NAOTMAA

On 9/22/2019 at 8:28 AM, Birdsall said:

Drew is giving good advice. I noticed that the reconstruction is being played nowadays whenever Sleeping Beauty is being performed at the historic Mariinsky Theatre. When Sleeping Beauty is played at the M-2 theatre it is the Sergeyev version. Somova has danced the reconstruction. And, of course, Novikova has too. I think I would lean toward Novikova like Drew says, but Somova is delightful too. Some people have held perceptions of her young years against her, but she is, in my opinion, a different ballerina nowadays. 

Is it actually being performed nowadays? I was under the impression it was only reluctantly revived last year because of the bicentennial. Before that it hadn't been performed for a number of years and I expected it to be put back to pasture again afterwards so I was shocked to see it scheduled on the official website for November. It would be fantastic to see it performed more frequently. I personally believe the larger then life spectacle outweighs the other issues the "revival of the revival" may have. It still feels more magical then any other.

Also it may be a long shot but I hope if these two performances go well it leads to a professional filming and DVD/Blu-ray release! They still have that performance filmed from fifteen years ago with Zhanna Ayupova (we got to see some clips of it in the "Sacred Stage" documentary) gathering dust in the vaults but it would still be great to see a current performance filmed.  

6 hours ago, Mashinka said:

They danced the first performance and for many people their interpretation of the roles surpassed anything that followed, but the ballet was created for Seymour and Christopher Gable.  Apparently Sol Hurok insisted F&N should dance the premiere.  I think to make a tie in with Fonteyn's birth would, as you say, be controversial.

According to Julie Kavanagh in her biography on Nureyev it was chief executive David Webster who insisted F&N dace the first-night at the Royal Opera House. Seymour and Gable danced the second night. Sol Hurok was the one who insisted F&N dance the New York premiere because he believed international success depended on them. In both instances Ashton backed the decision even though he had the power as artistic director to challenge them. So it was a double loss for the MacMillan/Seymour/Gable team who worked together to make it. 

MacMillan was pissed off because he wanted something new, more gritty and real. F&N were too old-fashioned for what he envisioned the characters to be with Lynn and Christopher.  Worse of all it was Seymour and Gable who had to teach Margot and Rudolf the choreography because apparently MacMillan was too bitter and disheartened to do anything. And they were the ones who had to watch Margot and Rudolf make the changes that clashed with the original vision. Kavanagh also points out that a year later MacMillian left the Royal ballet for the directorship in Berlin, taking Seymour with him. Later that same year Gable gave up ballet to become an actor. 

As for what ballet they would perform to tie in with Margot's birth wasn't Aurora considered her most iconic role?   

According to the Marius Petipa Society Stepanov notations for Sleeping Beauty were done around ca. 1903, 10 years after the premiere and after Petipa was dismissed from the Mariinsky. Chances are there were many changes done within those ten years by Petipa himself due to either change in dancers with different strengths or his own personal tinkering. And who's to say there wasn't additional tinkering after 1903 when the talent at the Mariinsky was overflowing to insane proportions. 

https://petipasociety.com/the-sleeping-beauty/

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In 1921, the first full-length production of Petipa and Tchaikovsky’s The Sleeping Beauty was staged by Diaghilev for the Ballets Russes on the 2nd November at the Alhambra Theatre in London under the title The Sleeping Princess. Dancing Princess Aurora and Prince Désiré in the première were Olga Spessivtseva and Pierre Vladimirov. The décor and costumes were designed by Leon Bakst, using the same type of designs he had used for Pavlova’s costume for her abridged staging in the United States. Igor Stravinsky arranged and re-orchestrated parts of Tchaikovsky’s score, while some of Petipa’s choreography was altered by Bronislava Nijinska

Diaghilev may have used the notations but as stated here even he had done some tinkering of his own both to choreography and music. So the line from Petipa 1893 to Ratmansky 2015 has quite a number of twists of turns of its own just like Vikharev's does. No one will ever know just how close to 1893 they are unless someone invents a time machine. 

edit: I do agree with Gnossie that the Baskt aesthetic doesn't feel very "Tsarist." I look at the costumes and sets and have a hard time imagining the Romanovs or Tsarist elite sitting in the Imperial box watching it. Everything I have read about Alexander III or his son suggests to me that they would have found it too far out there. Perhaps it would have been performed at the private theatre of a more adventurous aristocrat but not the Tsar's theatre.

