Alexandra

New York City Ballet is about to launch its Balanchine Centennial Season, and I thought we might do our own Centennial observance by taking a ballet a week and discussing it. Why not start with Serenade, Balanchine's first American ballet (1934). There are photos from the first rehearsals -- very eager, rather hefty young women. The ballet has changed over the years. I'm sure many here on the board know those stories and I'll leave you to tell them! Lore, questions, favorite performances......your experiences with "Serenade," please.

Thanks for that, Effy -- I wondered who Claire Henrikson was. Tina Hojlund was on leave for part of last season. Is she with the company full-time this year?

Thank you, Beckster! I'm glad you loved it (and I think many would agree with your last line!)

This is from a press release from Brooklyn College (January 25th at 2 P.M.) The group is led by Peter Bo Bendixen. Dancers are: Silja Schandorff, Caroline Cavallo, Marie-Pierre Greve, Tina Hojlund, Claire Henricksen, Amy Watson, Diana Cuni, Thomas Lund, Kenneth Greve, Dawid Kupinscky, Morten Eggert, Kristoffer Sakurai, Nikolaj Hansen, Mads Blangstrup and Fermke Molbach Slot. Repertoire will include: Bournonvilleana (excerpts from Bournonville ballets but the ballets are not listed), Stanton Welch's The Wish, Tim Rushton's Nomad, John Neumeier's Adagietto, and Napoli Act III.

I posted this on the Other Arts forum a couple of weeks ago (where it drew absolutely no comment!!): -------------------------- A very interesting article in today's ArtsJournal newsletter about a nostalgia for Modernism in the post-9/11 world. For those interested in Po-Mo (postmodernism) or curious about what the heck it is, this article in The Statesman explains a lot: Ransom exhibit reminds us we are all moderns now

For further reading, I think that the introduction to the second edition of Sally Banes's "Terpsichore in Sneakers" is a very clear summary of postmodernism in dance.

Just one quick amendation -- the modern age historically might be said to begin at several points in western history and the 18th century is one of them, but the Modernism that preceded post-modernism is a 20th century movement and alienation and fragmentation are two of its salient characteristics.

Bumping this up, but I fear, Glebb, that we won't be able to help.

Wow! I agree. Not that transition terms can't be useful, but.... In dance it's usually applied to the experiments of the Judson Church era, I think because people looked at what was happening and realized that it wasn't Graham any more, it wasn't Modern Dance so it had to be something else. I was blissfully unaware that other disciplines used "postmodernism" for years When I encountered it in architecture, I was puzzled, because, while "eclecticism" might be a characteristic of the Judson movement, "whimsy" sure wasn't. I went to dear old Google and put in postmodernism and this site came up. Looks pretty definitive, for those who want to dive in: http://carbon.cudenver.edu/~mryder/itc_dat...postmodern.html I hope Drew sees this thread, because she'll be able to give a more complete definition -- and a more sympathetic one! drval01, thank you for that -- I didn't know of "globalism" except in the political sense, but I can see how it applies to what's being programmed today in dance.

Somewhere out there, someone is looking at Today's Goddess of Emeralds (there must be one) and saying, "Ah, but you never saw Merrill Ashley in the role"...) There's a gorgeous photo, by Costas, of Balanchine working with Ashley in Emeralds. It's in his new book about Balanchine (I posted a notice about it on the Books forum about a month ago) and also the cover of this month's DanceView. The "used to like it, now sick of it" category could be one of its own. There are some perfectly fine, small works -- Ashton's "Wedding Bouquet," Balanchine's "Who Cares" and "Slaughter" -- that I saw so many times in quick succession that I'd like a break. Ashton's "Les Patineurs" was an ABT repertory staple and we got 3 or 4 performances a year of it here for at least a decade. They finally "rested it" -- and Joffrey picked it up without dropping a stich (Actually, I thought Joffrey's was a better production, better designs and a wonderful Blue Skater). But I would have liked it even more if I'd had a vacation. Back to changed opinions, I liked what Giannina wrote: I was already "grown up" when I stumbled upon ballet, but I do think one's taste matures with exercise

Yes! And that's the beauty of repertory, because the ballets are there for you to change your mind about!

Tobi Tobias's Arts Journal blog is a review of Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker's Rain http://www.artsjournal.com/tobias/

Haven't thought of Kammermusik in years -- I didn't love that one first time out, but I'd like to see it again. I hope we'll continue to discuss Oberon's question with the NYCB context, but dirac has also put up a similar topic more for the repertory in general in Discovering Ballet. So if this topc makes you remember how you used to like or dislike something in another rep that you've changed your mind about, you can talk about that here: http://balletalert.ipbhost.com/index.php?s...=0entry117477

Great idea dirac -- thank you! I liked "Voluntaries" (Tetley) when I first saw it with the Stuttgart. (I saw it during my second season of ballet watching). I don't know whether it was because they gave it such a heartfelt performance (it was in honor of Cranko, who had recently and unexpectedly died) that later performances lacked, or because when I saw it again about 10 years later I'd seen so much Balanchine and Ashton in the mean time that I wanted more from choreography, but I no longer enjoyed it. Going the other way, I didn't like "Sleeping Beauty" the first time I saw it. Didn't like the ballet -- dumb story -- didn't like the music. (I saw the National Ballet of Canada when it toured with Nureyev, and I saw a Sunday matinee cast, which was probably fourth cast in every role). The second SB I saw was by the Royal Ballet and I loved it.

