Mel Johnson

Estelle, in American show business slang, a "turkey" is a bad show, and preferably one that's big, overblown, and pretentious. Isn't there a farce entitled Georges Dindon? I think the French equivalent of the word in slang is "four".

Such is the nature of leitmotiv. It's even stranger in Madame Butterfly, where Pinkerton's motif is a little of the "Star-Spangled Banner" played somewhere in the harmony.

Such is the nature of leitmotiv. It's even stranger in Madame Butterfly, where Pinkerton's motif is a little of the "Star-Spangled Banner" played somewhere in the harmony.

Done, but you can tell everybody right here! I'm sure we'd all be fascinated to find the good stuff!

Jean-Luc, if you find them, even off this board, let Alexandra and me know immediately!

Hey, milliskin is a lot more expensive than plain old nylon!

Well, I didn't make evensong, so how about compline? My recommendation for Giselle the Sequel would be a sort of ballet version of "Malcolm in the Middle" with a feckless dad, four mayhem-prone boys, mom as dictator.... Giselle has pathos; this would have bathos. [ November 20, 2001: Message edited by: Mel Johnson ]

Actually, the first time I encountered it in an American company was a performance of the David Blair production of Swan Lake for ABT. Toni Lander absolutely nailed the fouettés, and there was very little the orchestra could do to pick up for Bruce Marks' tours à la seconde until they (the audience) calmed down a little. [ November 20, 2001: Message edited by: Mel Johnson ]

Actually, the first time I encountered it in an American company was a performance of the David Blair production of Swan Lake for ABT. Toni Lander absolutely nailed the fouettés, and there was very little the orchestra could do to pick up for Bruce Marks' tours à la seconde until they (the audience) calmed down a little. [ November 20, 2001: Message edited by: Mel Johnson ]

I think what has happened there is a failure of makeup design against the old pocketbook. There is a waterbase foundation called "Texas Gold" which, because of small metallic particles in the mixture, bronze perhaps, imparts a golden sheen to the skin. The same company makes a different product called "Texas dirt" which, because it doesn't have the shiny stuff in it, is much less expensive. I can just see some bean-counter somewhere in the POB organization saying, "Wotthehey! They're both Texas, aren't they? Take off the gold, bring on the dirt!" [ November 19, 2001: Message edited by: Mel Johnson ]

That caesura at the end of the fouettés has been there for so long, it might as well be notated into the score, it's part of the landscape now. But I agree, coming down center is a bit much!

That caesura at the end of the fouettés has been there for so long, it might as well be notated into the score, it's part of the landscape now. But I agree, coming down center is a bit much!

Kind of reminds me of one of the dancers I worked with at Joffrey. When I was there, 74-76, he was three years older than I was. Now his most recent bio, updated this May, makes him five years YOUNGER! How time does fly!

And in the old Ballet Suedois production of "Creation du Monde", the dancers wore allover body-stockings designed by Fernand Leger to follow a traveloguesque libretto by Blaise Cendrars. It always defied me how someone could interpret Milhaud's sophisticated and relentlessly urban score as primitivist, but Jean Borlin sure tried!

Technical advice for poster in need of "alt" characters: Press the "alt" key and use the following number codes on your numeric keypad to get the various "alt" characters. alt 130 = é alt 138 = è alt 133 = à alt 131 = â alt 136 = ê There are many others, but those, I think will get you started - experiment a bit. You'll find the rest. If your keyboard doesn't have a numeric keypad, then check the owner's manual for how to cause alt characters. [ November 12, 2001: Message edited by: Mel Johnson ]

Just so long as they don't start calling him Prince Hunk....

And as long as we bring up the Bach Revival of the 19th century, it's also worth noting that the character of Mendelssohn's vocal writing changes dramatically after he takes up his championship for Bach. The same sorts of forces work on dancers. The historical aspect of a dance brings a new dimension to their work, if we're lucky. Ballet is one of the most historically unusual art forms in that it has institutionalized the "oral tradition" of history, with a dancer able to trace his or her "genealogy" all the way back to Noverre.

Never fear, Nanatchka, the Perrault makes it clear, the entire kingdom falls under the Lilac Fairy's spell, so even the pets are safe! Desiré/Florimund would be better having Steve Irwin with him on the way into the castle with the amount of understory he's got to break through! I remember seeing the Kirov Beauty for the first time in 1964, and being disappointed in the sketchiness of the sets that they used.

Anybody who's ever farmed even a little farm will know the answer to the first question: Why are they always harvesting? If you've timed your crops correctly, you should be harvesting all the way from June (early peas and asparagus), to November (late wheat). And harvesting takes a LOT of people. Sowing seed or setting plants takes only one or two for every thousand square feet or so. Harvesting takes a crowd! Re: the Glazunov Seasons- I've seen photos (only a couple) from the original production, and it looked to me like Petipa had returned to the ballets of his youth, or even of his teacher's day, with much allegory going on, but in nice academically correct fashion. And also a big yes to the Call to Arms in Coppélia. The Franco-Prussian War led to the Siege of Paris and the demise of many of the original personnel from the original production of the ballet. I've often wondered if some of the disjointedness in the Act III divertissement wasn't at least partially attributable to that fact. (ps. Radishes come in both early and late, so you can start and end the garden with them. Just avoid hot weather - makes 'em bolt to seed too fast, and the radishes are too sharp to eat if it's too hot!) [ November 10, 2001: Message edited by: Mel Johnson ]

Actually, I think it was more Louis XIV, the compleat Absolute Monarch, in the guise of Le Roi Soliel, and all to the tune of something most people think is Russian, but it's actually French. The melody of the apotheosis is "Vive Henri IV", a French song of the early Renaissance. And a further yes to the fairies forming a tableau about the image of Apollo.

Another good thing about the S/N/D Ballet is its place in the opening to the West in the Cold War made by the "ballet gambit". Somewhere around here I have a souvenir book (one cannot call it a program) with many photographs of the company which was produced for a season in France, before the Bolshoi and the Kirov were allowed to travel internationally. Certainly, excellent ballet is always good propaganda for its producer, but this tour represented an important step away from Stalinist isolationism.

The Stanislavski-Nemirovitch-Danchenko Ballet has been one of Moscow's best kept ballet secrets for years - going back into the fifties. They've always featured provocative dancers and equally thought-provoking versions of the classics formulated at a time when restagings based on concentrated thought were rather discouraged.

I kind of like the idea of splitting the difference, where a male dancer en travesti can really make an UGLY Carabosse, and then, thanks to the healing power of forgiveness, she gets smartened up and gorgeous (switch to the female dancer) for the wedding, to which she is invited, complete with rats and amphibians as attendants, but nice white rats this time, and pretty green frogs instead of toads, all in beautiful livery.

It could be if: a) Your definition of "pirouette" is vague enough and B) You have a ball bearing in the toe of your shoe.

My memory of the Guinness figure is similar, but a little lower. 121. A special on the Guinness Book featured a brief interview with Jackson, in which she recalled the situation. She only stopped, she said, because people were starting to lose interest in the unending series of turns. Now if the new figure in the article were a typo for 138, that would be a different matter entirely.