Drew

1 hour ago, sandik said:

Pacific Northwest Ballet had 49 on contract this year (46 ranked and 3 apprentices) and filled in the rest from their school for their production of Swan Lake this year -- it's a lovely version and feels very full.  I can't remember -- how many dancers did Ratmansky have on stage in the corps?

In interviews prior to the La Scala premier, there were indications that the La Scala production used more people in the ensembles than Zurich and thus was more accurate still in reproducing Petipa's patters in Act I especially--I imagine Miami might go with the Zurich numbers. Honestly I can't remember if it was an interview with Ratmansky himself or not.

One thing I'm curious about is whether Ratmansky will stick to the approach that informed the Zurich/La Scala productions when it comes to his interpretation of performance style or whether he will shift to the approach he expressed in an interview about Harlequinade w. Marina Harss: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/29/arts/dance/harlequinade-alexei-ratmansky-american-ballet-theater.html 

Key quote I am thinking of below:

"As he has become more conversant in Petipa’s style, his freedom within it has increased. In 'The Sleeping Beauty,' he was adamant that the women should raise their legs up only 90 degrees and not point their feet when they stood at rest, but rather hold them in a semirelaxed position. Many of the women’s turns were executed with the foot on half tiptoe rather than fully on the tips of the toes.

"These period details were difficult to maintain — the dancers kept going back to their old habits, he said — so he hasn’t insisted on them in 'Harlequinade.' 'It requires too much time to make it work, and there are never enough rehearsals,' he said."

(I can't help but notice that what Ratmansky says about the change and what Harss says about it seem to me to be a little at odds--whatever her intention may have been. That is her language implies that his shifting views reflect growing mastery and ease "As he has become more conversant in Petipa's style, his freedom within it has increased." He presents it as a practical decision: "never enough rehearsals." We will see what Miami City Ballet and Ratmansky do with this production...I certainly hope I will see it.)

Kolpakova sounds pretty awesome....

If I had bought tickets for Liebeslieder and it was replaced, I would be much more than a little disappointed....

So lucky you got to see Naghdi’s performance. Her only performance the week I was there was a “schools matinee”; not sold to the public and I had to miss her....I was bummed about that....

 I also loved Naghdi on their tour though I only got to see her featured in Mcgregor, so I could hardly get a feel for what she is like as a classical ballerina — video of her rehearsing for her debut in Sleeping Beauty posted by the ROH gives a hint though and I have been reading raves fir her dancing as well.

I also was in the UK this summer as you were and saw the new Swan Lake. Unfortunately the week I was there her only performance was a “schools matinee” and thus not on sale to the public —I was very disappointed about that. I do hope to see her in the future! 

3 hours ago, Amicos said:

This is my first post at BA, though I have been reading posts here for quite sometime. Sadly, I am only able to make it to NYC for an ABT show once a year. I envy those of you that can go to several! This year I chose Swan Lake (it's literally been 30 years since I've seen it) with Teuscher, Stearns and Zhurbin/Forster at the helm. Here's what I thought...

 

[…]

 

Cory Stearns was not impressive to me at all. His physique and acting were good but he seemed heavy, too close to the ground in his jumps. His turns were a bit off as well. I was not impressed and even disappointed after I saw Tom Forster as purple Rothbart appear in Act 3. Wow! Why wasn't he Siegfried? His jumps soared, bravado shined. He commanded the stage for the short time he was on it. Hoping he gets more attention from KMc!

 

[...]

 

 I thoroughly enjoyed myself and am glad I saw the show. Can't wait to see more!

Welcome to Balletalert Amicos — I very much enjoyed reading your post. And I had been especially hoping to read about Forster’s performance as Rothbart. I am not a New Yorker and not seeing ABT at all this year. But the times I have seen them in recent years, Foster’s dancing has been something of a stand out. 

3 hours ago, rhys said:

Would you consider productions such as Nureyev's for the Paris Opera Ballet and Grigorovich's for the Bolshoi still "Tchaikovsky's (and Petipa's and Ivanov's) Swan Lake"? I ask because they seem to interpret the existence of Odette and the love story as reflections/manifestations of troubled aspects of Siegfried's psyche. None of the magic is real - in the Nureyev version it's all a fever dream. With these psychological approaches, "realist" settings seem feasible and perhaps quite plausible too.  

