Alexandra

It's a good question -- another aspect of it that I find worrying is, again, a language one. The few new classical ballets being created are either explicitly intended as "kiddie shows" or school choreography. I'm always astounded, flipping through the Dance Teachers magazine how many classical ballets are made for students at spring shows. Yet when those choreographers hit the "big time" -- a professional company -- they make contemporary or crossover works. I've noticed that several British critics are going out of their way to point out that Ashton's Cinderella has sophisticated, top-level choreography; they may have to, as audiences have been trained over the last 20 years to see a tutu and think "dumb" or "kiddie show." And then there's the point of view that children should be exposed to fine art -- the best that they have the intellectual and emotional capacity to understand at any given age. In that way, "Concerto Barocco," or "Agon" are suitable for children.

In addition to what Mel wrote, they aren't a syllabus as we know that today, although each "day" focused on something different (Tuesday, if I'm remembering correctly, is to build strength, for example). There's a lot of Bournonville's choreography in them -- it was a way of keeping the ballets. (Konservatoriet, for example, as well as Flower Festival). Eventually, each combination acquired the name of a dancer who did it particularly well, or particularly ill, and this was the way the children in the dancing school learned about the company's history. Most intriguing to me there's a Seventh School, "the Sunday School," compiled by Karl Merrild well after Beck, which contained HIS favorite variations. Apparently it is now lost. (Merrild retired in 1949.)

Thanks for that, Veronica. Do you see this company regularly? If so, I would love to read what you think about it. A colleague of mine has seen it a few times and says that there are some excellent dancers there, who also work in the shows.

Did anyone else see this? In my 25 years of reviewing, I've seen four things about which I could write nothing positive, and this is one of them. (My review is in the Post today). The two low lights, of many, that stand out are: One. Petruchio to the (completely uncharacterized and undifferentiated) suitors of Bianca, who have just described the object of their affections by much heart pounding and "drawing" the female form in the air, a la soldiers in WW2 movies: "So! Does she have a sister?" (repeat, says that. Not in mime, not in surtitles, but as in mouth open, words coming out) Three suitors, after much consultation and evil cackling: "Yeah! She has a sister!" Two. The red exercise ball. (symbolizing anger? a red exercise ball?) You haven't lived until you've seen a woman in a tutuesque costume take an arabesque with a red exercise ball between her thighs. I'd be curious to hear other opinions, especially from those who enjoyed the performance. I'd seen Ballet Austin's "Midummer Night's Dream" (also choreographed by Stephen Mills) two years ago and it was derivative, but not unpleasant.

Ari, regarding pas de trois casting (or "Prince's Friends" as the program unhelpfully put it, listing six dancers,a at least one of whom did not dance, and with no dates) there was no one official to ask after opening night. If the company sent a press representative, I did not see him/her. The Kennedy Center usually puts in program slips; it didn't this time. And they used to post cast changes, or casting that was not specified in the program, but that didn't happen eiither. The Kirov has been notoriously bad about casting announcements, at least here -- on one earlier visit, the Kennedy Center press person would go back stage and ask the person listed in the program if they really had danced and, even though that dancer might be in street clothes, eating a pizza, s/he'd say, "Yes," while the Mystery Dancer, seating and in costume, standing a foot away, would say s/he hadn't danced. I don't think the casting would be retrievable from the Kennedy Center press office at this point, since the company has gone home. I've now heard/read three different nominations for one performance, so I'm not going to try to sort it out. You all are welcome to! It's a shame for the dancers. Also, it undermines the point of having the Kirov be a regular visitor -- presumably to provide a standard for ballet, a measuring stick for developing a new audience for ballet, and educating that audience. If that audience isn't told who the dancers are, it won't get to know the company.

It's not just the designs, though; it's the staging and the direction.

