mbjerk

I was not referring to Boston in particular, only to large companies in general. To my knowledge there have been no cases where a director has come in and changed dancers, rep, board and vision in only two years. Usually it is a three to five year process and that is why most new ADs request a four to five year contract. It takes time - that is the nature of the beast.

With respect ot Boston, those that I know in and around the company are supportive of what is happening and understanding of the budget compromises necessary in these times. I make no judgement as I am not there, nor have any personal connections. Please take my opinions as generic for large, classically based companies. These companies are very different from smaller, choregrapher/AD based.

Yes Alexandra, I did not mean to leave it for modern to teach classical dancers to move. In my wanderings around the country, I do find students so conscientious and exact that they do not move from a line to a line through a line, they make poses and fall apart when asked to make an enchainment as a sentence/paragraph versus a series of slow, well articulated words. These are dancers at 16 and older with good training, but they are stuck in the mud. Yes, precise words need to be taught in the early years but I hope those words become eloquent, moving, individualistic expressions in a short while.

No, but I would have loved to see her do Julia. Different for her I think. I did see her in Facade as the Polka girl toward the end of her career - still spicy and did the fastest, quicksilver double tour at the end. How do we keep such treasures alive for the newer generations of dancers? Videos do not cut it in my opinion, but these dancers were glorious.

As someone with a history with the company, take what I say with that bias.

Dancers need classical training into their teens (15, 16). At the age of thirteen, they sould be introduced to other dance forms, but hard part is having students understand that these other dance forms are as legimate as classical ballet. In a professional ballet school, students are led to believe that there is only classical ballet. Modern especially fights this, but Horton tecnique is fantastic for teens!

For WSB, what is needed is someone whose dancing career embraced a wide variety of dance, who was classically trained in a professional school, and who has the confidence and respect to work with Septime to give the faculty a strict curriculum. Everyone must be on the same page.

I find that dancers who are encouraged to move to rather than make positions work best in a repertoire such as Septime's. Also, Septime and the new director should teach every level in the school once a month. Otherwise there tends to be a school versus company mentality.

As for syllabus, for the first three years I think Vaganova order of teaching technique sets up the use of the whole body the best and from then on as long as the faculty agrees on the what and how, it is not important. But any fear of moving has to go and the confidence to fail has to be encouraged for contemporary choreography.

There may be a school - company schism, but bringing in a third party may only add another level. Better may be for Septime to be in the school and talk to the teachers about what he finds lacking. Then work together to add those qualities to the dancers they produce.

I think the school produces good dancers now! IMO the school is not really broken, so why all the fuss? There are excellent teachers there now, and as with all excellent teachers their way is the best. Perhaps there does need to be a leader, but unless that person is respected and admired and respects and admires the faculty and Septime, then there will be a period of turn-out the door.

I hope that I have not ruined any friendships with these comments, I adore all of you and more importantly have learned a great deal in knowing and watching you teach.

Alexandra stated what I meant - that one must experience the industry in order to be most effective. Also in professions, without that experience the professionals will not listen no matter how beneficial the advice. Believe I know how hard it is to give up that mid-range six figure salary for the salary I have now!

I like to say that companies are like ocean liners - hard to turn about quickly. What one can do is change a deck or two (or sometimes even just a stateroom) and start the tugs working on turning the ship. The captain (AD) must have a clear course in order to use the tugs effectively. Where MBA's can help is in how to place the tugs, which decks need attention, and what/when to tell the passengers, crew and owners as the ship changes course.

Sometimes it helps to send out the launch to see what is ahead too!

Yes, performance is a step in the process. It is not the be all or end all. A healthy attitude lets the performance be the raw truth of the moment, not a calculated event. Then you learn from the truth and return to the rehearsal or class with that experience to grow from. The next performance takes you that much more into freedom. For me, that is the frustration of the once a rep season four times a year in the regional companies. You need the repetition in the same roles with the naked truth of performance to grow as an artist.

Or the atmosphere is one of fear of failure or unless I do this perfectly it is wrong. That is a huge problem with the classics as there is a tremendous pressure to be perfect, hence the inability to move with abandon. In a company class the teacher or direction may be putting too much emphasis on not breaking the form and not enough on moving from a line to a line THROUGH a line. Also the culture may be one of classical is beyond our capabilities and we are not worthy, which results in self-consicious dancers afraid to move.

In my opinion, those classical dancers who moved (move) freely were not so concerned with making perfect steps, but were concerned with dancing and story telling using a classical vocabulary.

Shadowplay - Tudor

And I am always a sucker for a fun Gala Performance, Gaite or Grad Ball.

I second La Sylphyde with Ballet Imperial to open.

I did not take any offense Ari. Actually, I was trying to figure out who the MBA was that created the products!

As with any academic education, there are many gaps when presented with the real world. The same for dance students who arrive at a company - what a difference than school or even apprenticeship!

Cabro's post is great! It happens in business also. How many start up manufacturing firms are there? It is all hi-tech as that is the open field.

