Alexandra

A humbling experience for an American, living in something that calls itself a world capital but has only two daily newspapers, to do a links search for reviews of one particular program. I do believe there are more dance critics in London than there are dancers! I don't know if this is an exhaustive list -- I couldn't find John Percival's review. At least, I don't think I did. It may be in here somewhere! If anyone has another link, please feel free to post it. Memories: Clement Crisp gets right to the point: Two duds out of three for the price of one: In what seems to be a mysterious exercise in public relations, the Royal Ballet has taken to giving its triple bills winsome little titles. The first of these, unveiled on Saturday night, is Memories. Memories is, to be blunt, an unhappy thing, comprising bought-in goods and a House favourite (Marguerite and Armand) serving as vehicle for foreign stars. If this is the Royal Ballet, then we are in for a bad time - but that, I fear, is what we have known over the past decade. It may be that the company's Australian director, Ross Stretton, believes that the Australian Stephen Baynes has something choreographically to offer with his Beyond Bach, which begins the evening. I am damned if I can see what it is. Http://globalarchive.ft.com/globalarchive/...19&query=ballet Ismene Brown found "Memories" a bit mushy: With this programme, the new director Ross Stretton's vision begins to emerge, and it looks a bit luvvie-ish. There is a well-crafted, unremarkable Bach ballet that Stretton commissioned when directing Australian Ballet, from Stephen Baynes, and has now imported to London for no obvious reason. There is a nostalgic late work by the British exile Antony Tudor, The Leaves are Fading, to some of Dvorak's more sugary music. And there is Ashton's purple riot of tragic passion, Marguerite and Armand, once the exclusive property of Fonteyn and Nureyev, but recently dynamited into scalding new life by Sylvie Guillem and Paris Opera Ballet's Nicolas Le Riche http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml.../ixartleft.html Debra Craine wasn't too pleased either: Familiar déjà view Ballets from Antony Tudor and Stephen Baynes make for mixed memories at Covent Garden Ross Stretton, the Royal Ballet’s new director, is keen to show us that he can programme a mixed bill that does more than lump three ballets together. His mixed bills are to have a theme, a single idea that will link his chosen ballets, no matter who made them, no matter when they were made. It’s a clever way to market one-act ballets, but it does run the risk of giving the audience too much of the same thing. Which is what happened on Saturday with Memories, Stretton’s first triple bill for Covent Garden. Remembrance of things past shapes a trio of ballets by Frederick Ashton, Antony Tudor and the Australian newcomer Stephen Baynes, and it’s a lot of wistfulness to take on board in a single viewing. http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0,,62-2002043269,00.html Memories are Made of This Nadine Meissner has a thing or two to say about the new triple bill packaging: IN ACCORDANCE with the arts-marketing wisdom that requires mixed ballet programmes to possess a linking theme and title, Ross Stretton's first triple bill as director of the Royal Ballet is called Memories. All three works look back in one way or another: on life and love, or, as in the case of Stephen Baynes's debut with the company, on ballet itself. Http://globalarchive.ft.com/globalarchive/...34&query=ballet Jenny Gilbert doesn't like the new packaging much either: A Bad Case of False Memory Syndrome You expect a new director to make his presence felt, but the most detectable change four months into Ross Stretton's directorship at the Royal Ballet looks like tweaking for tweaking's sake. Once there were mixed bills – three or four short ballets shown together to present contrasts of mood and style, with no particular regard to which. Now – in a move that smacks of clipboards and marketing men – every mixed bill is to be themed. "Memories" is the bland and unctuous title of the first. And two out of the three works it comprises are about as exciting as those mail-order porcelain collectibles promoted in similar fashion. http://enjoyment.independent.co.uk/theatre...sp?story=118134 Luke Jennings found more positive things to say: A leap into Enlightenment The Royal Ballet: Memories - Beyond Bach, The Leaves Are Fading, Marguerite and Armand Memories, the collective title of the Royal Ballet's new triple bill, suggests lavender-perfumed sentimentality and easily wrung tears. All the more glorious the surprise then, when, to the measured cadences of the adagio from Bach's Sonata in D, the curtain rises on one of the most beautiful and sophisticated sets ever to have framed this company. Vast columns, a spacious atrium, oblique shafts of golden light, gyroscopic chandeliers, the curling smoke of incense, skies of refulgent blue. http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/dynamic/hott..._text_id=451450 Jann Parry liked Marguerite and Armand (it's near the bottom, but there's an interesting review of Pina Bausch before you get there that's worth a read, IMO) The Royal Ballet's Memories triple bill is unbalanced by Ashton's Marguerite and Armand at the end. Instead of recollected passion, this is the real thing, brought to blazing life by Sylvie Guillem and Nicolas Le Riche. Charles Barker's conducting tips their beautifully considered performances into melodrama by underlining each scene as though accompanying a silent film that had lost its subtitles. Trust the dancers: they can deliver what Kemp could only fantasise about in his Memories of a Traviata. http://www.observer.co.uk/review/story/0,6903,643855,00.html Judith Mackrell takes Leaves Are Fading seriously: Antony Tudor was 66 when he choreographed The Leaves Are Fading, and the ballet seems a long way from the intemperate passions and dark visionary quirks of his radical youth. It is about an older woman gently reliving her past, and it is couched in the most decorous classical idiom. Yet as the woman's memories melt and merge, and girls and boys mature into lovers, the ballet's steps (choreographed to an arrangement of music by Dvorak) evoke a far greater range than their pretty surface suggests. The exacting detail of Tudor's imagination articulates a subtext of shivery expectancy, of fear and hunger, of powerfully coloured ecstasy that make this far more than a nostalgic watercolour. The Royal's dancers performing it for the first time on Saturday serve the ballet's complexity well. http://www.guardian.co.uk/reviews/story/0,...,640420,00.html