22 minutes ago, Gnossie said:

In YOUR opinion. 

I haven't seen the Ratmansky reconstruction so I can't compare but I guess looking at pictures and small clips the overall look seems very flashy and out there. I guess it's the feeling and atmosphere that would be the biggest difference. It certainly has the Dagliev flash which is different from Petipa and his overall style.

Of course Sleeping Princess was over 30 years after Petipa's original and a lot changed in between them (in dance and culture) so of course there is differences in that area. 

I read back then Petipa use to rechoreograph and tweak ballets on the strengths and weaknesses of the dancer taking over the role. That's why it's near impossible, even with the notation, to see what Sleeping Beauty was like when it was first performed in 1893. Yet today from what I've seen it seems everyone is expected to dance it as choreographed regardless. When did that change? 

Since the Sergeyev version has so many changes from what Petipa had originally created what version would people consider closestest to the original, after the reconstruction? 

In the end it was only revived as a gimmick to put people in the seats for the becentennial. It's probably why they added Act III to the gala when the original program failed to sell out. It was all about money 

Considering the fact that the Vikharev production only premiered 19 years ago, plus having a filmed video (rotting away in the vaults ) and dancers and advisors with first hand knowledge the fact they couldn't get it right is unacceptable. Many of the things they got wrong were rather simple and easy to correct. Flat out lazy and an insult to Vikharev. 

Is there a reason why no other ballet company will attempt this production? I've seen many other reconstructions performed by multiple companies but not this one. Do the Mariinsky own the rights or something? Somebody has to rescue it! 

https://www.ft.com/content/7ff78d18-25e2-11e8-9274-2b13fccdc744

a very short piece from the Financial Times. 

5 stars for Beauty although he notes the deterioration of the management, corps and soloists in comparison to a decade ago. 2 stars for the gala

I suppose EVERYTHING about the Mariinsky can be summed up here:

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At its best, the House of Petipa can still dazzle. Right now, it keeps standing in its own way.

Too bad the "house of Petipa" has its been giving its own reflection the middle finger for quite some time now 

3 hours ago, mnacenani said:

I am certain Buddy will post a detailed review of tonight's "Petipa 200 Gala" so I would just like to post a few words re my take on this evening. I bought my ticket before the program was announced and when it was posted it was something of a letdown for me - I was expecting something bigger, also taking into account the unheard-of price for Piter of R15K for best seats. OK, the program being what it was a train of thought can be extracted :  Petipa (SB) inspired Balanchine, thus M.N. Dream, Balanchine (Jewels) inspired Keikhel, thus The Seasons - presented in reverse order - Big Deal !  The funny thing is this was supposed to be the Petipa Gala but the third act of SB which concluded the evening was SEVERELY cut compared to what I saw on Friday 9th evening :  tonight only the White Cat-Puss in Boots and the Florine-Bluebird sequences were danced - NO Red Riding Hood and Wolf, no Cinderella-Fortune and no Cannibal chasing Tom Thumb&Bros !!  The broadcaster Mezzo must have imposed a duration limit I thought, otherwise it just didn't make sense, not to me.

I have often heard that Gergiev doesn't pay attention to the stage action to pace the music and tonight I witnessed it in unmistakeable fashion : at the start of the act the PdQ etc of the Fairies were conducted at such a faster tempo compared with Friday that I was waiting to see which of the dancers was going to slip up - none did.

Keikhel's The Seasons was  a take on Jewels I thought, with costumes changing colour with changing seasons, and at almost an hour much too long for what it is, should be cut to 30 mins. The "wedding" scene of Midsummer Night's Dream is my least favourite bit of this work - the story for anyone who cares about it is in the previous scenes. Did Petipa choreograph anything without a story ?? Serious question - I would like to learn.

They dumped Flora for that!?!?! It sounds like they butchered it more then feared. I mean even the companies that "cut the fat" still perform Red Riding Hood and yet they couldn't even do that  Did they at least do the apotheosis? Was that butchered too? 

