Alexandra

Dance Europe, a London-based glossy, announced that it would not cover companies based in Israel for poliitical reasons. This has sparked a lively debate elsewhere on the internet; here's an editorial published on Article 19. Dance Europe's position on Israeli dance As always, those blokes mince their words, but you can probably get an idea of their take on things from these excerpts: For that position, read the whole editorial. But, without getting into the many fascinating tangles of Middle East poliitics and just sticking with the question of the journalistic responsibility, what do you think?

I just received a copy of Mindy Aloff's "Dance Anecdotes: Stories from the Worlds of Ballet, Broadway, the Ballroom, and Modern Dance," published by Oxford. I've just skimmed through it -- haven't had time to read it through yet -- but I've read enough to think it's quite interesting. It's a collection of stories - backstage stories, culled from interviews, dancers' letters, etc. One very short story, on the back book jacket, is a good sample: "Cyd Charisse, on how her husband could tell at the end of the day whether she had been working with Gene Kelly or Fred Astaire: "If I was black and blue, it was Gene. And if it was Fred, I didn't have a scratch."

For diagnosis purposes, another cookie problem is that (in Safari and Firefox, at least) the topic squares are dark, indicating new topic, until I click "mark all threads read" rather than marking them as read automatically. This is also since the upgrade. I don't remember WHICH cookie option to choose, but I'm fairly certain that's the problem.

Thanks, Helene. I would bet it's something in the cookie settings in the board's APC. It started right after the upgrade.

Thank you for posting this, Lynette. Gosh, and I thought the U.S. and U.K. were allies! The Office of Homeland Security seems to still be getting its act together. Maybe the people who did such a fine job helping out with Hurricanes Katrina and Rita have been kicked upstairs to visa duty. Keeping British musicians out of the U.S. certaiinly makes ME sleep more soundly!

Helene, I've tried your suggestions, deleted all cookies, and am gettiing the same result with Firefox as well as Safari now. (Actually, it's worse. Before, I could always get into BT, but had to log in on BT4D. Now I have to log in each time I make the switch. (From my point of view, this is NOT a big problem, and certainly not one to make a priority.)

I have the same experience as Treefrog -- exactly, down to the browsers and their locations! And that it happened after the upgrade. (It's a minor pain, because, wiith Saffari, if I click Log In it fills in the boxes for me, so it's only two clicks, but it was nicer without them.)

No one, of course, would think it odd if NYCB did only one Balanchine after the Centennial. Not a word would be uttered

I'd be interested in seeing the company do these, certainly. Erik Bruhn staged a "Napoli" diivertissement for them back in the early 1960s (I believe it was one of Dowell's first ballets -- one of the solos) and Ashton had wanted to get "La Sylphide" when he was director, I know from Danish sources. From what I've read, I'm not sure I'd *love* this version of "La Sylphide," but then, I'm picky about Mr. B the First

Thank you, Natalia. While you're over there, could you ask them for a nice "Raymonda," please?

In Clement Crisp's review of the Royal Ballet's current triple bill, he writes this, after a mention of MacMillan's "Requiem." I wondered how American audiences might react to such a program note, and such a custom (and this may well vary by region). This was once common custom, but in our "anything goes" age, I was curious if it were still generally known, or if things have changed.

No, not much Ashton. Actually, barely any Ashton. Back in the Heritage bin already?

I'll drink to that.

It's a very short comment at the end of a very long piece (also about, among other things, Susan Marshall's new work and Benjamin Millepied's latest venture). Gottlieb notes that new soloists are needed because so many principals have just retired or will probably do so within the next season or two. His comment, "If we can extrapolate from the last dozen years, a few will be shot to the top too quickly and others will wither from lack of nurture" does not seem unreasoned, to me The "shot to the top too quickly" has been a problem. (A change from the "Peter's Kindergarten" Arlene Croce noted during his first decade; she wrote in a New Yorker piece that a generation of promising dancers, led by Roma Sosenko, had been kept in a kind of juvenile limbo.) Now the complaint is often that there's a sink or swin mentality -- and critics have a hand in this. I remember what seemed an almost instant coronation of Maria Kowroski. Such early enthusiasm is almost always followed by a reconsideration, and I've never thought it fair (although I'm sure I've been guilty of the same thing!) There are indeed some promising youngsters in this group, and in last year's promotions, too. But I think Gottlieb's comment on a weakness on the balletmistressing/mastering side is apt.

Bart, from the videos I've seen, the choreography of the '30s generally (and this includes Nijinska and Ashton) is more compact (my word for "the dancers are really close together). I talked to two colleagues about this, wondering what their memories and impressions were, and we speculated -- and it's just that -- that during the '30s and '40s because of style, history, politics, whatever, there was a more communal view of humanity. The "ME Generation" may have an impact on arts as well as advertising and personal relationships! One other thing that the dance students I showed this to got within 16 seconds was that the dancers were not concerned about technique, in the sense of being precise (turn out, line, etc.) "THAT's why they could turn so fast!" as one of them put it. So Massine was not looking for beautiful lines or pristine technique.

Fokine had very specific ideas about line. He wanted to go back to a more Romantic line, a softer look to the body. There's a bit about this in Lucia Chase's essay the big ABT book (by Charles Payne). On Massine, thanks to Paul and Crispy for those comments. I was watching "The Red Shoes" again a few weeks ago, and another thing I noticed was how tight the groupings were. Nothing is stretched out, not the body, not the collection of bodies, if that latter makes sense. In the off-stage scenes, there was the same sense of closeness. There's a little scene about a birthday party for Massine's character, and they were all huddled together, like a huge family trying to fit into a small frame.