Thanks, Brendan. Cutting a piece in that manner does seem -- how does one say this nicely? -- to show contempt for the audience: they don't know enough to care. Injuries can be cause to scuttle a ballet, but if it weren't a "Memories" program, a company could scoot in another opening ballet, if there were no alternative to the scheduled cast. I must say the "Memories" marketing caused me to raise an eyebrow. It's what's done here in smaller companies, dancing in cities with no arts tradition who are trying to build an audience. They program "Dracula" for Hallowe'en and "Romeo and Juliet" for Valentine's Day. "Take Mom to the ballet" they'll say for their Mother's Day program of pink sugar ballets. I have no inside information, and may be completely off-base by saying this, but "Memories" looks like program by marketing, that they've done an audience survey and are trying to bifurcate the audience into the 50-plus crowd (who, of course, must only like schmaltz and nostalgia) and the 30-and-under-crowd (who, of course, must only like loud music and sex. That leaves know what you're supposed to do if you're between 30 and 50. I was very glad the critics all pounced on this. London isn't Dry Gulch (with apologies to Dry Gulch.)

High drama indeed, Manhattnik. But wasn't Tracey scheduled to dance something herself at her farewell? What else was on the program??

Antony Tudor's "The Leaves Are Fading" received its premiere with London's Royal Ballet last week, with Cojocaru in the role created by Gelsey Kirkland. Would any of our Londoners care to comment? Did you like it? How did it go over? I read some of the British reviews and was struck how many of them mentioned that they were appalled by the new marketing trick of calling a program "Memories" and lumping three rather similar works on the same bill. Once upon a time (aka inthegoodolddays) a triple bill was supposed to provide a contrast, something for everyone. I'd be interested in your comments on that issue as well.

This sentence in today's Washington Post article (by the Post's music critic) on the impending Kirov Opera and Ballet visit struck me as discussable. "The idea that quality music is secondary to ballet in a way that it isn't to opera has taken root, in this country especially, because ballet orchestras play so poorly." Here's the context, including the link: The opera will tour with 350 people, including the Kirov orchestra. The ballet, because of a Kennedy Center labor contract that requires it to use the Kennedy Center Orchestra for all touring ballet performances, will be accompanied by the Center's own opera orchestra. Kaiser says that will help keep the ticket prices for the ballet -- which is sold out -- lower. "It would be wonderful to bring the ballet orchestra, but typically a ballet audience is not used to paying that kind of price," he says. But the absence of the Kirov orchestra for the ballet is one of the shortcomings of the festival. The distinctiveness of the Kirov's dance style -- renowned for the grace of its upper-body carriage and aristocratic gesture -- emerged in part because of the strong musical tradition within Mariinsky. Tchaikovsky premiered his "Nutcracker" and "Sleeping Beauty" there, and Glazunov his score to "Raymonda." The idea that quality music is secondary to ballet in a way that it isn't to opera has taken root, in this country especially, because ballet orchestras play so poorly. Hearing a major orchestra accompany a top-flight ballet company has become almost impossible, except at a handful of European opera houses that, like the Kirov, have both ballet and opera under the same roof. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/artic...7-2002Feb8.html