Thanks for these Jorgen and Effy -- great lists! Jorgen, I had a pang when I read your comment about "A Folk Tale." Earlier productions of this weren't children's ballets! (Kirsten Ralov's, especially, which went back to the original drawings of costumes for the trolls; they weren't cute but thuggish human-like creatures, exhibiting the worst of human behavior. And there was great dignity in all the roles, and the ballet generally.) I'm no fan of the current production, but I've heard a few people say that it's seen as a children's ballet there now, and I think that's a shame. According to theater lore, both Fokine and Balanchine, when they frst saw the company back in the late '20s, early '30s, immediately saw "Folk Tale" as a great ballet. If they can get "La Sylphide" back, maybe, some day.....

Thank you, Coda -- yes, I know Sologub is not a graduate of the Academy. I mean "Kirov school" in the sense of the company's style/technique. (I write that because this often comes up as a misunderstanding; someone writes "American Ballet Theatre has no school" and someone else, quite understandably says, "Oh, yes they do, they've started a training program" and that's not what was meant.) Wherever a dancer is trained, if he or she is dancing a leading role at a company of the level of the Kirov, I expect the dancing to exhibit the company's school. In modern roles, the disparaties wouldn't show as much. Having seen Sologub's Nutcracker, I can imagine she would be quite interesting in modern roles. (I also liked her very much in "Serenade".

quick note -- Thalictum, I didn't go Thursday; I went Wednesday, and both Saturday performances, so I don't know who danced Thursday night.

I think there are some Danish dancers still dancing who have had proper Bournonville training including the musicality -- Rose Gad, previously mentioned on this thread among them. Training certainly has been eratic during the past decade, but Anne Marie Vessel Schlutter has been head of the school throughout the Time of Truobles and she does care about the Bournonville style, and is knowledgeable about it. And I think now they're looking at it consciously. They stopped teaching the Bournonville Schools in the company in 1931 and in the school in 1949. Since 1951 (when Volkova came) the teachers incorporated Bournonville steps in their classes, but did not teach the set schools which, I believe, Beck had codified to be used in times when there wasn't a teacher of the caliber of Volkova -- and later Brenaa and Kronstam. The Danes have been working on a syllabus, or talking about working on a syllabus, for decades, and somehow it's never happened -- there are so many different strains of opinion in that company. I think they're working on it again. On spotting, they may well spot in some ballets and not in others -- the head positions in some Bournonville enchainements may preclude spotting? Just a thought, and I'll ask the next time I have the chance to.

This past week there have been about a dozen people who have registered saying they're ballet fans living in the DC area. I'm gonna take a wild guess and say that you've been watching the Kirov -- please tell us what you think. It doesn't matter whether this is your first ballet ever, or you've been waching since the cradle. And it doesn't matter whether you agree or disagree with anything that's already been written. The fun of a message board is reading as many different opinions as possible -- so please! Delurk.

I wish you had been able to come up, Drew -- I saw three of the performances and even though I didn't care for two of the ballerinas, the performances as a whole were very strong. A word to the side about my request not to discuss politics here: what I want to avoid is partisan politics in the sense of having comments like, "of course, any country that would go to war..." followed by, "watch it, my son is in the army" followed by "of course, only a Republican would say something like that." I've seen that happen on other (nondance) boards and I just don't have the time or patience to deal with it here. What you refer to is, in my book, history -- of course, an American view of Soviet ballet in a political context might be quite different than a Russian view, and a Pole may have something else to say about that, but I think we should be able to handle that. Back to Swan Lake, I couldn't figure out what Ari meant by the groupings of three, and saw them last night (I had been sitting close earlier; not a good vantage point for seeing patterns). In the fourth act, there's a cross-mirror image pattern: a group of three swans at the back stage right mirrored, on the diagonal, by three in the front stage left; and the reverse with four swans. I don't much care for the fourth act choreography, but only in comparison to either the Ivanov or the Ashton (or the Nureyev; I like his fourth act). Compared to the Grigorovich, not to mention the 70-11 dozen minor versions bobbling around, I think it's a bit dull, but not bad. The Mazurka dancers must have heard that some idiot was saying the Royal danced the character dances better -- they were splendid last night. (only joking about the first part of that sentence) I saw both performances yesterday -- Gumerova/Korsuntsev in the afternoon and Sologub/Sarafanov in the evening. The audience seemed to love both Gumerova and Sologub, and I do not understand why. I thought both were technically adequate and absolutely empty. Gumerova was stronger than Sologub, whose attention to the finer details is not very rigorous. One of the glories of the Kirov school, for me, is the way the instep of the working leg cuddles the knee in passe She seemed to swat her knee -- front or back, who's looking? Both women got through the fouettes -- Sologub throwing in a double here and there, which made her lurch forward -- and both traveled. But more importantly, there was nothing individual about their dancing or their portrayal. I liked Korsuntsev very much and wish he'd have been paired with Pavlenko. Sarafinov is too slight and light a Siegfried for me, and he was off-form in the solo, but his carriage, deportment and investment in the role were flawless. I hope he grows into it physically.