The Mezzo site said the program was two hours and fifty minutes long. How much of it was actual Petipa material and not "Petipa inspired"  Sounds like very little. And I thought The Seasons was suppose to be a reconstruction of Petipa but from what you descible is sounds like a Balanchine tribute where the only connection to Petipa is the ballet name and music used.

Overall it almost sounds like it could be a tribute to Balanchine disguised as a tribute to Petipa 

40 minutes ago, mnacenani said:

If you tell me how you are able to receive Kultura I will respond in kind

I unfortunately can't cause I don't get it  I was just looking on their website and only saw it after seeing Petipa's picture while scrolling down on the main page. I like looking at what's on tv in other countries even if I can't watch them just out if interest  

I noticed on the Russian Kultra channel from the 9th to the 11th at 12:45 they aired old recordings of Peitpa ballets in honor of the bicentennial. Sleeping Beauty with Irina Kolpakova from 1982 on the 9th, La Bayadere from 1979 on the 10th and on the 11th their broadcasting Raymonda with Kolpakova again. Tsiskaridze did the opening introductions. Its strange to honor Petipa with Soviet incarnations but I guess since none of the reconstructions were never filmed they got no choice  

Does anybody know where someone from outside of Europe can view the gala? 

Thanks for posting that Mme. Hermine! It's from a 2003 performance that was apparently filmed in whole and now hidden away in a storage closet. Perhaps never to see the day of light  

But lucky they let the filmmakers of Sacred Stage use many clips for their documentary because we have some record of the wonderful Zhanna Ayupova dancing the reconstruction. She's so soft and delicate feeling yet still confident and regal just the same. She just floats around the stage with such ease   I can't find the dream sequence with her and Anton Korsakov anywhere anywhere on youtube but she has that same serene and enchanted dreamy like quality that Quinten mentioned with the Sizova clip. 

I noticed that the Lilac fairy on the first night was wearing her vision scene costume (it is stunning!) for the apotheosis and not the one she wears when she puts the kingdom to sleep as she clearly does in the poor quality video Gnossie posted. Also Aurora's "favorite" Prince during the Rose Adagio is the wrong one too (he's in black instead of red), or they simply switched the costumes they wear. From my old video the choreography for the Princes seems a little different to? 

It all sounds so amazing! If only they filmed it  Even more cruel and unfair since the cameras are going to be there for the gala in 2 days  I hope someone gets the whole thing on YouTube for a while before it's forced off

3 hours ago, Gnossie said:

As I said on the Mariinsky Festival thread and forgot to post earlier here: 

The Awakening of Flora no longer to be filmed, so, the only reconstruction that the Mariinsky can actually perform very well because it's usually performed, they are not going to dance, they are going to dance the SB reconstruction, which requires an insane amount of coaching that the dancers are not being provided.

Coherence doesn't abound at the Mariinsky."

 

And by videos seen of today's performance, Vikharev and Petipa turn in their graves. Poor Novikova will try to save the ship tomorrow but with the horrible Desiré and Lilac she has been given......may Petipa and Vikharev help her.

 

Ditto, with what others have expressed, they better film the apotheosis, although it wouldn't be surprising to see a whole lot of Soviet pdds performed in "honor" of Marius Alphonse since the MOSG (Mariinsky Old Soviet Guard) considers Sergeyev to be an "improvement" of Petipa, Oh boy.....😂

I consider it to be self-sabotage. 

 

 

Nice to see you back on the forum Tabitha!!!

The only videos out there I've seen so far are of the Garland Waltz and the Rose Adagio as well as a short one of Tereshkina's entrance. Are there any more? 

When the castings first came out I thought it was strangely lopsided in favor of the first night. There seem to be a combination of big names, respected veterans and new generation promising youngsters. Outside of Novikova the second performance seems filled with much lesser names although Skorik has been getting a big push in recent years. That's why I thought and hoped (for a brief moment) that there were possible plans to film the first performance. Otherwise why would they seem to go all out in castings for one (and not the other) other then the fact they would want the very first performance of the Petipa celebrations to start with some of the best. 