I wanna move!!!! I agree that American TV coverage is less than desirable - intrusive, as you said, mawkish at times -- down to the commercials -- and, unfortunately, also very jingoistic. The first Olympics I watched gavel to gavel was the one in LA when the Russians and Cubans didn't come (1984?) and the incessant chants of USA!!! when we were beating some poor little Somalian in boxing, and gloating after each medal -- that the U.S. would probably not have won in boxing, weightlifting, and other sports had there been full participation -- turned me off. I was an American Studies major, so I understand the historical roots of our thinking of ourselves the perpetual underdog but I don't think other people do, and so this side of the coverage always makes me cringe. I'd also like to see some of the sports that A) aren't guaranteed good ratings and B) don't have American medal winners. I did find the opening ceremonies relatively tasteful -- I'd be interested to know how they played abroad -- and I loved the Indian dancing (It's rather like some of the reconstructed Nijinsky "Sacre de Printemps"). As a dance person, I was glad that America was represented by a hoedown -- no mention that the music came from a ballet -- and wondered where Ballet West was? If 16,000 people auditioned to be in the dance portion, couldn't they have given a few seconds to some ballet dancers?

Here's a link some might find useful: www.nbcolympics.com There are not only complete TV schedules, but lots of background info, interviews, etc. I only had time for a quick look -- I logged in to see what would be on TV tomorrow -- but it looks as though they've done a good job.

Aspects of this question are touched on in this article from today's NYTimes about surrealism: An Erotic Revolution Made Tame by Time It figures. Surrealism, which has given license to thousands of incontinent psyches, bequeathed to art history a trove of oversize phalluses, flaccid pocket watches, fur-lined teacups, locomotives steaming out of fireplaces, mustachioed Mona Lisas and pubic faces that are today as charming and tepid as they were once conceived to be appalling and crazy. Success neutered the movement decades ago. Breton was distressed by his offspring's popularity: you can't remain a revolutionary when everybody is on your side. The Surrealists, having opened everybody's eyes to the essential weirdness of everyday life, fostered the demand for ever greater anomalies, relegating their own work to the quaint status of bowler hats and antique sewing machines. Now much of it looks small and slightly embarrassing. http://www.nytimes.com/2002/02/08/arts/design/08KIMM.html

Thank you for that, Manhattnik -- I don't think the rococco element is accidental. I think "pure classical" is something that, too, is often misunderstood. The Greeks of our imagination wear white and walk around, in stately measures, discussing the position of the planets and the latest Pythagorean theorem before white-columned buildings. I remember being shocked when I first learned that all those buildings were in hot, Mediterranean colors! (I was very young). I think it's the neoclassical, in the 18th century sense of the term, that treats classicism as a recipe book. "Take one Alexandrine quartet..." I'd be happier not thinking of Balanchine's particular brand of 20th century neoclassism (which was definitely not following a recipe book) as "vulgar," but that's just me.

Words again. To me, that's not "vulgar." It's "spice." (I think we're seeing and saying the same thing.) Which, to me, is different from "lewd." I've often wondered if this distinction is not maintained by those who write about Balanchine and seize on the "vulgar" (as in crotchless panties or spitting in public) when what he really meant was to divert from the more old-fashioned "don't do pirouettes because they are vulgar." I also think that this vulgarity, or spice, or raciness has (through no fault of Balanchine's) become a cliche. I saw an after-Balanchine ballet a few weeks ago where the corps was so tilted, with windmill arms, that it was an example of taking something that was once fresh and turning it into something very routine. The other notion of vulgarity in Balanchine's ballets -- that they're overtly sexual -- has come up before here (and elsewhere, I'm sure). The San Francisco Ballet's (sorry) "Bugaku" was decidedly UNvulgar to me, with three very different ballerinas. They weren't doing a peep show, where the ballerina's splits have a definite, overt, in-your-face sexuality which I've seen other companies do. I vaguely remember Kent, and, to me, she was not vulgar, and the ballet had a ceremonial atmosphere.

