Drew

Fateyev does operate under certain constraints--notably Gergiev's leadership and what seems to be the latter's plan to have the Mariinsky at all times in 3 or 4 or 5 places at once. Fortunately, Skoryk's second performance of Raymonda in D.C. (which I saw) was quite beautiful and I am glad to have seen it. (Of course I am very sad that I likely will never see Lopatkina dance Raymonda in the theater.)I don't feel able to vote, but do love the Mariinsky Sergeyev production.

Very enjoyable to meet several fellow fans from BalletAlert at Kennedy Center this past evening. By sheer chance I was sitting next to NYSusan which was very nice. Unable to type at length but wanted to say that I, too, greatly enjoyed Skoryk's performance this evening. I gather there is plenty of agreement that Tuesday was...uh....not her best night. But this evening she danced beautifully and by the end, in the final grand pas, even at times with a kind of playful mastery. The harrowing Act II variation in the purple tutu had one or two moments when she.looked, just for a nanosecond, to have to catch herself -- though I thought she covered about half her diagonal of changements on pointe before cutting it short -- and I could wish her chaine turns were faster, but overall Act II went quite well. And especially in the adagio of the vision scene and the final grand pas I found her, as NYSusan wrote, gorgeous. I know reliability matters, but I have now seen Skoryk twice live and she gave really lovely performances both times. I can't help but be won over. Love the ballet--love the production. Find the backdrops, especially for Acts I and II utterly wonderful -- the best sort of medievalist (that is, 19th-century medievalist) ballet poetry. Like the costumes too--wouldn't mind the shredded romantic tutus for the corps in vision scene if they didn't clash with the classical ballet tutus worn by the demi-soloists. Did have trouble seeing the final departure of the lovers from about two thirds back in the orchestra. Plan to catch two more performances and will try to write again.

Very excited about Nedvigin's future role in Atlanta! He staged Possokhov's Classical Symphony on the company and I'm under the impression from an AJC article about his coming to direct Atlanta Ballet that the hope is that he will develop Atlanta Ballet and its dancers in a way that allows for more ambitious neo-classical repertory along the lines of much of what San Francisco ballet does. (As opposed to what I would call 'pop' ballet, contemporary eclectic, and outright modern dance--all of which Atlanta Ballet does as much or more than anything else.) Atlanta Ballet does dance some neoclassical works--John McFall has brought some fine works to the company including the Possokhov--but it has been a very mixed--and mixed quality--rep and one that hardly seems designed to develop the dancers' classical skills consistently. And would it be too much to hope that Nedvigin's coming to Atlanta might mean the company occasionally performing Balanchine again??? Anyway, on principle I feel for San Francisco fans, but this announcement has also filled me with some rare optimism about my local company.

Well, I HOPE that's how Taglioni felt.

I love the Kirov 1980 film--I feel that the dancers are really dancing the choreography, not going through the steps. I also love the video of the La Scala reconstruction. LOVE. But I think that in a high quality performance of any reasonably good production (Sergeyev's is something more than that) the presence or absence of the 'White Lady' is unlikely to make a big difference to me. Perhaps if I knew the score as well as others it might...But the crusades are still present as a theme even without her--along with the threat by a Saracen of a European aristocrat. For good or ill, the White Lady also makes Jean De Brienne even more of a dramatic nonentity than he is in a standard production -- or, if you prefer, more of a merely symbolic character. I would just as soon keep ISIL out of this ballet--for me, in the theater, a good Abdurakhman is more like a good Shylock. Villain, but you may feel sympathy for him anyway.

Opening nights are often 'meh' especially for companies on tour and no matter what the cast.

Is there a good guide somewhere to some of the less frequently performed mime? Less frequently in the last 50 years that is. Everything I have found online shows the basics from any standard Swan Lake/ Giselle ca 1970 -- I don't need to learn the gesture for let's dance or I am royalty -- but when I see things like this video I realize there are a number of gestures I where I am forced back on guesswork.

Birdsall's plan is pretty much mine as well -- to head to Kennedy head Friday/Sat intermissions and hope that those I recognize will allow for a graceful hello to people I have yet to meet! That is, with the universe's cooperation and spitting to ward off the evil eye that I make it!

Thank you Swanilda. I was especially interested to learn what Vasiliev was saying. Overall, of the ballerinas, I am enjoying Batoeva, Bilash, and Terada the most, though it is fun to see all the dancers -- and the range of choreography they are presenting.