I agree with Ari to the extent that MBA's bring a quantifiable focus to the discussion, This is healthy, but there are unquantifiable, intangible reasons to keep people ona and continue to do things in the same way. It is hard to quantify the costs over the next wo years of releasing someone with ten years experiece . The new people must be trained, climb the learning curve and create cost through multiple mistakes and taking longer to do things - these add cost. A lot of this is fuzzy data, so not used in a cost benefit analysis. Not to mention the lessened productivity due to falling morale and shiifting loyalties. The people do follow the if it ain't broke don't fix it and these MBA's first job should be to explain why it is broken and how those doing the work should design the fix.

Mel - you do have an MBA - Master of Ballet Arts - harder and longer to achieve than my Master's of Business.

MBA's, like Executive Directors, are brought in from the outside as fresh, educated eyes. They do not know the history or culture of the company (dance or corporate) and that is often by design. Unfortunately they do not take the time to learn of these important things and are therefore seen as arrogant and disrespectful. In my consulting days, listening to the why and how of the company was crucial to explaing the why and how of changes necessary to change the company in the direction the analysis pointed. Rallying the troops to the cause gets more done than telling them what they have done for so many years is wrong.

Why do you buy TIDE instead of CHEER or OXYCLEAN? They all clean clothes. Often the same logic goes into selecting dancers at this high a level. At the level of a Boston or ABT there are soooo many good dancers that the AD's choices are this subjective.

That is the difficulty in forecasting casting and the fun in analyzing what goes on. There are definite things: technical ability with ease, acting ability, looks, physicality, musicality, work ethic, casting appropriateness, willingness to do what is asked for, willingness to keep quiet, all the things in a "normal" work environment also apply: office politics, team work, personal chemistry, etc. How many times have you looked at pormotions or casting and wondered how that happened because you thought that person did not deserve or was wrong for the part or other reasons it does not fit. It is not possible to guess the inner thoughts of the people in control of the decisions beyond a certain standard of dancer (and sometimes not even that).

It is very hard to make students understand that after a certain point it boils down to luck and taste. They must focus on making themselves the best they can be. If they are good enough to be considered, then that is about all they can control - there most probably is not an objective reason that you did not get the job or accepted into the program. Students (and dancers) are often frustrated when they ask "what can I do to get in" and are told nothing save that "you are a good dancer, but not right for us."

Yes, but many thought the houses these two were building in the 30 - 60s (particularly Balanchine) did not fit in the neighborhood at the time.

To go further, these two did not have to deal with zoning, permits and building codes that most ADs deal with today - boards, unions, competion from other massive amounts of various entertainment media, etc.

Finally, I spoke with an executive director of over thirty years. His take on this was that he missed the practical "Ballet Russe attitude" AD - one who when faced with difficulties had a first responsse of how do we make this work for the best possbile performance? These days he finds that ADs (and dancers) have an entitlement attitude - well it has to be this way or it is not possible and that attitude does not allow for compromise to maintain quality while moving forward. It also leads to deficits and careless spending.

Here it is hard as companies differ in size, controls, etc.

But an AD does have a taste in dancers, in a style of working and in a performance quality. It is not unusual for a new AD to take a year with the existing dancers and then start to work toward his (in this case) taste. This happens even without a vision for the company. It may also be that the board wants a big company and the AD uses his taste to fill the dancers and rep without having a urgent sense of what his big company should look like. Also dancers may find the new AD not what they want and move on. In my experience, most who leave after the first year do so for two reasons: they were leaving anyway but waited to see what was up with the new regime or they want to dance in a differing way or amount that the new AD requires.

Sort of like decorating a house one room at a time using the existing furniture, perhaps refurbishing some. One has taste and style, but does not yet have an overall plan for the house. Due to time, money or sentimental reasons one throws out only what one truly cannot stand and works with the rest. Until that moment when new furniture can be bought or made. And there are times when one room is so different and fantastic that you go back and redo others to match.

The difficulty is this is so subjective and most AD's are not communicative about what they want to see. Even Balanchine and Ashton did not answer directly questions about what their visions were. They did it and it evolved over time. Both however had favorite dancers and ways of doing things.

In a weird way dancers are seen as cost where admin staff are seen as revenue generating, especially those in marketing and development. Dancers are the product, so to me it is strange to cut the product and keep the sales force - what do they sell?

Similarly older dancers are seen as more costly - less minutes danced with higher salaries - and younger dancers dance more with much lower salaries. There is often a tension between older principals and younger dancers. The trend in most companies seems to be a chain - get rid of the older, more expensive, push the younger less expensive and fill in with the school at no cost. I cannot imagine the discussions held between artistic, executive and board on this issue. It is not fair to generalize, but this is in evidence in several companies over the last five years.

Of course in a dream world you keep the older principals to dance, coach and provide examples of work ethic, artistry and company loyalty. But many fields have this issue - look at upper, middle management in corporations, basketball teams, and the theater.