That's a good point! But in painting, too, isn't much of the effect in one's imagination? The paint is real, but the effect it has is different on each person who views it because we each have different associations with images and colors. [ February 08, 2002: Message edited by: alexandra ]

I agree on costumes dating pieces. Not a ballet, but there was a period when the bell-bottoms in Paul Taylor's "Esplanade" looked very dated. Now, bell bottoms aren't newly out, if that makes sense, and so it just looks like clothes. But originally, the bell bottoms "read" as fashionable clothes, and so placed the dance in the NOW, and something very concrete, not a dancing studio. On "Serenade" (which I've seen in both hair up and hair down versions) has been in the gaslight blue dresses for so long -- most of its life. In a way, there's almost Serenade I and Serenade II (if Serenade I, with its bathing suits, were revied today, people would undoubtedly complain that the atmosphere was lost.) And Concerto Barocco looks more serene in white than it does (on film, to me) in black. I'm not sure these are examples of changing costume to fit changing times as much as Balanchine changing the way he thought about the ballets. When I said that the aesthetic hadn't changed, I should have clarified. I mean the idea of a "pure dance" ballet is still alive, at least in America. (In Europe, it isn't, and "Serenade" does look old-fashioned, and is referred to as old-fashioned in reviews, at least in both Germany and Denmark.) But on the broader point of costumes and decor, yes. I agree. They can date a work. I saw "Push Comes to Shove" so frequently over a ten-year period I think I could document each change. Some were made by Tharp, some happened when casts changed. And some when the work stopped being new and fresh through no fault of anyone. It also had something to do with the personality of Baryshnikov, and how fascinating it was to see a Russian doing something so American (and yet not being American), and a star clowning, etc., that no one, no matter how gifted, could compare.

There was a very interesting article in the Washington Post yesterday about a new exhibit that opened at the Kennedy Center, Jamie Wyeth's photographs of Rudolf Nureyev. (And there's a controversy involving NUDITY -- maybe that will get you to read the whole article! It's at the very end.) http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/artic...4-2002Feb6.html The article is written by the Post's art critic, which made it the more interesting to me, because he's writing about a dancer from an art critic's point of view. One of the things he says is that (I'm paraphrasing and condensing) when you read that so and so "can't be captured on film" or "no film can do them justice" what that means is that the artist's power existed completely in the imagination of the audience. I thought that was another way of getting at our perennial "is greatnest quantifiable" question, because one way to interpret that comment is that a dancer who has perfect placement or can jump 3 times his height or more pirouettes than anyone on the circuit that year, he or she is "greater" because those accomplishments can be captured on film. Pavlova's "Dying Swan," however, exists simply in the imagination of the audience. What do you think?

I thought Susie Crow's point about how much more precise the first performance of a particular work looked was fascinating. And I'd guess that had to do with two things: the role was made on THAT dancer's body, and no one, no matter how technically adept, will be able to dance it exactly that way. And two, more obviously, it was the first season. The more I see, the more I fear that ballets are like corn -- best eaten (seen) within ten minutes of picking! Another aspect of the swing of the pendulum to technique is that we're in an age of nondramatic ballets. During narrative periods, virtuoso technique has been less important -- there are exceptions there, too, of course, during the Lifts Period. That's a different kind of technique, an emphasis on strength rather than brilliance. To return to the original topic of the thread, and Lacarra, I hadn't had the time to post thoroughly earlier and wanted to add one point. One of the things I like about Tomasson as a director is that he has a good eye for what his dancers can do, and acquires ballets that suit them. From the little I've seen, that's what he's been doing with Lacarra. I'm surprised that several people mentioned she didn't do well in "L'Arlsienne." I would have thought Petit would be well within her range and I'd be interested in seeing her in that ballet. I also have to say that a dancer that can stir such strong opinions is worth seeing