Thank you -- this kind of information is helpful when planning trips! The production looks lovely --

Thanks for these reports. Very nice to read about the productions/dancers -- and I'm always happy to learn about a venue "with steeply raked seating providing excellent sightlines."

Thank you for the report. Any sense of how Moscow fans are responding to another Vaganova/Petersburg dancer in their midst?

Thanks Natalia for detailed return to all of your questions. Very interesting to read about.

No blame at all surely--and no need to apologize. It's a discussion board!

Thank you for updates--

I'm not inclined to take Millepied or Alu as the final word on what happened and why, but I think the complaint about Millepied's focus on 30 dancers within the larger institution can be read in different ways. In fact, I originally thought it just sounded like a variant of other complaints one has read directed at other artistic directors (successful and unsuccessful): that their casting is perverse, unfair, illogical etc. etc. And when new directors come in, they often DO have dancers and looks they favor, often quite different from predecessors and leading to resentment justified or not. Of course Alu may be right about leadership failures...but he may just be (more or less covertly) complaining about Millepied's casting and hit on a clever one-liner about it. I missed Dupont's career as a ballerina--never saw her dance, alas. But am eager to read about--and, I hope, one day, see what she does as a director.

I had thought that distinguishing "rooted in reality" from the "true" (as Kathleen O'Connell did) was analogous to what you mean here not necessarily opposed. I would add that most timeless truths come with a temporal index, thought that doesn't mean they operate mimetically or realistically. The truth of La Sylphide is more rooted in nineteenth-century fantasies about Scotland than in Scottish history. It 'transcends' its time, as you say, but not by shedding that nineteenth-century specificity (though I infer Hübbe's recent production for the Royal Danish Ballet partly tries to do something of the kind--I'm curious to see it, but also dubious). For Balanchine of course, it made sense to shed some aspects of temporal indices in many works--"Raymonda Variations" not Raymonda and, within his own oeuvre, Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto no 2 replaced the more specifically situated Ballet Imperial (the first version of the former ballet and having a backdrop recalling St. Petersburg and other elements recalling the nineteenth century Imperial Ballet). But a straightforward argument could be made that that approach carries its own temporal index in 20th-century modernisms of various sorts or, in some cases, in practical exigencies facing his company. I'm not really disagreeing with you, just noting that what is often called art's transcendence is not an easy thing to characterize outside of its historicity. Especially as it's not exactly ideas that make an artwork great. Arlene Croce once wrote that Jerome Robbins was more universal when he was entirely local and specific ("Fiddler on the Roof") than in his attempts at making universal statements.

No kidding...I had plans to up-end my entire work week if she was dancing the opening. (As a fan I'm not happy and if I were Kennedy Center I would not be happy either...)

I have plans for dinner Sat but am hoping to meet people during intermission -- I suppose by Kennedy head? -- Friday & Sat. This is assuming health & weather cooperate for trip! The way the airlines work it's actually cheaper for me to fly from D.C. to NY than to take train since I am flying into D.C. As always with the airlines - ours not to reason why. But I do hope to be at BAM as well on Sunday night. I know I'm lucky to be able even to plan this kind of trip, but confess to a twinge of envy for those of you who live in cities that get great ballet regularly, touring companies and all. I am not a sanguine traveler.

I will be there on the weekend--and hope to meet some of you then.

Proportions aside, I agree completely about Peck's range...I found she was really able to show the more plangent, melancholy 'notes' in Divertimento from Baiser de La Fee (a Mcbride role). And she brought a sense of privacy and hidden depths to her role in Liebeslieder. She may not be right for every role--though I think I'd be happy to see her give any role a try--but for sure she can and has reached deeper and farther than soubrette in any number of roles.

Yes--I was just about to edit my comment to add that invoking the Mariinsky's resources could just as well refer to the theater as anything else. Very enjoyable reading about the production from those lucky enough to be there.

screw up--please delete

Its original name? The Imperial ballet? I assume you mean the ballet company reverted to the theater's original name. I tend to think fans can be forgiven for getting lost in this particular tangle. Though the New York Times probably should get it right. (But then again, as noted below "Mariinsky" in Macaulay's review could appropriately refer to the resources of the theater.) I loved the photo published with the Times review.