That makes sense and I suppose you are right but the approach itself is not one I have much affinity for... I have questions about turning the ballet's action quite so explicitly into a personal psychodrama in which Odette is, so to speak, merely an occasion for Siegfried's angst, an approach that seems to me at odds with the music and the choreography as we have inherited it. I also fear one loses something from the story that I find very powerful when one loses, or attenuates, Odette's anguish as having its own, authentic force and, indeed, when one loses the idea of the hero's actual encounter with the numinous world of "quest romance." Siegfried's psychodrama can still be read into that story allegorically--it just becomes more of a subtext that the ballet has transformed into something that (in my judgment) has a deeper reach.  That is, I think  the Swan Lake created by Tchaikovsky, Petipa, and Ivanov is not just about a young man freaked out (much as Tchaikovsky was) by the need to marry; I think it's a story about freedom and sacrifice, and I also think the ballet's fantastical middle ages, as they created it, crystallizes or culminates an entire nineteenth-century "mood" in a peculiarly beautiful way. 

All that said, I'm not a ballet historian or professional and I'm certainly not a purist; as a ballet-goer, no more, I have come to accept that most major company productions of Swan Lake today are in some fashion, minor or major, revisionary and I usually try to "enter into" what the productions are trying to do, especially now that my opportunities to see major companies are reduced to a handful of performances a year. (In the case of Grigorovich's most recent production though...I just couldn't. Its cutting of Tchaikovsky's final measures seems almost criminal to me. I know some admire this production a lot. So, call it my loss.)

3 hours ago, rhys said:

I would add that for all its "historical" trappings, the Royal Ballet's new production isn't consistently "realist" - this conception of Rothbart feels particularly cartoony to me. I have yet to work out how, in this late 19th-century Germanic court, a palace coup can be accomplished simply by making the heir to the throne pledge to marry your daughter. Do you have any theories?

I infer that in Scarlett's production Rothbart's goal isn't getting Siegfried to marry his daughter, but rather preventing him from marrying anyone (since marriage could potentially create an alliance that would strengthen the kingdom), and bringing Siegfried to a personal crisis so that Rothbart himself can take over the court in chaos when there is no-one in fit condition to oppose the take over -- plus, while he is at it, make sure he keeps control of Odette (and her kingdom) blah, blah....but is this exactly how Scarlett is thinking of it? Does it work for most audiences? Is it really plausible? Those are different questions. Taking the production on its own terms, I personally found I could go along with this aspect of it, though the question I raised in my earliest post about those terms still stands...

10 hours ago, fondoffouettes said:

There may be other examples from other modern ballets, as well. But I can't think of any traveling fouettes in the 19th-century classics.

You got me thinking about this....and someone mentioned Nutcracker above...there are also some travelling fouettes  (or what I would identify as such) in the Vikharev Coppelia the Bolshoi dances.. 

I was surprised by Cirio’s announcement too, but he really did dance oddly few of the major male leads for an ABT principal despite ABT’s less than stellar current roster, and for all we know may have other private reasons for moving to ENB.

6 hours ago, Laurent said:

... I am, moreover, sceptical about the relevance for a modern, thoroughly progressive member of western society, of such terms as 'Redemption' and 'Beyond'.

Tone is sometimes hard to read on the internet and I wasn't sure if you meant this ironically, critically, or straightforwardly.... But just responding to it as a straightforward remark...I find myself remembering something you wrote on the "Is Bournonville Alive" thread; perhaps the question is whether an approach is wrong "at its root." You had been praising Meinertz' criticisms of Hübbe's productions of Bournonville as "important and very timely."  As I understand Meinertz, Hübbe's erasing of the Christian elements of Bournonville's ballets is a major issue for him--here's the quote:

“In Hübbe’s productions of 'Napoli' and 'A Folk Tale', Bournonville’s Christian faith has become the great man’s downfall. Nikolaj Hübbe has explained that being atheist, he doesn’t find the role religion plays in these two stories credible. But if you remove, as he has done, the 'Kierkegaardian; moment of subjectivity in Napoli Act II, where Teresina chooses faith and is redeemed, if you remove the moment in 'A Folk Tale' where Hilda recognizes her true identity and humanity by the sign of the cross, and the moment where Junker Ove recovers his sanity drinking water from a holy spring, then we’re no longer looking at the same world of ideas or values, they’re not Bournonville’s....

