Petra

I saw the Sat night performance of Romance and Revelry. It was a wonderful evening. Besides Fancy Free, which I'd seen once before, this was the first time I'd seen Robbins' standalone ballet choreography. This is definitely the type of choreography that suits the PA Ballet dancers. They are great at 'character' ballets and roles. Aranxtcha Ochoa was the standout for me this evening, because usually I admire her without liking her. She has great technique and facility so she always gets cast in lead roles even though IMO she doesn't have the personality to carry them off. She was well-cast in this program - the first duet in "In the Night" and the girl with the hat (is this the ingenue role?) in The Concert, where you have to be OTT, and I enjoyed her performances. Fancy Free was lots of fun. In general, the audience laughed very appreciatively throughout Fancy Free and The Concert, even though the applause was rather subdued at the end of each ballet. I adored "In the Night" - the backdrop of a starry night, the beautiful costumes (except for the middle pair - brown with a military motif ) - a romantic sucker like me had to love it. Of course, it's much more than that, and I'll get to what I think about Robbins's choreography in a minute. The Concert was a blast - the corps de ballet section (is that the Minute Waltz?) was side-splitting funny. Jena-Pierre Frohlich set Fancy Free and The Concert. Christine Redpath set In the Night. Martha Kroeneman was the very energetic pianist, for In the Night and for The Concert. I'm awed by the way Robbins (throughout the program) combined the sublime with the ridiculous, the classical with the vernacular. It's something we've become used to in contemporary film and literature, but ballet is usually either/or. At a certain point along the spectrum, ballet usually loses its classical identity and becomes modern or contemporary. With these 3 ballets, that didn't happen for even a split second - no matter how slapstick or contextualized the ballet became. Anyone else go?

"Adin" means gentle or delicate in Hebrew. Does this connect to the ballet in any way? (There seems to be a little sub-genre now of ballets on Jewish/Middle Eastern themes.)

The page also includes an ad for the last 4 days of Nureyev's Don Quixote at the Cinema Studio. Those were the days for ballet journalism because those were the days for ballet!

I used the Museum Day pass and went to the Hagley Museum in Delaware with my children. It's located on the site of the Du Pont family's gunpowder factory on the banks of the Brandywine River and today it is a museum-cum-reconstructed/preserved factory-cum-ancestral home. We had a great time. Our visit focused on the scientific and technological aspects of the place rather than the cultural, as we didn't even go to the Du Pont's home and French gardens. We all learnt a great deal about watermills and other machinery - especially me, as I had to understand the information and then explain it all to a very curious and verbal ("But why, Mummy? How does it work?") 4 and a half year old. There is something incredibly fascinating and even uplifting about old fashioned machinery - the cogs, the pulleys, the wheels within wheels - even when you realize that all this was harnessed to manufacture gunpowder. Highly recommended if you want to combine some learning with a day outdoors or with children of all ages if you're in the Philly/Wilmington, DE area. Did anyone else celebrate Museum Day?

Allegra Kent has written an article for the Oct issue of US Vogue (with Sandra Bullock on the cover). It's for the 'nostalgia' section - there's a reprint of a picture of Kent in Vogue in 1961 - part of a 9 page photo-article (!!!) shot by Bert Stern - and Kent writes about her memories of that era. I love Kent's written 'voice'. Also, the October issue of US Marie Claire (with Sarah Jessica Parker on the cover) features Jennie Somogyi in an article on women who use their bodies in special ways (swimmer, violinist, tri-athlete, etc.). I love the close-up of her feet - 6th position en pointe, with one bare foot. It's very interesting to compare the way dancers were portrayed in 1961 with the way they are portrayed now.

What productions of Sleeping Beauty did Kirkland dance in? The 1970's ABT productions were Royal Ballet-based, weren't they?

Young country. Long history. Old land. If Ms. Acocella expects Israel to emulate the American experience in any way, she is way off mark. The United States of America was born, the state of Israel was reborn. In any case, Israeli dance is influenced much more by the European scene than by the American scene.

papeetepatrick, I find your argument in favour of Riefenstahl very Romantic and compelling, and my instinct is to agree with you. I think art-lovers respond easily and favourably to "authenticity". We are often willing to ignore or overlook the faults of the artists we admire, and in the past there have been quite a few discussions on BT about what kind of behaviour becomes a 'genius' most. Unfortunately, in the year 2006, admiring someone because her beliefs are authentic and not 'fake' is dangerous, especially when that belief is that one group of people is superior to all other groups of people. Edited to add: This is to ensure that none of us need to be in the situation that Schwartzkopf and Riefenstahl were in. And let's fact it, they had it good. Many artists didn't have the privilege of making a choice, and were shipped to Theresienstadt, the 'up market' concentration camp.

I don't want to fan any flames, but I find it hard to understand how Leni Riefenstahl can be considered in any way morally superior to Schwartzkopf. It seems like Schwartzkopf joined the Nazi party mainly because she was opportunistic whereas Riefenstahl was an 'ideological' Nazi who bears some responsibility for propagating Nazi ideology. Two ladies who were beautiful and talented and morally repugnant. Isn't there a fairytale (or a soap opera) about this?

I have an additional question which may be slightly off topic (and, thank you Estelle and cygneblanc for taking the time to answer all these questions): Have the students with "foreign" names like Glyn Scott and Lucie Fenwick been brought up in France and progressed through the ranks of the School or have come in their later teens for "finishing" as they do at the Upper School of the Royal Ballet or at SAB?

