Alexandra

I'm glad you enjoyed that article, Giannina (I did too It ended up being a very "Giselle" issue.) I think a lot of the "redemptive angles" have been downplayed over the years. Yes, I always thought that Giselle would go to a quiet grave after her good deed, and wouldn't be forced to dance in the corps de ballet for eternity Maybe I thought this because one of my early definitive Giselles was Carla Fracci, who, when dawn broke, was almost nunlike in her purity and goodness, and obviously relieved and proud that she'd pulled him through. Somehow, she projected that this was about the power of love, but also something beyond earthly love.

Got this press release from public television today: It's Merce's time to be honored by AMERICAN MASTERS: Merce Cunningham: A Lifetime of Dance will have its premiere on Sunday, December 16, 2001 at 9:00 p.m. (ET) on PBS (check local listings). The film is directed by Charles Atlas and features a nearly a dozen excerpts from the repertory, including footage from Merce's own collection of his early (and rarely seen) works. Naturally, there are lots of interviews - with the expected colleagues, like Mikhail Baryshnikov, David Vaughan, Carolyn Brown, Robert Rauschenberg and John Cage - as well as with Merce's long-time friends from back home in Centralia, Washington and from his many early supporters in Europe. ------------------- I haven't screened this but I'd strongly recommend it, especially for those who haven't had the opportunity to see much Cunningham. Like him or loathe him, he is of monumental importance to dance -- and ballet -- in the past 50 years. Like Balanchine, his breath is on everything. He's a delightful person, too -- rather elfin, not what I expected, which made him all the more delightful.

I'm sure Paul Taylor would be absolutely delighted to be named a humble ballerina. Please stick to the topic (begging, humbly.)

Re Toni Lander, I could name lots of Danes -- but their modesty is one of the main reasons why the non-Danish world doesn't consider them "true ballerinas." (Of ones I've seen live, Lis Jeppesen, Mette-Ida Kirk, Sorella Englund, Rose Gad, Silja Schandorff.)

Among the very young, I'd count Alina Cojacaru. She may change of course as she matures, but right now, she dances as though she doesn't know how good she is. I'm probably just having a mental block here but of the stars from the 1970s through today, I can't think of many who could just come out and hold the stage by her presence alone, and didn't have to kick the sky, hold a balance forever, or do double fouettes in both directions to get attention. Perhaps Elisabeth Platel and Isabel Guerin of the Paris Opera (not to slight other Parisians; there are some, like Loudieres, whom I didn't see enough to judge).

Once upon a time, pirouettes were vulgar. We've had discussions here about holding a balance too long, flicking the wrists at the end of a variation (especially if the feet didn't quite land in position), smiling/grinning in a classical role. A friend of mine heard complaints in London that a dancer in Don Q there ran his fingers through his hair in a mid-performance curtain call; this was thought outrageously vulgar. There are those mid-Act II curtain calls for certain Albrechts, too, where he rouses from his stupor to wanly face the audience and humbly acknowledge their applause. In some eras, the rules for Vulgarity are quite plain and dancers who transgress them are snubbed, or given bad reviews. In today's anything goes atmosphere. . .well, anything goes. What do you consider Vulgar in classical dancing? (In answering this question, it must be understood that ALL of us have exquisite taste. We just differ on the details.)

Once upon a time, pirouettes were vulgar. We've had discussions here about holding a balance too long, flicking the wrists at the end of a variation (especially if the feet didn't quite land in position), smiling/grinning in a classical role. A friend of mine heard complaints in London that a dancer in Don Q there ran his fingers through his hair in a mid-performance curtain call; this was thought outrageously vulgar. There are those mid-Act II curtain calls for certain Albrechts, too, where he rouses from his stupor to wanly face the audience and humbly acknowledge their applause. In some eras, the rules for Vulgarity are quite plain and dancers who transgress them are snubbed, or given bad reviews. In today's anything goes atmosphere. . .well, anything goes. What do you consider Vulgar in classical dancing? (In answering this question, it must be understood that ALL of us have exquisite taste. We just differ on the details.)