Is there any news on who's dancing in the gala? It's only 3 days away! Ekaterina Osmolkina (who you mentioned previously as a Vikharev muse and if we were lucky Flora) danced Aurora in the 2007 New Year's gala and was positively lovely. Perhaps she'll do it again since she isn't scheduled for anything until the 18th. Is there any other lady who is currently not engaged? Any Désiré's? And any casting for The Seasons and Balanchine's Dream yet? 

I'm still not happy about this but if they're going to do Act III of the reconstruction again then we better not be robbed of seeing the whole apotheosis in all its full blown majestic glory again. In the 2007 New Year's gala it was interrupted in favor of Rossini's "Il viaggio a Reims"  version complete with opera singers. I want to hear Tchaikovsky and see the Lilac fairy and the gods in the clouds! This time they got no reason not to but knowing our luck so far they'll probably find a way 

So it seems that not only will we not get a filmed version of the whole Sleeping Beauty reconstruction (we already have Act 3 filmed! Why ignore the rest?) but we now won't get a possible DVD/Blu-Ray of Flora either. 

If they want to change something in the gala then ditch the Balanchine. He may be Petipa's spiritual son but he still isn't Petipa.

Eliminate the actual work of the man your honoring in favor of an assimilation. Taking Flora out is just stupid. They really know how to mess thing up! 

18 hours ago, Royal Blue said:

 

 

 

Since the Lilac Fairy plays such a pivotal role in The Sleeping Beauty, this thread is naturally interesting and important. Particularly the illuminating exchange quoted above. 

Essentially, this immortal fairy tale intimates that wisdom and love enable a human being to understand and cope with Reality. 

The Sleeping Beauty centers on a romance between two strangers born many years apart who fall in love with each other at first sight. This appears nonsensical. Yet it is an affair brought about through the intervention of a supernatural being symbolizing Wisdom! 

What Prince Désiré and Princess Aurora have in common is their "royal" pedigree. (The word "Beauty" as opposed to "Princess" in the title is crucial: it humanizes the story.) Their capacity for love and wisdom is among their key attributes.

In the reconstruction videos I've seen it doesn't really look like "love at first sight." That seems to have come in later versons

What I saw was when Désiré kisses Aurora he moves away before she gets up. She gets up and immediately moves to her parents and apparently doesn't look at the Prince at all. Aurora says she's been kissed and turns to the Lilac fairy. Then the Lilac fairy takes center stage and explains what just happened. She then takes the Désiré's hand and leads him to the King and Queen where he professes his love and asks permission to marry their daughter where they immediately accept. He then runs to Aurora but she moves to the other side of the stage. Its only when the Lilac fairy takes both of their hands and joins them together that they hold hands. Then they move together to the King and Queen who put their hands on top of Désiré's and Aurora's as the final seal of their engagement.  

So to me it doesn't look like love at first sight. It looks more like a royal marriage arranged by the wise and good Lilac fairy and sanctioned by the King and Queen. Prince Désiré may be in love but Aurora doesn't seem to have any say. Her marriage has been decided for her and she accepts it without question. That was after all the duty any proper royal princess during that era. It was a match made by the heavens, not love. At least that's how I interpreted it. 

The 2006 Royal ballet version, which I saw on DVD, on the other hand looks very much like "love at first sight." Désiré kisses Aurora and stays by her side. She wakes up, smiles, and immediately joins arms with him. Although in that version it feels like the roles of the Lilac, King and Queen are quite diminished in favor of boosting Aurora and Désiré.

If I'm not mistaken is seems that in nearly every other version (royal ballet, Sergeyev, Nuréyev) the Lilac fairy doesn't even appear in Aurora's bedroom when Désiré kisses her. She's gone after leading him to the castle and doesn't show up again until the wedding party as a guest. She's only present in the bedroom in the reconstruction and the recent Grigorovich. I haven't seen the Ratmansky so I can't say if she's there or not. 

