2000s, but a few from my dance school growing up.

1. In the Night at SFB in the 2000s

2. Romeo and Juliet Balcony Pas, MacMillan version

3. Giselle (Joanna Berman's last performance)

4. Serenade (dancing it and "getting" Balanchine for the first time)

5. Filling Station at SFB, mid-90s

And an extra 6/7. The Nut and/or Swan Lake--saw both when I was 4ish at SFB and have been hooked ever since!

Just stumbled upon this (old!) discussion doing some research for my dissertation and thought I'd chime in: the 1957 TV version (broadcast on the Seven Lively Arts) had a full "normal" PDD w/ variation for cavalier. The UCLA Film and Television Archive has a copy and I'd assume the NYPL might as well. Thought it might help some future scholar scrounging for information!

Casting is now up on SFB's website for Coppélia. It is (except for Maria Kochetkova) the principal women not in SL, and Dores Andre making her debut as Swanilda.

Tuesday, March 08, 2016 - 7:30pm—Opening Night

Cute photo, but I’m curious: it looks like they are bare-legged, no tights. I realize this is a rehearsal, but I hope they wear tights during the performance. I like the bare-legged look in contemporary ballets, but defintely not Swan Lake.

They are definitely wearing pink tights in that photo--no need to worry on that front!

The BalletTalk for Dancers forum has a section on colleges, which lists many schools with programs, some out-of-date in terms of info. Dance Magazine also puts out an annual college issue that lists many programs. theudancer.com is another resource that's new and growing.

To some extent it depends on what you mean by "top university" and "continuing their training." What you'll mostly find, outside the main ballet programs (Indiana, Utah, Purchase, Julliard, NCSA, Butler etc), are anecdotes. Assuming you mean US World Report-esque colleges and specifically turning out ballet dancers who danced post-college, a few anecdotes off the top of my head:

Princeton: Alexis Branagan (NY Theater Ballet); Indre Vengris Rockefeller (Suzanne Farrell Ballet); Hannah Rich (Joffrey Ballet Concert Group)

Harvard: Puanani Brown (ABT, through she left Harvard to pursue dance)

Stanford: Cora Cliburn (Post:Ballet, still at Stanford, one of Dance Magazine's 25 to Watch this year)

I'm sure there are more (especially at Columbia/Barnard) I'm just not personally familiar with them!

Well, I was right about André, but also, sadly, wrong about Chung. Would have liked to see her do the part.

Casting just went up: 3 each for Tan, Kochetkova, and Sylve (!!!!); only 2 for Froustey. Very interesting...and if I were in SF I'd be running out to buy tickets for one of those Sylve shows!

I think Chung is likely--I'd be a bit surprised by Andre. The only full-length she's done the lead in so far is R+J, I believe (and Nut, but that's a different beast). I'm not sure I see her O/O happening for her this year. 3 each for Froustey and Tan; 2 each for Zahorian and Kochetkova; and 1 debut for Chung would be my guess, but I guess we'll find out soon!

I'd also love to see de Sola try the part. I think she'd be stunning--it's really too bad these (presumed!) injuries seem to be holding her back a bit. Would love to see Stahl as well, but I'm not sure Helgi sees her that way...

At the pre-dress lecture tonight the stagers suggested that they have a great deal (near total was my impression) of control over casting. They also indicated that in Monte Carlo there are never more than two casts and that to have more than two wouldn't allow for the kind of detail and depth that Maillot requires. Boal, on the other hand, did indicate that a couple more casts learned R+J, even if they don't have the opportunity to perform.

Anyone know what's up with Sasha de Sola? I would have expected to see her in some of this rep. Wasn't she in the Pas/Parts video? Hope she isn't injured again... Maybe they're just keeping it to one cast for the first week and she'll pop back up soon!

So sad about this one. She was fabulous in the rep this weekend and I was looking forward to seeing more of her this year. Sigh...family comes first but definitely a sad day for audiences.

Mathilde also posted on Instagram last night about her (ex?)-partner's film about their lives: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tVVzhf4xXB8

Aran Bell's Instagram is here (https://instagram.com/aran_bell). Hard to say if he's still with the studio company or not. Has a "Last show" post, but that could just be the last show for this year

Also, nice video about Miko here: https://www.facebook.com/KQED/videos/10152794672491191/?pnref=story

And Froustey's Instagram definitely suggests she's back in SF.

The "Fancy Free-ness" of it might be related to the fact that Robbins choreographed it in 1950--in fact, Bernstein first thought of doing Age as a ballet, but was convinced to do it as a symphony instead. Interestingly, the Robbins ballet was quite non-literal and abstract, making use of leotards and tights, masks, stilts etc. It adhered much more to the sense and philosophical themes of the poem/score than to the literal narrative.

Out of curiosity (and because I'm writing a dissertation chapter about the original) was the Robbins connection mentioned anywhere in the program notes? During World Ballet Day when they showed a clip of rehearsal, Scarlett didn't mention Robbins, but the fact that everyone seems to see a bit of Fancy Free in it makes me wonder if he was thinking more about the 1950 ballet than he let on in the interview.

I'd also heard about Jahna moving to SFB, but nothing official yet, so nice to hear it was mentioned this week.

I will say, I find it a bit of an odd move as she's been getting fabulous parts up here in Seattle. SFB's a bigger company and even for rising stars, it can be very very hard to move up and out of that corps.