Very interesting question. For something very topical, yes, the times change. The only thing I can think of isn't a ballet but a musical -- "Hair." When "tricky Dick" left office, not only was the rhyming scheme thrown off, but...well, "Hair" was of its time. If it's revived, it will be a period piece. (Of course some day, someone will do a contemporary dress "Hair," where everyone is bald and it's set in Des Moines....) Artistically, I think that as long as the aesthetic is alive -- for the dancers, for the audience -- the ballet will look undated. "Serenade" does not look like a 70-year-old ballet because the audience still believes in it and the dancers can still put it over (at least for an American ballet audience. It may well look very dated in Frankfurt or Wupperthal.) I can see the cracks in the Balanchine aesthetic; I've seen two ballets done so poorly (NOT by NYCB) that they were almost unrecognizable. The phrasing, the structure, the tone, the whole approach to the ballets were just off. Partly it was because, I suppose, the stagers gave the dancers the steps and couldn't manage to give the ballet a frame. I've seen many Ashton ballets look dated, and I think it's because the dancers have stopped believing in them. Ballets need to be loved, or they become unwanted castoffs and go out and commit terrible crimes Coaching can solve that. The recent "Fille" performances seen in DC by the Royal were believable to me, and I think that must have been at least partly the doing of the stagers and coaches. I've seen lots of video-mixed-with-live-performances of Bournonville ballets to think that it's not a straight, downhill slide. There are speedbumps. The "La Sylphide" on videos from the 1960s are choppy, down at heel productions The ones from the 1980s and 1990s were much better. I've heard enough from dancers how Hans Brenaa made them love some of the ballets that are now almost despised (Far From Denmark, King's Volunteers on Amager). If there was ever a case of one man making a difference. Brenaa not only brought ballets back from the dead literally (they'd been out of rep for 30 years) but made them live. And then there's Les Noces (Nijinska's). Abandoned, homeless, certainly divorced from contemporary life by its content. Yet there it is, by accident of history and act of Ashton, saved from the rubble. I think it's the most modern ballet I know. It always shocks me. I've often thought what it would take to make this look dated and I don't know.

We wouldn't be forgetting the two little cadets in "Far From Denmark"? There were lots of breeches parts in ballet in the 19th century -- not the ones where a woman played a man (Frantz in Coppelia) and everyone knew, but, as Leigh mentions, where the characters in the ballet were unaware of the gender switch. Petit did this in his "Diable Boiteux." I saw Ferri in it (I don't remember if she created the role). She was a reasonably convincing boy, not a bad fencer. Are you looking for plot twist suggestions, Leigh? Or something defined by technique? Would a contemporary Boy have to do double air turns, or some identifiably male step to pass? Or are you thinking retro?

