canbelto

Hmm I think if anything ABT's audience is more conservative and a bigger chunk of the audience thinks ballet starts with Swan Lake and ends with Romeo and Juliet. Those two ballets seem to sell out no matter who's dancing, while ABT struggles to fill seats even for La Bayadere. I will be watching Ratmansky's Harlequinade with eager eyes but part of me will miss this lovely dance Balanchine did for Colombine/Patricia McBride:

Harlequinade rarely sells well at NYCB either. Think the commedia dell'arte storyline is rather cruel and unappealing for the average ballet goer.

Balanchine's Coppelia is very traditional, especially in the first two acts. He and Alexandra Danilova reconstructed it from memory. The third act is re-choreographed but not re-structured: there are still divertissements and the wedding of Swanilda and Franz. Very unusual for Balanchine he actually added a variation for Franz. Some YT clips: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9uqqKfGbzPg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IysxWx631ok https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uIGwSkvvADs

Ratmansky's best works for ABT are IMO Serenade on a Symposium, his Shostakovich Trilogy, and his Sleeping Beauty reconstruction. I also like Seven Sonatas although that's not a ballet that really works on the Met stage. At NYCB his batting average is much higher: Pictures at an Exhibition, Concerto DSCH, Namouna, Russian Seasons, and Odessa are all pretty great with PAAE and DSCH being the greatest.

Thanks foir your review. Your comments echo almost exactly Edwin Denby's reaction to seeing Alicia Alonso's Giselle so many years ago:

You can always go across the lobby and see the ever-lovely NYCB production of Coppelia.

One other dance I've seen that directly references the Holocaust is Robert Battle's "No Longer Silent" which the Ailey company dances. At the end of the dance people are clawing to get out of the gas chambers. It was disturbing but came with no warning and was followed up with Revelations which of course had people dancing out of their seats.

Yeah we had to get parental permission slips but the whole class did go and see it. And it wasn't easy watching it but I did think it was a very meaningful field trip. Then again I haven't seen AfterRite but I assume that the issue is that the topic isn't explored in a very rich, artistic way but comes across as a shallow cheap effect?

I wonder how any of you would feel about Paul Taylor's works like Last Look, Death and the Damsel, Big Bertha, Banquet of Vultures, The Word, Speaking in Tongues? A lot of disturbing images in all of them. Or MacMillan ballets like Manon or Mayerling with a lot of adult themes? Even some Balanchine works have moments that aren't G-rated. Agon and Prodigal Son come to mind. Robbins' The Cage is not G-rated either. Also if kids could handle Schindler's List (which was actually an 8th grade field trip for me) or Life is Beautiful I think they can handle AfterRite?

The plan is to eventually start writing again. Idk. Maybe I'll get really excited about the Harlequinade restoration.

Hi, thanks to the ingenious suggestion of a friend I figured out I could change the blog title and URL and thus make it harder for kids to find my blog. So therefore my new blog url is: http://humbledandoverwhelmed.blogspot.com So for example the review of Giselle/Robbins Festival is: https://humbledandoverwhelmed.blogspot.com/2018/05/robbins-festival-ends-supergiselle-at.html

Hi, thanks to the ingenious suggestion of a friend I figured out I could change the blog title and URL and thus make it harder for kids to find my blog. So therefore my new blog url is: http://humbledandoverwhelmed.blogspot.com So for example the review of SuperGiselle is here: https://humbledandoverwhelmed.blogspot.com/2018/05/robbins-festival-ends-supergiselle-at.html

One thing that prevents me from enjoying Shevchenko is that her feet look really sickled. In fact sometimes it looks like her ankles are bent over in a way that makes me think they'll snap.

Macaulay is a vocal opponent of the kind of grand diva Russian ballerina mannerisms. I think what he means is that Misty's dancing doesn't have those mannerisms.

My review of the Robbins festival, and also my last blog entry for a very long time: http://poisonivywalloftext.blogspot.com/2018/05/robbins-festival-ends-supergiselle-at.html

I was there for the Super-Giselle and here's my thoughts. Since I will no longer be blogging after this thanks to BA for reading my blog for so many years: http://poisonivywalloftext.blogspot.com/2018/05/robbins-festival-ends-supergiselle-at.html

I had to work (ugh) but did see some of the coverage and thought she looked beautiful and radiant. I loved the simple silhouette of her dress. And they look so happy together. And I loved the scene of Meghan's weeping mother, as well as the diverse wedding guests. This was in many ways one of the most revolutionary of royal weddings.

What??? Giselle is just one Romantic ballet. It's not the be-all and end-all of classical ballet.

Because a particular style and school makes the company unique and it usually will bring a specific repertoire. Otherwise it's just a hodgepodge of dancers and the quality of the company relies completely on the roster of dancers in that company at that particular moment. ABT was a "great" company when it had a strong roster of dancers. But it has no particular style or schooling and no repertoire that defines it as its own and no one else's company.

ABT is nowhere near the top 5. In order to be top 5 you'd need a school and a specific style and training. ABT has neither. I'd say top 5: - Mariinsky - Bolshoi - NYCB - Royal Ballet - Paris Opera Ballet A good case can be made for Royal Danish Ballet, Cuban National Ballet, and smaller Russian companies like the Mikhailovsky or Perm Ballet.

I mentioned this in another thread but one of ABT's very greatest Giselles (Diana Vishneva) just had a baby boy. Congrats Diana!

Diana Vishneva just gave birth to a baby boy. Congrats Diana!

She has every right. It sounds as if she's been estranged from her father's side of the family for a good part of her life. Not uncommon among broken homes of blended families. Now whether she should have prepped her father a bit more or booked an earlier flight for him so he could be under the protective security of Kensington Palace is another matter. Either way, it's an unfortunate situation and I hope Meghan and her father aren't permanently estranged.

The DailyMail coverage of Meghan Markle has been horrific. I'm shocked at the open racism in their articles.

Haha true. But more often I like her practical business casual outfits. In other news there's quite a bit of drama with Meghan's father and his decision to attend/not attend the wedding.