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I really was surprised by how smooth Simkin's partnering with Lane was. He definitely has improved alot over last two years. I'm looking forward to seeing him as Romeo later this season. His jumps and turns were amazing as always. Cirio was technically very solid and has very fluid upper body movement. Those attitude turns were breathtaking! Unfortunately, Cornejo's been overshadowed by Cirio's Ali (but then almost every Conrad is overshadowed by Ali). I have this feeling that Cornejo's jumps hasn't been as high as last season.... Is it just me? Maybe they just look lower in my seat. I hope he isn't dancing with an injury.

Does anyone know when the cast will be revealed?

Great news! I've been wondering when they are going to promote him. Congrats!!

That's depressing to hear since I became Gillian's fan after seeing her in Sylvia. She's usually great in the role. I hope she can perform like her usual self later this week. Who was Kochetkova's original partner on Wednesday? I don't think it was Hoven originally...

Boylston/Bomes pairing sounds interesting...although it would've been great if they handed the role to Abrera or one of the soloists.

Simkin has the perfect look for Romeo... I just hope he can handle all the grueling lifts. Neverthless I'm very excited to see his interpretation!

I really think Shyklyarov or Kimin Kim are better choice than Askerov, Ivanchenko, and Korsuntsev... at least ticket sale wise. Maybe some of the TBA will go to Gorak or Hammoudi. It's really unfortunate because I was looking forward to seeing Lendorf's Colas.

Oh wow... I really did think that Andrey took a few steps.. (and I was looking through my binoculars!) Now that seeing the footage I must have been delusional. It's great that someone actually recorded it to correct my mistake! Regarding Chopiniana, I agree with you that it wasn't really a mistake. Once again, I was looking through binoculars and I was noticing little things that aren't really significant... I have to admit that I'm not that familiar Shurale and I thought the last lift was supposed to be a one hand lift. My apologies!

Ilya is right! I think people sitting on the balcony level probably saw it very clearly. It was the part where the ballerina has to lean over the male partner's shoulder while maintaining her penche position. When Andrey was about to kneel down, Uliana hurriedly reached for his shoulder. They didn't make the mistake when they repeated the same move the 2nd time. In The Legend, during the last lift Andrey had to readjust his feet's position and moved to his left a little bit before Uliana could start changing her position (split legs in 180 degrees while being held upside down). Not sure the name of this lift. In Shurale's climax, Zyuzin was supposed to lift Martynyuk with his one hand but he lost his balance and quickly changed it to two hand lift. I mean, I can really just overlook all these mistakes because it was a great evening.

I was there for program C although i can't say much about it... It was my first time seeing her Carmen (actually my first time seeing Carmen live) and I thought she and Sergeyev were great. I'd love to see Sergeyev in DonQ. In Woman in the Room, Diana accidently dropped her lemon while dancing... and that's as much as I can say about the ballet. It was better than I thought and Diana has great stage prescence (and she's actually tiny!). I just don't know enough about these rather modern dance works to criticize them.....

As far as I know, this performance has nothing to do with Ardani. They are (business)friend with Vishneva but have no ties with Lopatkina. If Lopatkina and friends were to visit NY again next year, they will have to plan their visit on March in order to perform at the Koch Theater because NYCB will be performing there throughout January and February.

Since this happened at the stagedoor I'm not sure whether I'm allowed to talk about this but Uliana actually said that she prefers this type of galas more than dancing in full length ballets now. She was so gracious for all the supports and even apologized for coming out so late (I think I waited for an hr and 20 min). That's fine since she's worth the wait. She's a great ambassador of Russian art and I'm grateful that she staged this in Brooklyn. I just hope she comes back next year.... or sooner...

Oh wow... Tonight's performance was just amazing... Lopatkina/Ermakov's Melody and La Rose Malade almost had me in tears.. Ermakov really is a sublime partner. It was very clever to close the performance with light hearted Little Humpbacked Horse (I love this ballet!). Shklyarov seemed more relaxed in it after performing his close to perfect Albrecht variation (no botched turns, higher jumps, and quieter landings). Osmolkina and Zyuzin's balcony pas de deux was another highlight. I'd love to see the whole ballet because I prefer Lavrovsky's R&J to MacMillan's. While the rest of the cast took a bow, Lopatkina changed her costume to prepare for Dying Swan. She only needed a minute. What a professional! I would see anything she dances in. I know I've whined a little about their last two performances but today made up for everything. I just hope Lopatkina and her friends come back again next year!