Yeah I know Gergiev only cares about opera and Fateyev is a "yes man" but I hoped against the odds that Putin going in the Tsarist direction would make them too even if their hearts weren't in it. Mariinsky will NEVER be an opera powerhouse no matter how hard Gergiev tries. The ballet will always be its bread and butter, claim to fame and prestige. It takes some character (not in a good way) to keep ignoring that for over twenty years  

The sooner he gets overthrown the better because surely at some point that's got to happen. The state of the ballet has declined so much so fast and the opera certainly isn't making up for it. All that history of the glorious theatre just crumbling. It's shockingly dreadful to see all the top Vaganova graduates going anywhere but the Mariinsky  Just imagine how amazing all the Petipa tributes would have been had they continued the path of the late 90s/mid 2000s 

I just find it weird because unless I'm miss reading things, or reading the wrong press completely, it seems these days Putin likes to wink and nod towards the Tsarist past (he seems to think of himself as a Tsar) more then the Soviet one. Wouldn't those who follow the regime line, like Gergiev, follow suite? Wouldn't embracing the reconstructed Beauty be the theater's way of doing that? 

If the reconstructed Beauty was filmed, in full, in the mid-2000s, is there any reason why it was never released as a DVD/Blu-ray or even broadcast on cinema/TV? It seems such a waste to film it and then let it rot on the vault shelves  Compare to the Bolshoi the Mariinsky seem pretty poor when it comes to releasing its stuff

Flora has quite the Imperial history. It was first performed at the Peterhof palace in honor of Tsar Alexander III's daughter, Grand Duchess Xenia, and her marriage to Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich. It likely was the last ballet performance the Tsar saw before he died. And then it transferred, with the same cast, to the Mariinsky. It was the farewell benefit for Maria Anderson, the original white cat in Sleeping Beauty, who was forced into retirement after a tragic burn accident during Cinderella rehearsals. And of course the first Flora was Mathilde Kschessinska, Nicholas II's famous mistress.   

It really is a beautiful ballet and its too bad outside of Russia people barely know it. Has the Mariinsky ever performed it on tour? 

1 hour ago, Gnossie said:

 

The answer to that is a resounding YES. 

 

 

If you love ballet, if you love Tsarist grandeur, if you love authentic Petipa then you, balletomanes of the world, should NOT miss the opportunity to see this. The lovely Ekaterinburg staff takes better care of their Fille recon than the Mariinsky does with theirs, God knows what will the Soviet old guard do to the Flora and Beauty reconstructions now that Vikharev is no longer with us. 😭

 

Ugh, why film it only to keep it locked away in the vaults? Especially since audiences have been denied the possibility of seeing it live and many really want to  I'd love to have a full performance of Ayupova's Aurora. In the Sacred Stage documentary Rose Adagio clips she was so serene and regal 

How many reconstructions have been released on a DVD/Blu-ray? The only one I know is the La Scala Raymonda with Novikova. I'm not sure if one would count Pharaoh's Daughter since Lacotte seem to play a bit fast and loose with the choreography but I guess that's another. With so many being performed and redone I would like to think in the next year or two we'll get an overflow of them. 

I really do wonder what the new/old Beauty will look like on Thursday and Friday considering the fact that apparently nobody who worked with Vikharev on it originally is involved this time around. I also noticed on the cast playbill and dancer biographies that many of the dancers danced their parts in the Sergeyev version. Only a very few of them have ever danced the Vikharev. So is it simply going to look more like the Sergeyev with the Tsarist era costumes and sets or are they going to make an effort and not spit on Vikharev's grave? Also Mr. Scholl said the Mariinsky isn't very good at preservation so I hope the costumes and sets got a good cleaning and refreshing up before they're presented to an audience. I'd hate for all that grandeur to look all sad. All the same could be said for Flora too!

I'm very much looking forward to the Vaganova Petipa tribute gala in June. I'm sure Tsiskaridze and crew won't disappoint. But I hope it makes it's way on YouTube as I won't be able to access the channel it's airing on here 

As for the Vaganova school, it's wonderful their embracing the imperial past when the Mariinsky won't. Rejecting the imperial past is like rejecting Petipa. Which is sad because the Mariinsky and Petipa (who symbolizes everything that is imperial in ballet) are suppose to be bonded and forever linked. But it will be okay as long as somewhere in Russia their upholding the grand traditions that made it the worlds ballet capital. The Bolshoi is definitely benefiting from it.