Plotting the growth is easy - begin in the 60's with one admin staff to every twenty to thirty dancers and end today with one admin staff per dancer. Between marketing, development, planning, board relations, etc. the staffing has grown exponentially. Much of this is due to the funding organizations giving monies for organizational planning and stabilaztion, which is needed but the old adage of what is rewarded becomes habit...

Heard from the inside at Boston Ballet that every department had to cut, so I apologize for my cynical nature.

When faced with tough choices it is a matter of the big picture versus the small details and the director must look across the whole operation.

But I bet the managerial, executive staff was not cut....Unless the reason was not budget but due to the fact that she did not get along with Miki.

Yes, Heinz was a beautiful dancer. I remember him from Page's Nutcracker also. I think he had leukemia or some other similar disease. He did the Snow Pas with Patricia Klekovic and they were fantastic.

In my experience too the INS has had little rhyme or reason. I have friends in Atlanta getting a green card within the first six months here and others in the DC area still working on it after four years. Go figure!

I do think the lawyer who fills out the application has a lot to do with it as does the amount of paper filed with the application. Do you feel there are INS dance experts who look at this?? Doubt it. Also if the company has unsuccessfully placed ads and/or held auditions here to fill the positions, it seems to help with employment visas. As for performance visas for companies - I am sure the State Department's list of terrorist potential countries palys a role these days.

Not to mention Ashcroft's perspective on art and what is acceptable...... My fear is that 9/11 has given these people the ability to deem what is to be allowed and what is not.

Given what others have posted regarding choreographers and the lack thereof in the US, is the INS justified in this?

Darrell Barnett, Greg Huffman, Andrew Levinson, Greg Osborne, Philip Jerry - all dear friends and dancers - contemporaries of Chuck Ward, Peter and David, etc.

Great crop of American Dancers swept away.

David Peregrine from RWB died in a plane that he was flying, I believe.

It depends on how you define boutique. Joffrey was the boutique as both a 20th century museum of dance and a showplace for a pop-contemporary (times not dance) energy. ABT had the theatrical and the classics and NYCB showed off its Balanchine view of the world. All sold out large houses quite often and in many cities. When one ventured into the territory of the other it was an event that all fans turned out to see and discuss. Joffrey doing Shrew - ABT doing Symphony Concertante and NYCB doing Tharp/Robbins are examples where audiences converged to participate. At first this cross over was exciting for all. As with all things, as it became more the rule, the fun subsided.

IN my opinion (read here I go again) what has happened today is that companies now offer similar ballets and dancers. As a result, I suspect the majority of audience loyalty comes from either history (or a lack therof) or convenience. Why shop at the Neiman's down the road when Nordstrom's has similar dance across the street (or Old Navy has it for less and better marketing)? Unless one is of a type that will not be caught dead in Nordstrom's because one's history will not let one or one is knowledgeable to the point of telling which store has the best and do not care where one buys it, one shops for ease or with one's friends.

I know that I now go to ballet to be taken away from my daily life. Whether baudy or beautiful there are very few dancers left that transport me. Unfortunately I am one who has seen much and I expect the classics to tell a story, the abstract to wow me with musical brilliance and the dancers to perform magic. I do not care whether it happens on the street or at the Met, but good is good from any perspective. Even if I do not like it, I admire and respect it!

Not only cross taste marketing but a "customer" centric view as panic sets in while audiences shrink. There was a philosophy that artists produced as a form of their expression or take on the world. Now it seems that artists must look to their public (whatever that means???) and create work that they will like.

There is a huge discussion on this in the Kotler book on Marketing the Performing Arts. He agrees with you, Alexandra, that companies must have a strong indentity and then market that to new and old audiences. The examples of companies that tried to be all things to all people mainly ended with a new director or lost audiences.

I guess we should be grateful that today the Ashton uppers visit the McMillan lowers (classes or tastes??). In the nineteenth century I doubt if an upper would be caught dead in a lower and a lower probably could not afford to attend an upper. This was a tradition brought down through the centuries - royalty versus peasants. Royality versus bourgeois versus servants. Today the upper East side versus Upper West versus Village versus Alphabet City....

Is the question "Are seperate and unique identities good for ballet"? I think this discussion is happening all across the performance media - radio, news, movies, etc. as the Time-AOL-Warner-Disney-Radio One.......Barnes and Noble, Borders, ........

I miss the individual bookstores that reflected the owner's taste and the individual companies that reflected the director's taste. In the seventies and eighties one went to NYCB, ABT and Joffrey expecting differences and formed fierce loyalaties around those companies tastes and dancing. While somewhat true today, I think it is not as much.

Are dance companies to become McDonalds and Holiday Inns where the standard is similar around the globe, yet the same and not very luxurious?

Milk Bones were the crunchiest, but I preferred the ones for small dogs. ;)

Those days were fun. The dancers in J II were wonderful and we were all growing up togther as people and artists.

Times change! Now when I say I lived in the East Village and also Brooklyn Heights, everyone thinks that I was rich - in those days those were tough areas.