"Monkey in the middle" was a grammar school game -- another way of saying "you're IT". (the monkey was "it"). I think we had a thread once on dancers you've changed your opinion of, but that doesn't mean we couldn't start a new one, Zerbinetta Back to Oberon's very good question -- are there others who've changed their opinions of ballets over the months/years and, if so, why?

No, Z, that was a typo! Zerbinetta, you're now monkey in the middle What ballets have you changed your opinion of?

Thank you, Helene and sandik -- if you can't be there, you wanna read about it! And it's wonderful to read so much detail.

Certainly today's dancers and choreographers DANCE, so they know the current styles. But thinking of past uses -- think of Robbins in "Fancy Free," Ashton, to take one example, of using Charleston and the Cha Cha in his ballroom pas de quatre for Swan Lake -- they took popular material and grafted it on to a classical base; it looked like dancing by ballet dancers. Older forms, as you say -- the good old waltz -- get kneaded into classical dancing very easily. I think the parallel situation in music -- where contemporary serious music doesn't usually refer to popular dance forms, and beyond that, often doesn't have "feet" -- that's one of the causes of the current bifurcation of the repertory: dances that use pop music material as pop music material, without comment or distance or objectivity; and the ballets using existing, older, classical music, which is often rather sterile. Remember the clip from the Balanchine biography where Balanchine, urged on by moppets "Fred" and "Ginger" and their "Dad", has to make a series of Yankee Doodle classical variations in different rhythms? Maybe that would be a good exercise for young choreographers.

You ask really good questions! The first time I saw 4 Ts I (gasp, blush) didn't like the music. The second time -- a year later -- I did. Nothing analytical about it. I think I just needed to hear that score more than once (I played it at home several times between performances). As for Midsummer, partly I first saw the ballet when it wasn't in its best shape; lots of injuries, and, as happened a lot in the late '70s and early '80s, some ballets were a mess ("Serenade," for one) They didn't look rehearsed. Also, I'd seen Ashton's "The Dream" and loved it (still do) and kept wanting Midsummer to look like Dream. I first loved Midsummer when I saw Pacific Northwest Ballet do it. It looked fresh and loved and the dancers were wonderful; they made it live for me. I think the dancer can make a huge difference -- but I think there are some people who want to see THEIR dancers in anything, and others who want to see the ballet, and can put up with whoever is dancing it -- different way of looking at things, and perhaps at different times. I think there's also a sorting out period, especially something that's new (or new to you). It takes awhile to see everything -- just seeing the whole stage, knowing what the principals, or whoever is center stage, well enough so that you dare sneak a peak at the corps. Where you sit can matter -- a story ballet can seem distant if you're too far away (or the dancers can seem to be mugging if you're too close). And then there's just good, old-fashioned taste. If you don't like story ballets, seeing Karsavina and Nijinsky reborn might not do it for you. And finally, there's Stockholm Syndrome. A captive audience grows to love its captors, feel protective of them. Some ballets, even mediocre ballets, just grow on you. This is as good question, I think -- what about others? What opinions have changed, and why?

Oberon, you can edit your posts -- click on the edit button/icon that's at the top right of the post window. (I made the change for you.) Good question -- I change my mind about ballets all the time I didn't like "Four Temperaments" the first time I saw it, and it took me years to like "Midsummer."

Robert Gottlieb on ABT's Fall Season iRanks of Dazzling Boys Prop Up A.B.T.’s Fall Seasonn The Observer:

Here's the full press release from the Kennedy Center: Washington, D.C. -- Suzanne Farrell, Artistic Director of the Kennedy Center’s The Suzanne Farrell Ballet and Exploring Ballet with Suzanne Farrell, has been awarded the National Medal of Arts for 2003. The awards were presented by President George W. Bush on Wednesday, November 12, 2003, in an Oval Office ceremony. The President was joined by First Lady Laura Bush, Honorary Chair of the President’s Committee on the Arts and Humanities, and Diana Giola, Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts. The National Medal of Arts is the federal government’s highest acknowledgement of the contributions of artists. Suzanne Farrell was one of George Balanchine’s most celebrated muses and remains a legendary figure in the ballet world. She is a repetiteur for the George Balanchine Trust, the independent organization founded after the choreographer’s death by the heirs to his ballets to oversee their worldwide licensing and production. Since 1988 she has staged Balanchine’s works for companies all over the world. She was born in Cincinnati, and she received her early training at the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music. Ms. Farrell joined Balanchine’s New York City Ballet in the fall of 1961 after a year as a Ford Foundation scholarship student at the School of American Ballet. Her unique combination of musical, physical, and dramatic gifts quickly ignited Balanchine’s imagination. By the mid 1960s, she was not only Balanchine’s most prominent ballerina, she was a symbol of the era, and remains so to this day. She restated and re-scaled such Balanchine masterpieces as Apollo, Concerto Barocco, and Symphony in C. Balanchine went on to invent new ones for her-Diamonds, for example, and Chaconne and Mozartiana, in which the limits of ballerina technique were expanded to a degree not seen before or since. By the time she retired from the stage in 1989, Ms. Farrell had achieved a career that is without precedent or parallel in the history of ballet. During her 28 years on the stage, she danced a repertory of more than one hundred ballets, nearly a third of which were composed expressly for her by Balanchine and other choreographers, including Jerome Robbins and Maurice Béjart. Her numerous performances with Balanchine’s company (more than two thousand), her world tours, and her appearances in television and movies have made her one of the most recognizable and highly esteemed artists of her generation. She is also the recipient of numerous artistic and academic accolades. Since the fall of 2000, Ms. Farrell has been a tenured professor of dance at Florida State University in Tallahassee, Florida. Suzanne Farrell began her association as a teacher with the Kennedy Center in 1993 and 1994 when the Kennedy Center offered two series of ballet master classes for students from metropolitan Washington and Baltimore with Ms. Farrell. The Kennedy Center enlarged the program to a national level in 1995 in order to fulfill the Center's mission to enhance the arts education of America's young people. This intensive three-week program, Exploring Ballet with Suzanne Farrell, takes place each summer and has just finished its 11th session. Since 2000, she has been the Artistic Director of the Kennedy Center’s The Suzanne Farrell Ballet which made its debut during the Kennedy Center’s Balanchine Celebration performing Divertimento No. 15. The company has since presented an east-coast tour, performances in residence at Florida State University – where Ms. Farrell is a professor in the department of dance – and two full seasons at the Kennedy Center. The company is currently completing a nationwide tour that has taken The Suzanne Farrell Ballet from the East to the South, to the Midwest and West in three programs of all Balanchine repertory. Following the reaming tour performances in Berkeley, CA and Santa Fe, NM, the company will open the Kennedy Center’s 2002-2003 ballet season with a full week of performances in the Eisenhower Theater on December 2, 2003. In addition to her work for the Balanchine Trust, she has served in a variety of cultural and philanthropic organizations such as the New York State Council on the Arts, the Arthritis Foundation, the Professional Children’s School, and the Princess Grace Foundation. Summit Books published her autobiography, Holding On to the Air in 1990 and Suzanne Farrell – Elusive Muse (directed by Anne Belle and Deborah Dickson) was an Academy Award nominee for Best Documentary Film in 1997. Ms. Farrell joins her Kennedy Center colleague Leonard Slatkin, Music Director of the National Symphony Orchestra, as a recipient of the National Medal of Arts for 2003. Other recipients were Mac Christensen (President of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, accepting on behalf of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir), Beverly Cleary (Children's Book Author), Rafe Esquith (Arts Educator and Fifth Grade Teacher) Buddy Guy (Blues Musician), Ron Howard (Actor, Director, Writer, and Producer), Evan Andrew Smith (Chairman of the Board of KLRU, the PBS station in Austin, accepting on behalf of Austin City Limits), George Strait (Country Singer and Songwriter), and Tommy Tune (Broadway Director and Actor).

There's a thread in the Arts Administration Forum, for those of you who may have missed it, discussing the news reported in the NYTimes Nov. 12 and 13 that Movado has switched its funding from ABT to NYCB. http://balletalert.ipbhost.com/index.php?s...pic=14473&st=0&

And that was "the second company," not the Royal

Love the Nureyev story -- I've read that there are hordes of Nureyevs in Ufa, but I still like the derivation. I'm sure people would be interested in others! djb, I do have the link handy Here's a master page about Italian names: (I have no Italian blood, just curious about 19th century ballet history!) http://www.angelfire.com/ok3/pearlsofwisdo...italynames.html For a direct link to finding where people live, try this one: http://elenco.libero.it/elencotel/public/R...rcaOmonimie.jsp It is, I think, a phone directory (!!!) Put in a name and you'll get a map with little circles on it (indicating all the people named Blasi, say, if that's what you're searching for). Click on each region and you'll get the names, addresses and phone numbers, by province, city, suburb, whatever, of all the present day Blasis! If you're interested in the derivation of names, try this. (It's in Italian, but I was surprised how much I could read of it, and you can always copy something into one of the translation sites) http://www.melegnano.net/cognomi/cognomi00.htm That site must have taken so much work!!!!