You don't have to defend for Uliana because everyone knows it was BAM's mismanagement or Mariinsky's negligence to not include all the credit info. As Ilya mentioned I'm disappointed that Mariinsky didn't have any backup plan in case of someone's injury. They are too big of a company to not be prepared of this kind of circumstamce. Let's see how tonight's performance goes because the program does look more promising.

I actually liked Pavlova and Cecchetti but I agree that she could've performed something else... such as the white adagio in Swan Lake!! I also agree about the missing window. When I realized that it's not there I wondered how Shklyarov will exit from the stage... (He just jeted to the side to make his exit... which isnt as dramatic as the original) Sergeyev was great as Torero in Carmen Suite today! It's very disrespectful that BAM didn't print his name on the brochure. I'm also wondering why he wasn't scheduled to dance anything else in other programs. He isn't included in the DC tour so why don't let him perform more? Since they won't be performing DonQ pas de deux maybe Sergeyev can fill in and perform Espada variation instead. It's just my wishful thinking!

What i meant was the website was showing that she would be dancing Russian Dance from "the Nutcracker" not "Swan Lake". Obviously it was a typo and they fixed it since then. So I went to today'd performance and have one complain: in my opinion, BAM's floor isn't appropriate for ballet. Whenever toe shoes touch the floor it makes a very loud noise. I felt the same thing last year when Mariinsky were performing Swan Lake. I could tell that some of the dancers where very cautious to make less noise when they move and once the music became loud enough to cover the noise they started to move with more freedom. This is just my observation so others might have felt differently. Few things I noticed: Shklyarov seemed to be either still recovering from injury or preserving his body for precaution. He had some issues with turns which is quite surprising. I've never seen him making this many small mistakes on stage. Hopefully he can come back to his usual self soon. Lopatkina and Ermakov looked so beautiful together! I fully understand why people are praising this partnership. There was just one noticeable mistake during their Chopiniana performance but I can overlook it. My favorite was the Firebird Pas de deux. Lopatkina looked very striking in the costume. By the way, Popov is injured so they omitted Carnaval from today's program and DonQ Pas de deux from Sunday's. For the Bluebird Pas de deux, Sergeyev substituted for him! It was a happy surprise for me.

I hope Lobsanova and Lunkina are coming!! So excited for this news!!

I was thinking this was a typo because Lopatkina usually dances Russian Dance from Swan Lake for galas. Hopefully it's a typo from Bam or Mariinsky.... I was hoping to see something other than Woman in a Room for program B but oh well. At least I haven't seen Vishneva's Carmen Suite yet!

I've been checking their website every day. Hopefully he recovers from the injury in time! They haven't updated anything for Vishneva's performance yet.

I think most seats (even the standing seats or 5th rings if you bring your binoculars) provide a good view. If you are concerned about sound quality, just avoid the back seats with low ceilings because the orchestra does sound a bit muted in my experience.

I am well aware of Gergiev's scheme but I plan to go there anyway to see Lopatkina. I see Vishneva during ABT season every year so I won't be going to see her solo performances unles's her program looks interesting. I am also making my trip to DC to see 3 Raymonda performances. Hopefully Lopatkina performs on the opening night.

More information regarding Mariinsky's performances at BAM has been released! http://www.bam.org/dance/2016/mariinsky-residency Feb 25th Program A: Bolero performed by Maya Plisetskaya Woman in a room performed by Diana Vishneva The Dying Swan performed by Ulyana Lopatkina Feb 26th Program B: No specifics yet... but the website says Lopatkina will be performing. Feb 27th Program C: No specifics. Vishneva will be performing. Feb 28th Program D: Lopatkina performing the works by Petipa, Fokine, Messerer, and Petit. Probably same program as her recent performance at Yale (Russian Dance, Chopiniana, etc) So no Raymonda after all. I gotta catch the first Raymonda performance in DC then come back to NY to see Lopatkina!

hmm... Is BAM too small to perform Raymonda? I've never seen this production live so I don't know how big the production scale is. I think I will be making a trip to DC to catch the opening night performance. I hope I can see everything from 2nd tier front row!

I woke up late and missed the Bolshoi and half of Royal Ballet portion! Are they going to upload the videos later? I can't believe I couldn't wake up in time!!

Oh no! They were both great in Flames of Paris performances in NY. I hope they find a new company soon... I'm wondering why they fired her husband though... Maybe it was his decision to leave with his wife.