Pere Menestrier did indeed stage ballets -- lots of them, mostly horse ballets. (He also wrote a huge history of ballet, in something like the 1680s, cataloguing, I've read, over 400 ballets. Don't know how many of them were by Jesuits, though.) Try to find Marian Hanna Winter's "Pre-Romantic Ballet" in a library (it's very scarce, and long out of print). You might find some more in there.

Cecchetti studied in Copenhagen and danced there (not at the Royal Danish, but in another theater) for two years. He once wrote that his teaching "owed everything to Bournonville except the barre." (Bournonville's barre was notoriously short.) I once showed "Konservatoriet" to a Cecchetti specialist, a teacher, who thought it looked as though both methods had derived from the same source, but weren't quite the same, but "Konservatoriet" is said to be a class of auguste Vestris's (modified for the stage). The solo dancer's variation, I'm told, was one of Jules Perrot's. There were some things in the older techniques, Grissi, that have been lost, as you point out.

Press release from the company: The Washington Ballet and Its Dancers Reach Agreement on Collective Bargaining Contract The Company Returns to the Stage Beginning in May as Spring Productions are Reinstated (Washington, D.C.) – The Washington Ballet together with its dancers and their representing union, the American Guild of Musical Artists (AFL-CIO), announced today they have reached agreement on a collective bargaining contract. In addition, the company announced it will reschedule for later this spring two of the remaining three productions in the current season. “It is wonderful to have an agreement in place that protects the dancers and creates an environment for them to thrive as artists, and simultaneously respects the artistic prerogatives of our institution,” said Jason Palmquist, Executive Director of The Washington Ballet. “We look forward to coming together once again as a unified tour de force in our community.” In addition, The Washington Ballet has determined it will be able to mount The Bach/Beatles Project and 7x7: Women in May and June respectively. An evening of works by Lar Lubovitch, also slated to be performed this spring, is the only production not to be presented. The Bach/Beatles Project will take place at the Kennedy Center May 10 – 14, -Page 1 of 2- and 7x7: Women will be performed at The Washington Ballet Studios June 6 – 25. “I am elated to be going back to work and engaging with the dancers in the making of great art,” said Septime Webre, Artistic Director. “It will be meaningful to heal while dancing together and sharing our work with audiences. Today is a great day.” “There is nothing the board wanted more than to have our dancers back in the studio, so we are thrilled to have a contract in place that respects everyone’s concerns,” said Kay Kendall, President of the Board of Directors. “It is wonderful to be whole again, and to have our Company functioning along with our school and education and outreach components.” Subscribers holding tickets to any or all of the following productions - The Bach/Beatles Project, 7x7: Women or Othello –will be receiving immediately via mail a packet of instructions on the handling of tickets for rescheduled performances. In addition, subscribers can visit washingtonballet.org or call 202.362.3606 x 605 for instructions on handling of tickets for rescheduled performances.

I think this is a very good point, Bart. Many people writing today really don't seem to know the history of the terms or their correct definitions; there are national differences -- Russian and French emloy are different, for example; there are different nuances in different times. When someone reads in one review that a dancer who is five foot three on a good day and known for his quick bravura dancing is thhe epitome of a danseur noble, s/he is bound to be confused. We used to have some very good, serious discussions about employ on this board -- don't have time to look for the threads now, I'm afraid.

drb, I think people today would call a Siegfried, say, "merely a porteur" but that's because they don't understand what a danseur noble was As Leigh wrote, there was a period in which there were very few male dancers (fashion of the times; long story) and their job was really only to present her. The danseur noble, as Mel wrote, did not do the showy technical work -- BUT this was not a lack or a weakness. He showed his beautiful lines -- and, yes, his deportment. And he mimed with authority. He danced the "stately measures" rather than quicker steps, but these were considered the more difficult, because they had to be perfect.

I'd count Somes as a "danseur noble" too. And in the 18th century, danseur nobles would also do character (acting) parts, often of villains -- Gaetan Vestris began his dancing career as a grotesque. The genres were always a bit fluid. Though Auguste Vestris gets into the history books as the genre blender (he could dance all types of roles) one reads of dancers in the early 18th century doing demicaractere as well as noble and serieux. It's height -- though Nagy and Bruhn were not of the textbook stature, at least 5'11 -- but it's also carriage and presentation. And, by Danish employ (I can't resist), the tilt of the nose. (Straight noses, serieux; turned up, demicaractere.)

Hair color? Height? Body type? Any description? Lots of Danish ballerinas wear white Romantic tutus!

tee-hee Very good, Natalia! Re religious sensitivity, there are quite a few 19th and early 20th century ballets that would seem extremely insensitive to those whose cultures are portrayed in them. I was showing "Le Corsaire" to a class this week, and the kids wanted to know if this was what "Muslims were really like." To relate politics and religion to ballet, I wonder if these depictions of harems and eunuchs and slavetraders will go the way of the Blackamoor?

Cyril W. Beaumont wrote "A Ballet Called 'Giselle'" (as well as "A Ballet Called 'Swan Lake'") and it is a history and analysis. There's also a much newer book by Marion Smith called "Ballet and Opera iin the Age of 'Giselle'" which is exaclty what its title says, but includes several hefty chapters on "Giselle," including much material on what the ballet originally looked like (LOTS more mime scenes, etc.)