Kathleen O'Connell

I'm OK with keeping long-term soloists who aren't likely to make principal on the roster so long as they are regularly (and justifiably) cast and have a real role in the company. (Like Lauren King, for example.) I don't think that applies in the case of Suozzi.

For me, yes, in the sense that a full(ish) head of hair is part of the costume. Princesses wear tutus and tiaras; Princes wear jeweled tunics and hair. If they don't have their own hair, a hairpiece is fine with me—like the curls the ballerinas wear in Apollo. I've got no issue with bald dancers (or dancers with mop tops and beards) in ballets where the look can be part of the overall theatrical effect.

He's still a soloist. I can't remember the last time I actually saw him on stage.

Adrian Danchig-Waring. I'd pair him with either Reichlen or LaFreniere—he's partnered both in Chaconne. Sterlin Hyltin demonstrated that a not-tall dancer can be a success in Mozartiana: I'd like to see Indiana Woodward take a crack at the role—more than Peck. ETA: I think Reichlen could be good in Mozartiana. When she lets her incomparable Rubies Tall Girl peek out for a moment or two in other Balanchine roles (Stars and Stripes and Chaconne for example) she brings something all her own to them. Re LaFreniere: After seeing her debut in Chaconne I'm eager to see her in every other Farrell role.

Wish I could say the same. Every few years someone interesting gets cast and I think "How bad can it be?" and buy a ticket. About five minutes after the curtain goes up, I am reminded of just how bad it is. It's ugly, it's airless, and it's so stripped down to steps! steps! steps! that just about all the theater has been drained out of it. "How much story do you need?" Balanchine famously asked. Well, more than Martins (and Per Kirkeby) deigned to give us. Balanchine's one-act version is by contrast distilled and does indeed give us all the story we need.

Oh, I think I'll go down a different path. The "mad scene" is where she gets good and mad. She's got better things to do with her life than be the next dead girl a thoughtless nobleman begs forgiveness from in the last act.

Is this what you're looking for? Here's Act 2:

We also don't know whether or not "mild" Omicron infections carry with them the risk of long Covid. ETA: I put "mild" in quotes because not landing you in the hospital doesn't necessarily equal "mild."

I assume that performances are being cancelled because infected or exposed members of the cast, crew, and orchestra have to isolate for 5-10 days and it's simply not possible to put on a performance with whoever is left standing. Even if they aren't required to isolate by operation of law, union rules, NYC / NYC employment regulations, etc., the cast and crew have friends, families, and communities they need to protect. Not everyone they have contact with will have been vaccinated—children under 5, for example. It's also likely that at least some members of the cast and crew are in regular contact with people who are at risk of severe disease, even if they've been vaccinated. If I were a young parent among the cast and crew with toddlers at home, I wouldn't be particularly eager to spend my working day in close contact with someone who was infected or exposed. Ditto if I had an immunocompromised spouse or partner or parent.

This was the point of my post: Omicron is blowing through NYC despite the city's high vaccination rate and wide acceptance of mitigation measures like masking and social distancing—even outdoors. (I will note that the tables nonetheless still appear to be full in the bars and restaurants in my neighborhood ... ). Knowing this, I'd say @YouOverThere didn't overreact: the behaviors that might have been safe (or at least safe-ish) for vaccinated people taking reasonable precautions a month ago are riskier now. Fingers crossed that Dr. Wachter's assessment is correct! PS: I know someone who was just diagnosed with Covid despite being vaxxed and boosted and having been previously infected earlier in the pandemic. It's like Omicron looked at their immune system and just laughed.

Thank you! I'm just sick enough to have a ready excuse for not doing anything I don't really want to 😉 That being said, please treat this new variant with respect ...

Nope. Despite being boosted, being scrupulous about masking / hand hygiene, limiting my indoor activities to brief forays to the grocery store / pharmacy once omicron made its way here, and living in a city where the vast majority of the adult population is vaxxed and everyone is masked, I still managed to get covid this week. Fortunately my symptoms are mild thus far—Thank you, vaccines!—but clearly the new variant is (ahem) nothing to sneeze at, especially if there are immune-compromised or people with co-morbidities in your community for whom infection might well turn out to be severe.

It will take years if we don't, as a society, take the precautions that have been proven to work in reducing the virus' spread. These include vaccination, proper masking, and reduced congregation.

Although it is possible for individuals who have been vaccinated against Covid-19 to get a breakthrough infection and to transmit the virus to others, they are much less likely to become infected than an unvaccinated individual or, in the case of the omicron variant, a previously infected individual who has not been vaccinated. An individual who has received a full course of the vaccine plus a booster is even less likely to become infected. And, if they do become infected, their viral load decreases more quickly than it does in an unvaccinated person, and thus reduces the amount of time during which they can transmit the virus to others. A fully vaccinated audience is much less likely to spread Covid-19 than an unvaccinated or partially vaccinated audience simply because there will be fewer infected individuals than there would be in an unvaccinated or partially vaccinated audience. Requiring vaccination is a sensible precaution; it's more than security theater. I didn't get vaccinated so that I could do things, I got vaccinated to protect myself against severe illness, hospitalization, and death; to protect my family and my community—especially those who aren't able to be vaccinated or who are immunocompromised—from the risk of severe illness, hospitalization, and death; to help my community reach herd immunity and thus reduce the virus' ability to mutate into dangerous variants; and to ensure that the healthcare system wasn't overtaxed to the point where it could no longer deliver effective care to anyone, whether they had covid or not. I got vaccinated so that things could eventually return to normal and we could all do things again. People are forced to do all kinds of things to ensure the safety of everyone. They are required to get drivers licenses and auto insurance, for instance. They are required to register their vehicles and have them regularly inspected to make sure that they can be operated safely and with reduced emissions. ETA: Here are some links re Omicron and prior infection: Prior COVID Infection Less Likely to Stop Omicron, Says Study Omicron more likely to reinfect than Delta, no milder -study Vaccines and virus spread: Vaccinated People Can Transmit the Coronavirus, but It’s Still More Likely If You’re Unvaccinated