"It really bugs me, and intellectually and creatively I find it to be a very lax attitude, not just because he undermines the dramatic logic of the pieces and actually turns them into the sentimental tales he supposedly wants to save them from being, but because he could so easily work with the concept and the idea of faith in new ways that could enrich their meaning and significance..."

The Meinertz (that Alexandra had linked to) is here: https://alexandermeinertz.dk/2018/06/08/is-bournonville-still-alive/

I take it Meinertz is suggesting that a successful modern production of Bournonville would be able to capture Bournonville's faith in a way that was fresh and genuine enough that even a modern audience that mostly didn't share that faith could still share in some dimension of its meanings/implications or, if you prefer, moods--could translate it as it were (for example, into the belief that there are some ideas worth dying for; something more than self-interest to shape our lives, etc. but still without getting rid of Bournonville's Christian specificity). After all, to take a very obvious, example, one doesn't have to believe in an afterlife to find profound meanings in Dante.

I think the final Act of Swan Lake is trivialized without some idea of transcendence whether you call it "redemption" or not.  My own personal idea of transcendence is not Catholic and I'm about as much of a theist as Hübbe--for me, the traditional Lake scenes still offer an image of transcendent freedom -- or the yearning for it --and, if only because of the music, most more or less traditional productions still convey some residual element of that idea. But the final suicide/sacrifice of Odette and Siegfried, with their otherworldly reward, and the defeat of Rothbart, still seems to me much the most profound ending. For that reason, I dislike Sergeyev's "happy" ending--which I realize he may have had no choice about adding; still, I find it "wrong at its root" and it also makes hash of the moment in the first lake scene when Odette prevents Siegfried from attacking Rothbart because killing Rothbart would render the spell permanent.

Nonetheless, I have to say that Sergeyev's production does capture for me a sense of transcendence/yearning (or did in the Mariinsky performances I saw a few years ago) in much of its Act IV choreography. A traditional ending with the double suicide and the lovers united beyond this earth as one used to see, for example, in Blair's production still seems more moving to me and obviously is truer to the vision of Swan Lake's creators. In the current ABT production, which keeps the double suicide, too much Act IV choreography is changed/lost for my taste and some of the Siegfrieds I've seen showboat the suicide which I also dislike. But the Mckenzie ABT production does preserve the idea of sacrifice and reward beyond earthly reward--for me those things can still be modern "progressive" ideas as long as progress is taken to mean something more than naked self-interest and economic growth .  Perhaps just as importantly, I don't need works of art to mirror back to me exactly my own belief systems. (I would guess most of us don't and only draw the line in the performing arts when something seems offensive in a peculiarly timely and unnecessary way--and when it can be staged differently without disturbing it "at the root.")

I do think Scarlett and Macfarlane have taken a late 19th-century fantasy about the middle ages and transformed it into a 21st-century fantasy about the late 19th, and that has consequences for the whole tone and resonance of the ballet. As I wrote above, I tried to absorb the production on its own terms and found much to admire in the performances I saw...but my "inner" Swan Lake is a different one.

I can't imagine ABT won't continue to attract talent. Surely it's not as if the United States--or even the world--has a ton of major ballet companies (underline ballet) with fabulous jobs for which there is little competition, and offering extensive repertories, long seasons, and solid benefits so that dancers just have their pick. A male dancer as talented as Cirio -- well, yes, he likely will have a range of options as long as he is in his prime and possibly even later, but there is a lot of talent out there and especially talented women. As far as dancing the nineteenth-century classics go...ABT, with all its woes, doesn't just dance the classics but dances them in productions that, whatever their problems, are not as woefully small scale as those of at least some "regional" companies.

As I was typing, Maps posted. So...stop the presses--Miami will do Ratmansky's Swan Lake in 2020!!!! I had completely missed that. Trip being planned...NOW...