Congratulations, Amanda!!!!

Gotcha. I figured it was either the name of a tabloid or that you were leaving it vague...

perky, what a wonderful way to describe Concerto Barocco (and you found the perfect icon!!). I too think it's a perfect ballet. Swan Lake is another type of perfect ballet IMO. The combination of a very Romantic almost-mythic story and the Classical symmetrical construction of the 4 acts enable it to withstand almost any production.

Natalia, what do you mean by the term 'Russian Life'?

I checked the website this morning and casting hadn't been posted yet. I'll be going to the Sat. evening show.

whitelight, you can scroll down the internal frame of the bios and the photos. Yes, it's very annoying. I can only do the "internal" scroll with my mouse and not with arrow keys.

However, there is a consensus on this site that, whatever the merits of Bourne's Swan Lake, it isn't ballet.

Helene, I hadn't thought about friends and relatives coming to see the children but you are probably right. Socalgal - Midsummer Night's Dream is the best program I have seen this season!! I am sure you will have a great time. By the way, I didn't mean to put anyone off - the children were well behaved. Hopefully, my son will be one of the well-behaved children at the Sat matinee too.

I saw the Sat evening performance and was absolutely enchanted by the ballet. Three days later, I'm still finding it hard to describe the ballet, because it is such a magical masterpiece of a ballet. The first act is amazing in the way Blanchine wove (weaved?) the strands of the immortal, mortal and "rude mortal" worlds and in the way he wove the narrative with pure dancing. In the second act, the mortals and immortals have returned to their separate world and it seems that they are all the happier for that. I saw the second act as being the opposite of the first act - the chaos and non-stop action of the first act is followed by the good order and the measured dancing of the second act, with its opening courtly dance and the divertissement representing Ideal Romantic Love. The set and costumes were magnificent - I loved that almost every little 'bug' had an individual costume. Julie Diana was lovely as Titania. In fact she surprised me as I thought her wonderfully modest and graceful presence wouldn't suit the role. (I also saw the PNB DVD last week and there could not be two dancers less similar than Diana and Patricia Barker.) However she is so ethereal and 'flighty' that she was a very convincing fairy. Zachary Hench was an excellent Oberon. I saw him last autumn as Siegfried in Swan Lake but he was injured then, so this is the first time I really saw him dance. Great batterie. Arantxa Ochoa and Alexander Iziliaev danced the divertissement. I always admire her dancing, but somehow she doesn't click with me. Maybe next season when there is more 19th century Petipa rep, I will get her. Iziliaev is an outstanding cavalier always. He's a good dancer but he seems to be at his best when he's partnering someone. Have I mentioned the children? They were adorable. The entire company seemed to be in a good mood. I love seeing them when they are so happy to be dancing. Dale - I will be going to the noon matinee on the 22nd too. Please be prepared for a very young audience. There were many children at the evening perofrmance and the matinee on the 22nd is the Family Subscription date.

I'm so excited as this will be the first time I'll actually see two performances of the same program. Touch wood, hold my thumbs, and as we say in the Levant to ward off the evil eye, hamsa, hamsa...

Caroline (sp?) Kennedy was interviewed yesterday on NPR promoting her new anthology of poetry for children, "A Family of Poems". She mentioned that instead of buying gifts at Christmas and on birthdays, her mother (Jackie Kennedy) preferred to receive a poem and Caroline would spend time in choosing or composing a poem and then decorating a card with the poem. The interview was mainly fluff, but it obviously achieved its purpose as I am now considering buying the book.

I'm hoping to get a double dose of Julie Diana - as Titania and in the 2nd act Divertissement. I'll probably have to settle for a sandwich at Cosi, though.

dirac, it looks like Julia Roberts is very much aware that she is reaching the 'danger zone' and seems to be taking a very careful aproach to her career at the moment. For example, her current Broadway run in Three Days of Rain and her bowing out of the forthcoming Ocean's Thirteen show that she realizes she has to position herself differently. This has also coincided with her becoming a mother, but IMO it's more than merely reducing her work load.

bart, according to amazon.co.uk it will be available April 20, 2006.

I don't think that an observer of the Israeli modern dance scene woud seriously consider any of the prominent companies or choreographers to be propaganda tools for the perpetuation of the occupation of the West Bank/Palestinian Authority. Like many other artists in many other countries, Israeli choreographers and dancers are as a whole a left leaning bunch. Some like Ohad Naharin (Bat Sheva) and Rami Beer (Kibbutz Dance Company) have made topical, relatively political work. Kyr, Ohad Naharin's first major work for Bat Sheva, and IMO a masterpice, is an incredible commentary on and analysis of Zionism and the State of Israel. Others like Inbal Pinto work in their own remarkable fantasy world (although I haven't seen any of her most recent pieces). Further more, the Israeli dance scene is very much an equal opportunities area, unlike many other fields of Israeli life. You don't have to be a native=born Israeli Jew in order to be fully accepted in the dance community. Also, I'm no defender of many Israeli policies, but is Israel really the most evil of all the empires out there today? Is anyone saying they will boycott Sudanese companies until the Sudanese government is prepared to take action against the genocide currently taking place in Darfur?It's the pick and choose aspect of Dance Europe's decision that is incredibly obnoxious.