I think extreme arguments are useful. It's easier to argue about absolutes than in-betweens. (Pit Hitler against Gandhi; everyone can see the point. Well, nearly everyone; there are no absolutes on the Net ) As for ballet and good old days and heydays, the idea that everyone who says that a ballet looked better 20 years ago, or standards have slipped, etc., is misguided and looking at life and ballet through rose-colored glasses -- and, by implication, pretty darned stupid (or are we just blind?) -- is, well, insulting. I'm sure there was never a time when every ballet performed every night in every corner of the world was perfect, but I don't think anyone has said that (in this or the many other discussions where this topic comes up.) Nor are there times when every dancer and every ballet is wretched and horrible -- in that sense, I think extremes don't serve much of a purpose. Or, Nevasayneva, remembering one of my favorite Trockadero ballerinas. There are differences among companies and even among dancers within companies in every historical period; that doesn't deny there are overriding trends. La Trasherina can be giving encores of Giselle's Act II solos, with fouettes (an expression of her own irrepressible personality) the same year that La Sublimova is moving us to tears with a simple gesture and perfect classical placement, no more than two pirouettes allowed, in ring number 2 and La Extremova is scratching her nose with her knee while hopping on pointe in ring number 3 and La Dramqueenova will be acting up a storm (with some appropriately tortured backbends) in ring number 4 -- BUT one of those dancers will be reflecting the dominant trend and the others will be bucking it. Whichever ring you're watching determines your view but that doesn't mean that there aren't historical trends. There are times when extreme technique dominates, times when "don't dance so they notice" is the rule, times when the 90 degree arabesque is considered perfection and anything above or below it is just plain wrong, etc. Exceptions prove the rule. Unless they become critical mass, they don't disprove them. When they achieve critical mass, they become the new rule. Putting on my Administrator's hat, a general comment, since I haven't had much time to post this week -- and this is not directed at any single person, but really is a general comment, not only on this thread, but for the board as a whole. Please take it as my Quarterly Let's Talk about What We Do Here post: Opinions -- whether you think Lacarra is the greatest ballerina in the world, or an example of what you think a ballerina should not be -- are very welcome here. Discussing opinions is what we're supposed to be doing. Mocking those opinions or attacking people for holding them is not. I thought we'd gotten away from that, but this thread has taken a few nasty turns. Please, stop the personal references and anything that can be considered a flame -- and that includes mocking someone for holding an opinion. (Again, this is a general comment, not directed at any particular person.) Another general comment that I raise about every three months: Dancers are people, not just objects to be discussed or used to make a point -- or dissected in embarrassingly minute anatomical detail. Yes, they are public figures, but that doesn't give us the right to be rude or cruel. The advice I got as a young critic -- to write about dancers as though their mother is reading over your shoulder -- can apply to internet posts as well. Any opinion can be expressed, but there are a variety of ways to express it. Thank you. I now return to civil discourse as a civilian liebs, I think the "must a dancer dominate three acts to be a ballerina" is worthy of a thread of its own too. I'll post it tomorrow, if no one has done it before then. [ February 08, 2002: Message edited by: alexandra ]

I'm all for sauce, but the notion that eras of good taste are imaginary is something I can't swallow. I don't think we can go back to the aesthetics of another time, expecially one 150 o4 250 years ago, but I don't deny that those times existed. I came to ballet at the end of one of them, and I've seen it. Estelle, I agree (surprise ) that it may be a lack of coaching or direction. If -- to take two dancers who've been mentioned here -- a Maurin is considered THE company's ballerina and gets all the new works and all the first nights, no matter what is said, her approach, her aesthetic, will dominate and other dancers will imitate her strengths. If a Lacarra gets all the first nights and the new ballets, then even if coaches and teachers spent all day saying "lower your leg!" (or whatever) I doubt it would matter. (I'm not trying to favor either Maurin or Lacarra, just saying that there's a difference.) This thread has raised a lot of interesting topics. The idea that a ballerina MUST be able to carry a full-length ballet is one of them. (Like nearly all questions raised here, I could cheerfully argue for either, or both, sides of this.) Part of me agrees; it's what separates the girls from the women, if I can make such a non-PC statement. And the other part of me says that there have been ballerinas in Balanchine ballets who are sprints rather than long distance runners, if you will; and ballerinas in Fokine, Massine, Tudor ballets.

To begin with an aside, I almost wished I had seen the Hamlet referred to above. That's the fourth mention of the production as a new (low) standard in theater I've heard in the past few weeks. To me, the problem with extreme dancers (like a Guillem) isn't the dancer him/herself. There will be those who like them and those who don't, as with any dancer. It's that they become imitated -- which is not their fault. NYCB went through the same thing with Farrell, whose off-center, risky dancing and high extensions suited her perfectly but did not suit others and I've heard many stories of imitators trying to out-Farrell Farrell and coming to grief onstage -- and of Balanchine suggesting that maybe you shouldn't do that, dear; it doesn't suit you. I think this is another of the many examples of imitation looking at the externals -- what can be (relatively) easily imitated -- rather than deeper qualities. "New Star does 32 fouettes. If I learn how to do 32 fouettes, I'll get her part and be a star." It's not new. I'd also second what has been said about dancers' careers being over by 25. This is a throwback, too. The Romantic era ballerinas were has beens by their mid-twenties, at least in Paris, although they had longer careers on the road. I think it happens in any period where there's an incessant demand for the new. And I agree that during the Romantic period there were teachers (who were also fine dancers and choreographers, like Bournonville and Blasis) who railed against high extensions -- which were not invented yesterday; there have always been extremely flexible people. There were American dancers who worked in vaudeville at the turn of the 20th century who could put the current crop to shame, and there were fairgrounds dancers and controtionists back to the middle ages who were also extremely flexible. (I don't mean that flexibility in itself is "wrong," just that it isn't new.) Often, though not always (the Romantic era again being an exception) the emphasis on technique and extreme technique blooms during choreographic lulls. When new work that challenges and inspires artists and audiences isn't being created, I think the dancers need to feed off the technique itself, and the concentration goes there. Croce wrote about this, complaining about the Russian emphasis on technique as an end in itself (not complaining about too many tricks, but rather the pedantic emphasis on stylistic niceties and a certain dryness of delivery). I'm sorry I don't have time to look up the quote; later (nor do I have time to edit this post, which I'm sure is an example of rambling, top o' the head incoherence).