Hello GKimbrough -- great to read you again, and thanks for posting this. Everyone I know who's seen the movie (admittedly not that many yet!) has made similar comments. This one "gets it." I like your comments about the Blue Snake, too. You're right. Sometimes everyone (except, perhaps, the choreographer) knows a new work is a stinker from the first day, but you have to go on with it.

Gia Kourlas interviews Kyra Nichols in the NYTimes today: Kyra Nichols Keeps Balanchine in the Air

I've been hearing about this book for months but didn't know the title -- thanks! It's not on Amazon yet, either the U.S. or U.K. version. (Im told that Sorella Englund is also in it, as is the Canadian dancer-teacher, Margaret Mercier, who taught at the RDB School for many years and is now teaching in Sweden.)

It's also a matter of what one is used to -- if you grow up with a Jester, then he must seem "right." The old RB version is the gold standard for me, too -- and I would make the case for the mime. There is no story in the Sergeyev -- no command to marry, no explanation of who Odette is or what is her plight, no oath, and so the two-seconds of betrayal that happens in the ballroom scene doesn't make sense. And then there's the happy ending which, as has been mentioned, is at odds with the music. The character dance issue is a good point -- though when I first saw the RB production in the 1970s (slipped, I know, from the 1960s) their character dancing was at least as strong as what we saw here this week from the Kirov -- the Venetian was lovely (though that's not really character dancing) but the Spanish was more classical than character in delivery, and the czardas and mazurka were rather palid. I am glad they do character dances and not semi-classical ones, though. Another comment on the Jester. Having him be "sweet" on one of the pas de deux girls to the point of following her around with a rose is in the worng key, for me, as is having him comment on the suitability of each Would Be Bride. I don't find any of the additions to the old Royal production anachronistic or inappropriate to the ballet. So yes, that's the one I'm used to, but I do think there are differences. Now, compared to the Grigorovich, the McKenzie, the current Royal, I'd take the Kirov's in its current state.

Hi, Carmel Capehart! I think the film isn't in general release yet -- either that, or everyone is still recovering from Nutcracker!!!

I wasn't there, but I was told by a friend that Scherbakov did the pas de trois in the Sologud-Sarafanov performance. (I agree, having the names in the program would help. Opening night, one of the women who danced hadn't even made the "menu").

That's what they used to do in the Blair and the Royal version -- she jumps over cliff, then he jumps over cliiff. But they still had a happy ending -- they went up to heaven in a beautiful little swan boat. I don't know the date -- someone else will, I'm sure. I always assumed that going up to heaven was not a Soviet-approved happy ending for religious reasons, but there may well be another reason (and needing a happy ending during sieges, bombings and wars is certainly undestandable!) What I loved about the tragic ending wasn't that it was sad, but that it had so much more depth. She doesn't just die -- she dies because otherwise, she will be a swan forever, and she'd rather die a woman than live a swan. (And wouldn't that be a terrific metaphor for time of war?") And then he realizes that he has no life without her and dies too -- and it's not old-fashioned. They did the same thing in "Splash" (which I always thought had to be written by a ballet fan -- it's got bits of La Sylphide and Swan Lake in it)

Ari, I was curious about the Vinogradov too -- I've never seen it, and I'd be interested what you thought of it, and how it compared more specifically.