ENB is a touring company that appears all over the UK —in places and at theaters you won’t see the Royal Ballet, nor is it at the level of the Royal. I  just saw them in two performances of Sleeping Beauty at the London Coliseum...they do have some wonderful dancers (Cojocaru who joined after departing the Royal is one of the finest ballerinas I have ever seen). However, I found the quality of their pure classical dancing rather uneven up-and-down the ranks across two different casts. Both nights I attended I saw bobbles and weaknesses to an extent that I didn’t see when, say, ABT danced Ratmansky’s production —and ABT was far from perfect. On the other hand, I very much liked a couple of soloists and it also looked to my eyes as if the dancers had been given some serious stylistic guidance, and that is not to be dismissed. Moreover, Sleeping Beauty is the very toughest of tests when it comes to classical dancing, and I would guess the company makes a more consistently strong impression in other productions and more contemporary repertory especially. They do have some striking productions and seem to do some very interesting programming of newer work that has gotten them attention. Fondoffouettes just posted as I was typing and I think the point is very well made made that whatever the exact comparison to ABT, the opportunities for Cirio himself may be better at ENB.

11 minutes ago, MadameP said:

 

Hope we see Maria Khoreva in a principal role soon.  She is off to a good start!

 

 

In every video that has come out of this year's graduation performances Khoreva has looked like a ballerina.

How great you got to see this!  Many years ago I saw the Salzburg Marionette theater staging of Don Giovanni; I thought much the staging was more conservative than it needed to be but it did make great use of the marionette "tenor" in the champagne aria -- he was dancing about and finally leaping over the furniture as he (or rather a recorded Cesare Siepi) sang the aria. I think Magic Flute is an ideal opera for marionettes, and I would love to have seen the performance you saw.

It would never occur to me that Tsiskaridze wasn't "in command" so to speak or the person in charge; I just wondered a bit that no-one ever mentions Ayupova when she does have an important appointment at the school. I'm actually a little surprised to read that Vaganova doesn't get "all of her attention" -- or at least the lion's share -- given her position there...

I do remember her as quite a wonderful ballerina...

3 hours ago, Laurent said:

 

"Boneless" sounds to me as a derogatory term and it went into the history of ballet as a derogatory term when it was first employed (désossée) by Julien-Louis Geoffroy to condemn the novel way of dancing introduced by Geneviève Gosselin, a notable precursor of Marie Taglioni.

 

If Gosselin was a notable precursor of Marie Taglioni, then it's possible that Geoffroy's condemnation of her dancing shouldn't get the last word....

Right now, there is no Swan Lake on the boards (of which I'm aware) that answers to everything I hope for from a Petipa-Ivanov descended Swan Lake.   I still found much to admire in the Royal's Swan Lake and in their dancing, and I tried to give an honest view of my response to it above. I can't deny the production is flawed even if I personally didn't need a defibrillator.

1 hour ago, Ashton Fan said:

In an ideal world Kevin would exercise far more control over the new works and new productions staged by the Royal Ballet. He would have told Scarlett to stick more or less to the original text and at most allowed Scarlett to create his own act 1 waltz although with the current state of the company he should have thought very seriously about reinstating the Ashton pas de douze and he would have promised us that the company would stage the original choreography and the Ashton version for the fourth act at alternate revivals.

I think that if the Royal Ballet leadership wanted the kind of production you describe, then it might have made more sense to hire someone to do the staging who had long experience with, and extensive knowledge of, not only the "original" text but of nineteenth-century ballet generally and of the Ashton (I'm aware that Scarlett made extensive study of Swan Lake and its history, but it's still not quite the same thing)--and then, if the company wanted a nod to the "new" generation of British choreography just invite Scarlett to choreograph the Act I Waltz and leave it at that.

That is, I find myself wondering why O'Hare would ask a distinctive, in-demand young choreographer with no particular experience in staging the classics and whose own work (whether one likes it or not) does not seem to be in any deep conversation with nineteenth-century tradition--why he would ask such a choreographer to do the staging if he didn't expect him to try to put his stamp on things? 

20 hours ago, sandik said:

In this, the RDB finds themselves in the same pickle juice with many modern dance companies that were named for or focused on their founder.  Bournonville, Balanchine, Limon, Brown, and many more -- none of them are making any more new work.

New York City ballet has had some real success with substantial new works, some now danced by other companies —of course they dance a lot of new work including a lot that is pretty ephemeral. Also, Balanchine (for now) offers a much wider base repertory to work from than Bournonville.... 