I thought Fonteyn added the balances in the Rose Adagio -- or Ashton/DeValois added them for her. I have read her saying, though, that the balances have to look as easy as "walking off a bus" or there's no point to them. I agree with Mary Cargill that the point of the Rose Adagio is for Aurora to meet the Princes, to be presented, so missing one -- or holding the first balance so long that the last three have to rush, or being so shaky that the four Princes have to line up like sardines in a can so Prince 2 can shoot out his hand the minute Prince 1 lets go -- ruins the scene. As for balancing in Don Q or other showpiece ballets, I guess they're all right at a gala, which is a kind of Fool's Night, where vulgarity is permitted

I checked Thomas's web site. If it's accurate, Jeannie is closer to being right than I am. He turned 20 last July 18th. I would have put him at 22. His age has slipped around, though. When he started, he was older than he really was. I remember reading he entered one of the competitions when he was not quite old enough to do so, and it came back on him a few years later, when a judge remembered. More importantly, it will be interesting to see how Thomas functions with a company -- a great company at that. So far, he's forged a career as a gala performer and medal winner, and there's a great distance between punching out a one-minute solo and carrying a whole ballet. He has an enormous talent and I hope both he and the Kirov benefit from this. (Personally, I like Thomas better in character solos and wish he'd go Hollywood. He'd be the John Travolta -- Saturday Night Live Travolta -- of his generation. And maybe even a nice sitcom with a male ballet dancer portrayed positively )

Thanks, Sonora. Good to "see" you again -- please do write some comments, when you have the time.

Hi, Jeannie -- stay away from caves!!!!! You are more than welcome to gloat , but I do have to say -- Rasta can't still be 19 years old. He's been 19 years old for several years now, I think.

While it's always good to remember that it's possible that the people we write about read this board, I don't want that to squelch discussion. All of Juliet's points are good ones, but I doubt that Mr. Martins, or other company directors, are looking for advice from the internet It probably doesn't hurt them to know what their audience, or at least a vocal part of it, is thinking.

I agree, especially that "the dancers technique is more attenuated, thinned by their ballet training as they move further from the founder's physicality and because many of the dancers seem to lack conviction." I first saw the Taylor company as its second generation (the Nicholas Gunn, Carolyn Adams, Ruth Andrien) generation was at its peak, and thought the next generation (Kate Johnson, David Parsons) already too balletic. I want modern dance raw! I've always been ambiguous on this question though, because, unlike ballet, which has its rules -- you have to work with them. You can bend them, twist them, etc., but there's a point where you push too much and it is no longer ballet, in the same way a chicken soup with too much beef and beef broth stops being chicken soup. But modern dance -- it's always been defined by the dancers, but the current generation. So while part of me cringes at the notion that an art form that became an art form specifically to be expressive -- that was its raison d'etre -- could become something else, I don't think I have the right to them them they can't be minimalists. (I remember when Lucinda Childs added a third step to her two step vocabulary. It was big news. Each new choreographer had to do an Isadora, go back to the beginning and invent a movement style.) I think keeping alive works from one generation to the next is almost impossible, but it has been done. It's probably not fair to expect dancers who come of age in works with three steps in them, trained not to be too expressive, to be able to fill a Limon role.

Thanks for posting that, Tancos. I hadn't seen it.

Modern dance is in just as much danger of being swallowed up by "dance" as is ballet, and the grand old modern dance troupes are suffering many of the same institutional ills as the grand old ballet companies. Two things in this article by Anna Kisselgoff in today's Times struck me: First, the contrast between the "grand themes" of the modern dance pioneers and the tiny little ones of their successors -- and this fits into a historical pattern; the Giants of one generation often have a freezing effect on the next. And second, how to keep a dance company alive through the new works it needs, while keeping the spirit of the company, and its old works, alive. Modern dance has at least one burden ballet does not: technique is so specific and personal to the first, second and third generations, at least, that they're integral to the work. (In ballet, I would argue, STYLE may be integral to a Bournonville, Ashton or Balanchine ballet, but the basic technique, the codified steps, are the same.) Without dwelling on whether or not Doug Varone is really truly Limon's successor, I thought the more general topics might make an interesting discussion. As a choreographer, José Limón was an unabashed humanist. He found his grand themes in Shakespeare, the Bible, Eugene O'Neill, myth, history and in the great composers. But after his death in 1972, the younger choreographers who created new works for his company tended to work on a smaller scale. The psychological as expressed in everyday personal relationships did not interest Limón: the choreographers who followed him lacked his universal scope, and most of their pieces were eventually dropped. In Mr. Varone, however, the company has found a model: a major modern-dance experimentalist who directs his own company but who understands the technique and aesthetic of the Limón troupe as one of its alumni. http://www.nytimes.com/2001/11/15/arts/dance/15LIMO.html