Helena makes a good point. When Nureyev was 19, they revived some older ballets that had been out of repertory because no one could dance them. (Laurencia being one.) Because Nureyev's decline was so, well, spectacular, it's hard to remember what he was like as a young dancer. Hard, too, to think that when he first came to the West, no one could dance Solor.

Well, since dance teachers are all dancers.... The genie can go back in the bottle; it has in the past. There's a tension throughout history between Extreme Technique periods and Moderation periods. I think it's obvious why; there's only so far the human body can stretch. Unfortunately (as far as I'm concerned) when the pendulum does swing back, it really swings, and there is generally an extreme anti-extreme period, if you will, where dance is almost anti-dance with minimal movement. That doesn't last long and moves fairly quickly into the Moderation period where there's more attention to quality than quantity before stretching and spinning to Extremes again.

Hi, alliecat. It's fine to put this topic here. I've never seen Dance Spirit, so maybe others can speak to that. Dance Magazine is a general dance mag. It covers ballet, modern, jazz, show dancing, all kinds. It has news and reviews, and features, often including previews of new ballets, interviews with stars, etc. There's also Pointe Magazine which seems very popular among young dance students and has lots of photos. All of these magazines have web sites. Why not check them out? There will probably be tables of contents, sample articles, etc., and you can get an idea of the magazine's style. www.dancemagazine.com www.dancespirit.com www.pointemagazine.com

I'm sorry I missed it -- I just logged on, but it was over. I just don't have any free time this week. Webcasts are a great idea, though! More in the future. Thanks for posting all the news, Jeannie. I think this forum is turning out to be both useful and fun

I wonder how much the fear factor has to do with shock? Once we know the monster will die, we can sit there in safe superiority and watch it happen. This question has been dancing out in the back of my head all week. I can remember two instances where I was surprised -- not quite frightened, but not completely sure of the outcome (aside from Romeo and Juliet, where it so often looks as though the men have been given their swords an hour before showtime, and I just can't watch). Once was Nureyev in "Swan Lake" (Royal Ballet, c. 1977) in the final fight with Rothbart. For a few seconds, you really thought Nureyev would win. The moral force of his fighting made Von Rothbart seem weak and evil. I think Von R had to remind him that HE was the winner here, because the impetus of the fight changed rather suddenly, but for just a moment..... Another time was in the Royal Dane's Giselle, with Peter Bo Bendixen as Hilarion. He's a tall man and looks like a stage villain. When he's first surrounded by the Wilis, he scoffs at them. You could hear him think, "Get real, they're only girls." When they begin to dance around him, his reaction to them makes them monsters -- they're just dancing, he's terrified, like a man caught in quick sand. You can see the moment he realizes that they are not just girls, they're malevolent and he is going to die. In the 19th century, story telling was often done by inference. In Folk Tale, you know the earth moves not because the stage shakes, but because Ove looks at the ground in something between wonder and terror. Maybe the monsters in Firebird don't look quite as scary to us now at least partly because the other characters don't react to them?

Thanks, Calliope -- that's what I was getting at. Perhaps it is because we are bombarded with the reality of evil every day that it's difficult to believe it on stage. Also, to audiences bred on puredanceballet, expressionistic ballet seems overdone. (As, to people who prefer expressionistic theater, abstract ballets can seem dry and wanting.)