2 hours ago, Laurent said:

... Concerning your question why the first White Scene's choreography is 'sacrosanct', while the Second one's isn't: Swan Lake without the White Adagio, without Pas de Quatre, without Odette's variation, loses all of its appeal to the public. 

The question was intended rhetorically— to suggest that there should be more respect for Ivanov’s final white act (at it has been inherited) not to imply any doubt of the respect owed to the first one....though reading my post over I can see that might not have been clear.

Thanks for this report...I thought Queen of Spades was a kind of intriguing and even slightly unexpected subject for this kind of full length ballet, so I was rather curious how it came off.

People don't often mention her--at least not on the websites I read--but I had been assuming Ayupova must play an important role in the new leadership of the school too . . . no??

Sounds like a really wonderful evening!

I know ABT hasn't recently cast the pas de trois roles with principal dancers, but it's not necessarily inappropriate or unheard of to do so. The Royal Ballet has several women principals dancing in the pas de trois in their new production of Swan Lake--including one of their rising stars, Francesca Hayward, who isn't dancing Odette-Odile at all but only the pas de trois ; another principal (Takada) is cast both as Odette-Odile and in the pas de trois. (Yet another Odette-Odile--Naghdi--was scheduled to dance the pas de trois on tour--and, when on tour, only the pas de trois; I don't know if that has changed since the injury to Lauren Cuthbertson.) The Royal Ballet doesn't lack for good soloists either.

I'm not advocating for how Lane should be cast--though if she were dancing Odette-Odile and I were in New York, then I would certainly buy a ticket to see the performance (and how much more so if she were cast with Cornejo)--but I don't think I agree that being cast in the pas de trois should be thought of as "insulting" ...

Well that is interesting (and not entirely shocking) to read...

4 hours ago, Alexandra said:

About the current Festival, with a special word about "Etudes." 

NOTE: The article is in  Danish BUT if you scroll down, you'll find an English version.

HÜBBE’S COMPANY

Thank you Alexandra. Do you think a sizable portion of the audience in Denmark feels as Meinertz does? or is much of the audience on board with more internationalization (assuming people more or less agree with his analysis)? Having typed that question, I realize there probably is no simple answer--presumably the audience is as varied as any major theater's ...but I guess I'm curious if he is a voice crying in the wilderness or one of many voices? Or even just what your thoughts are? (I suppose I can hazard a guess as to the last... . )

Welcome to Ballet Alert jplombardi.   Seating tends to be very personal--everyone has different preferences, and at least one person on this site has posted that she thinks every seat at the Met is a "compromise." I agree.

But here are my thoughts on the seats you mention:

First: banking at the Met is not great and in the first 8-rows or so, there is none at all or none to speak of. As someone relatively short, I personally would avoid row G. (For some people being close up is such a pleasure they don't mind the interfering heads, and you know yourself and your mother best, as well as how tall you are.) For myself, I would try M 5-7 as I think with the side sections it's actually a little easier to angle oneself to look between heads. I have also sat a bit further to the side than 5-7 in rows M, N, and O and lost next-to-nothing of the stage action. M is about as close as I can get to the stage at the Met without having problems with seeing over people--maybe L too. Others have had success closer than that, so it's just my experience. The center section on the aisle seats you mention sound good as well. 

Grand Tier gives you an excellent view of stage and seeing over heads shouldn't, except in very rare cases, be a problem though I must admit I have only sat in Grand Tier row A. However, the Met is huge and even though there are many seats that are much further away than Grand Tier Row D you may still discover that you feel a bit far away from the stage. But it's more of a guaranteed good view of the entire stage than orchestra seats--and many people prefer that overview to being close. A good pair of opera glasses can be helpful too. So think about what your mom and you would enjoy!

Restaurants? Shun Lee West is highly regarded and most people find the food pretty fabulous--they also have a Dim Sum cafe which is a different reservation/room. Both "Shun Lees" are nice places to go and more or less across the street from Lincoln Center. (I actually prefer simple or casual food before a performance because I'm often worked up with excitement, so I've mostly given up on Shun Lee West, but I would still recommend it. However, I'm not really a gourmand, so others may have better-informed ideas or know about the Grand Tier Restaurant.)

Hope you have a great trip.