Thanks, pleiades! Hans Brenaa brought spotting to the RDB from his studies with Egorova in Paris. Erik Bruhn said he spotted naturally, that no one taught him. I love the little pieces of lore that indicate Bournonville deliberately put impediments in his teaching and other practices to discourage gymnastics -- no spotting, the turned in arms, the thread between the legs so the women wouldn't put their legs up too high.....you have to work hard to keep the public from getting what it wants!

Bring me my smelling salts! I can see it now. Benno comes back, and he and Siegfried engage in their own pas de deux while Odette is left hanging in arabesque. I think you're right, Dale -- there would be that temptation these days. (That, or Odette would have "done" Benno in a previous ballet.) I liked your points about Benno allowing Siegfried to show his love -- that's what I was getting at when I said that stories were told through contrast, but I didn't finish the thought. It's the old SHOW, don't tell. You can see Siegfried falling in love by his reactions. Another parallel is that of the 4 Princes in tihe Rose Adagio (Mary C and I were talking about this the other night, so she may chime in here). I think in Russia they're still danced by principals -- Princes, and stars. And often we, who are not brought up in that tradition, say, "What a waste!" because they don't dance. But again, they add to the picture. It's not that Aurora goes to sleep because her father only offers here the 4 tallest guys in the corps de ballet, or soloists working their way back off the injured reserved list, as husband material. They're real princes -- just not The Prince. And they make the birthday party a true court celebration -- not, again, one King, one Queen, two servants, and the rest the nice neighbors who live down the road. Benno haters and jester fans are, of course, invited to post. A lot of these issues -- mime or no mime, Benno/Jester -- depend on how one views the ballet. What is the ballet? The score, and any choreographer can take the music and, if s/he treats it with respect, do with it what s/he will? The libretto? The original choreography, amended -- and of course this is the most difficult issue -- as years go by in a way appropriate to the ballet; meaning that an addition looks natural, not like like a wooden leg.

Another thing about Benno -- he helps flesh out Siegfried's world. In productions now, Siegfried is alone, surrounded by anonymous courtiers and, sometimes, the local peasantry (or what could be a folk dance troupe rented for the occasion). And his tutor.. And his mother, who may well wander on without her entourage. Also, there were often pairs in 19th century ballets -- the dark and the fair, the good and the bad, the good and the better. Contrast, playing one person off another, was a storytelling device.

re the stupid/wise owls -- it's possible there can be opposites. I've still not gotten over the shock of learning that in Norse mythology, the sun is feminine and the moon masculine. So perhaps in different mythologies and different climes, owls suggest different things. Our Rothbart certiainly isn't wise. (Although, of course, he could be a rat, say, who transformed himself into an owl so that we'd think he was wise. A thoroughly modern thing to do.)

As self-appointed chair of the Bring Back Benno! movement, I must speak Benno. Why was he there? For the story, because he's a nobleman and gave Siegfried a friend of his own rank. Siegfried has someone to talk to, and originally Benno and Siegfried had a few moments of conversation (mime). Choreographically, Benno is present for, and participates somewhat in, the white swan pas de deux, making the occasion formal, not Valentine's Day Romantic, and his participation anticipates a similar role for Rothbarrt in black swan. 19th century pas de deux have become concert numbers, but originally they were interwoven with the action. And also, in building a ballet company, Benno was a good training role for a young Siegfried to be: how to walk on stage, how to look like a nobleman, how to stay in character for a long time. What happened to him? After the Revolution, when you had a very new audience and lost (sometimes to the cemeteries) people who'd been brought up in the Maryinsky tradition, people didn't understand why he was there. Who's this guy who doesn't dance? We did the same thing -- we, Western Europeans and Americans when we first met Swan Lake. The theory was that he was "helping out" in the partnering because Gerdt, the original Siegfried, was too old -- that never made sense to me, not from when I first heard it, when 50 sounded ancient. He doesn't do that much. But he does complete a choreographic theme. Hang in there, Benno. In only another 200 years or so, they'll want you back. They'll have tried everything else.