Thank you so much for posting that, Leigh. It's a wonderful piece. There's a lot in there that's worthy of discussion, and I hope it will

Thank you so much for posting that, Leigh. It's a wonderful piece. There's a lot in there that's worthy of discussion, and I hope it will

Thank you so much for posting that, Leigh. It's a wonderful piece. There's a lot in there that's worthy of discussion, and I hope it will

Thank you so much for posting that, Leigh. It's a wonderful piece. There's a lot in there that's worthy of discussion, and I hope it will

Oh, Patrick Bissell! Thank you, RG. I'm chagrined to have forgotten him. I remember one Friends of ABT rehearsal I attended of the Vision Scene at the Kennedy Center where Bissell -- I think yet to make his debut in the role, and about 20 -- was very patiently explaining to the corps, "You're supposed to keep me from getting her." He had everything for the role, to me -- the presence, the height and proportions, the grandeur, and, probably most importantly, the sense of being a real person (Prince) on stage -- filling the role.

Thank you for that, Robert! I'd never read that (I don't know how to do accents either. It's something with knowing a number code, and using the alt key plus the number pad, but I've never cracked it. Sometimes I'll write Desire' -- which probably doesn't help much, but makes me feel more virtuous.) Angleterre -- no apologies necessary. I deleted your first post. Did you know you can edit your own posts? Just click on the little pencil icon at the top of the message block, and you can go in and change things. All of us drop words, or make spelling mistakes when we type and you'll see a lot of "edited by xxx" lines at the end of posts

This question was posted by Richard Jones on the "It is in my will" thread on this forum. I thought it should have its own thread. Here is Richard Jones's post: Just to broaden the discussion slightly, I wonder how many others have seen a role performed by the dancer on whom it was created, and then seen a later performance by someone else, either during or after the choreographer's lifetime. Two that come to mind for me are from MacMillan ballets: Mercutio in R & J (David Blair) and The Chosen One in The Rite of Spring (Monica Mason) - both from the mid-1960's. I have seen MacMillan's R& J a number of times, with Mercutios of varying shapes and sizes. Of course it always works in some way or other, but I am grateful that I saw David Blair in the role; the strength of his characterisation is still vivid in my mind. I saw MacMillan's 'Rite' two years ago (English National Ballet) with Tamara Rojo as the chosen one; again a very different style of dancer to the role's creator, but bringing her own special qualities to the part.

Richard, that's an interesting question -- we have discussed it before, although, as with any question it can always be discussed again. It is very different from the topic of this thread, though, so I'm going to start it as another thread, in Aesthetic Issues. I'd ask anyone who wishes to discuss this to do so there, and leave this thread for the question of choreographers' rights. Here's the new thread: http://www.balletalert.com/cgi-bin/ubb/ult...=29&t=000094&p= Drew, very interesting post -- sorry I haven't had a chance to comment. I'll be back later [ November 11, 2001: Message edited by: alexandra ]

Ah, that ending. I swear I saw one performance where he ended in attitude on high demi-pointe, THEN slammed into fifth position (after having done a double air turn in between each turning jump in the coda), and stood there, arms up, gathering in his applause, making it absolutely clear that nothing further was going to happen until the entire Met stood. (We responded.)

I've always wondered about the Florimund/Desire naming -- which came from where, and why the change was made. (I'd vote for Desire. ) My two Princes were Nureyev and Dowell. I saw Nureyev much more often -- I didn't like the four-solos-in-the-second-act version either. I liked Nureyev and Dowell not only for the beauty of their dancing, but because they could fill the role, something very few people can do. I never wanted the Prince to "do more" or wondered why he wasn't dancing. Both Nureyev and Dowell WERE always dancing -- their walk was dancing.