Maybe if you're very, very naughty Ms. Santa will tie you to a kitchen chair ... 😈

I haven't seen that many NYCB Nutcrackers live, so I don't want to claim that my experience is representative, but every satisfying Dewdrop I've seen has radiated authority rather than mere technical chops. She's the queen of her realm: a Hippolyta, not a Butterfly. "Authority" is a quality any number of types can project.

Watts once described herself as a "medium." She wasn't tall the way, say, Kowroski was tall, but she wasn't short, either. And yes, I never cease to be amazed at how "not tall" some dancers are when I happen to find myself standing next to them.

Taller NYCB ballerinas have danced Dewdrop over the years—Karin von Aroldingen, Kyra Nichols, Heather Watts, and Sofiane Sylve, off the top of my head. ETA - and more recently Maria Kowroski, Sara Mearns and Teresa Reichlen.

There are some interesting performances—e.g., Trisha Brown's O złozony / O composite and Balanchine's Le Palais de Cristal—that aren't that easy to find, either online or irl. It's also nice that the on-demand viewing window is 30 days. Thank's for the heads up!

Sigh. It's definitely the fly in the ointment. I consume most of my performing arts content on my tablet or computer but every now and then I'd like to watch something on my TV. It's possible to relay from computer/tablet to TV using Airplay or Chromecast, but it's not as straightforward as a TV app would be.

Medici.tv is running a Cyber Monday sale. Annual subscriptions (including gift cards) are $38.70. The pay-as-you-go plan is $3.22 per month. Note that although the prices are marked as "first year, then USD $129/year afterwards," I was able to re-subscribe at the discounted rate. (I didn't renew when last year's discounted subscription ran out about a week ago, so that may be why I was able to re-subscribe now.) It's a good deal at the discounted price if you're interested in streaming on ballet, opera, and concert performances on demand from an existing catalogue.

The Carolina Chocolate Drops billed themselves as an "old-time string band." (They stopped performing together sometime around 2014 or 2015. Their most well-known member is probably Rhiannon Giddens, who, among other things, hosts WNYC's opera podcast Aria Code.) Old-time string band music might be thought of as the older folk cousin of the more recent (and commercial) bluegrass, which really didn't take off until the 1940s/50s. Bluegrass is a "stricter" genre: it has specific instrumentation (upright bass, guitar, mandolin, banjo, and fiddle with the dobro as an option), a hierarchy of which instrument plays what in the overall rhythmic and harmonic texture, almost always features vocals sung in harmony, always features improvisation, and celebrates virtuosity. Old-time string bands use a wider diversity of instruments, textures, and rhythms and, most relevant here, play music originally intended for dancing. Here's Cornbread and Butterbeans to liven up your evening:

From C|NET (of all places ...) Google Doodle marks German composer Fanny Hensel's 216th birthday "She was a talented composer, but her ambitions were limited by societal constraints on women." aka, Fanny Mendelssohn (Felix's sister), born on Nov. 14, 1805, in Hamburg, Germany https://g.co/doodle/s4adpze

😱 I can't even wrap my head around this. I suppose there's some combination of height, muscle mass, and body fat that might make it difficult for an athlete (male or female) to achieve elite performance in their chosen sport, but I find it incomprehensible that a racer who whittles herself down from 16% body fat to 13% body fat will thereby see her times improve. I realize it's a different sport, but have these coaches looked at Serena Williams lately? (She's the GOAT, as far as I'm concerned, and not just among women.)

Troy Schumacher's company Ballet Collective has posted the livestream of its 10th year anniversary performance at Bohemian Hall. The performance features choreography by Schumacher, 14 dancers from NYCB and the Martha Graham company, and live music performed by The Knights. PROGRAM Natural History the first ballet created and performed live in the US during the pandemic, inspired by poems from Carey McHugh with music by Ellis Ludwig-Leone Faraway (duet) from our collaboration with climate artist Zaria Forman and composer Judd Greenstein All That We See painter David Salle presented Troy Schumacher and composer Ellis Ludwig-Leone a series of mysterious croppings from a large work-in-progress PERFORMERS Dancers: Devin Alberda, Daniel Applebaum, Harrison Coll, Jovani Furlan, Emilie Gerrity, Anthony Huxley, Lauren King, Claire Kretzschmar, Ashley Laracey, Mary Thomas MacKinnon, Mira Nadon, Lorenzo Pagano, Davide Riccardo, and Leslie Andrea Williams. Live Music from: Members of The Knights with Special Guests