Helene

Marina Harss just tweeted a link to this article on the WNYC website which highlights three major Flamenco artists performing in NYC in March and a major Flam: Farrquito performs at Town Hall tomorrow night, February 22 at 8pm," and it includes "a dance dialogue between himself and hi grandfather, the legendary "El Farruco." Sarah Baras and Ballet Flamenco perform "Shadows" at New York City Center* from March 7-10 Soledad Barrio and Noche Flamenca perform "Entre tu y yo" at the Connelly Theaer from March 8-31 There's a link to Harss full review from the article. *A co-production of the New York Flamenco Festival: http://www.flamencofestival.org/en/festivales/espanol-ff-new-york-2019/

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The extra matinee dates should be available for the April/"Giselle" rep; the PNB School show generally uses extra matinee slots during the March rep. Nothing was mentioned about the November program: were it to be a full-length or full-evening, like "Jewels," I think they'd have touted that in the printed materials. According to a Hubbard Street brochure, "One Thousand Pieces" is 90 minutes long with one intermission, so while an early evening, I'm not sure Giselle is much longer. I'm glad to see the Stowell "Cinderella" on the schedule. I was afraid that the Maillot was a permanent replacement.

Renewals are up on the PNB website, and early renewal information showed up in my mailbox today. This is what the brochure reveals: Program 1 (September 2019): Agon (Balanchine/Stravinsky) Carmina Burana (Stowell/Orff) Please note: Opening night on Friday, September 27 starts at 6:30pm. Program 2 (November 2019) No details yet. Nutcracker Program 3 (February 2020): Cinderella (Stowell/Prokofiev) -- Ten performances -- and the gorgeous costumes are by Martin Pakledinaz Program 4 (March 2020) One Thousand Pieces (Cerrudo/Glass) -- brochure calls the piece "massive" Short clip on YouTube by Hubbard Street: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_TAfZLSEfas Program 5 (April 2020) Giselle (PNB recreation/Adam) Program 6 (May-June 2020) Plot Point (Pite/Hermann) Premiere (Liang/TBA) Waiting for the Station (Tharp/Toussaint)

From Helene and Victoria Leigh from Ballet Talk for Dancers: Dear Members, We are again at the point of needing to cover the costs of running Ballet Talk for Dancers and Ballet Alert!, and we need your help! Your donations are used ONLY to cover the fees to Invisionzone and the cost of the bank account services and PayPal. If you are using your phone, please scroll to the bottom of the screen and click "Full Version," after which you should see the donation information in the top right of the home page. We are asking for $25 donations, but will graciously accept anything that you can do. The fund raiser will end as soon as we reach the goal needed to keep us afloat for a year. If you prefer to send a check, please make it out to BALLET TALK, and mail to: BALLET TALK 11165 Abbotts Station Dr Johns Creek, GA 30097 ***PLEASE PUT YOUR SCREEN NAME OR REGISTERED EMAIL ADDRESS ON YOUR CHECK, or on your ELECTRONIC DONATION FORM, SO THAT WE KNOW WHO TO THANK!!!!!!!!!!

Eva Stone is taking on two elephants in the room: 1. "The dearth of female choreographers, she says, often leads companies attempting to level the playing field to grab an established dancer and say, “You! You’re a woman! Choreograph something!” 2. Something Balanchine often tried to dispell, that choreography is a result of innate artistic genius through a year-long class at Pacific Northwest Ballet School in which she teaches the craft of choreography to the young women of the Professional Division. They presented their solos a few weeks ago: https://crosscut.com/2019/02/teen-choreographers-hope-break-ballets-glass-ceiling?fbclid=IwAR25HBgmzwIK73koBk2pJAl8QVvJMcojS4iPr9H9AnvjrykEq_8SSsXfU4M

PNB posted to its Facebook Page about a profile of Kiyon Gaines Ross on the mobballet site: http://mobballet.org/index.php/2017/05/03/kiyon-gaines/?fbclid=IwAR12qTJ-HfjWAOtBzgwnLMGzkw7W2VekeYYru2-Y06l8x6cteL2tjTXLngA

It's pretty much a quote of Napoleon crowning himself without religious consecration, ie, his legitimacy was based entirely on his own talents, not bestowed by anyone. Since this wasn't the original ending or intention, I think the choice for that ending was pretty clear. In similar tales, like the Magic Flute, where a foreigner marries into the family after proving himself, the power is transferred to the couple to renew the kingdom. The couple doesn't seize the crown.

Generosa was beautiful, and her performance was full of detail and warmth. I'm at the theater for the matinee, thanks to a friend who gave me a ticket she couldn't use, in case my flight to Anaheim was canceled, and I'm thrilled to see how many people made it today and are warming up in the lobby, especially the kids who came all dressed up. (I opted for Michelin Man chic.)

One of the PNB Auroras making her debut this run is Laura Tisserand, who I'd 5'11".

I'm going to miss Peter Docherty's costumes so, so much, from the saturated turquoise and royal blue dresses of the courtiers to the jewel-toned fair costumes to the garland dance costumes for the women, to the hunting scene and Act IV ensemble dresses, but, especially, the opalescent vision scene long tutus with the full, tulle underskirts.

GuideStar, the service that made 501-c (3) 990's available online, has merged with Foundation Center to form a new organization called Candid. This is the text from an email I received today: Hello Helene, Because you are a user of GuideStar, we are notifying you that GuideStar and Foundation Center have joined forces. Starting today, we will operate as a single, new nonprofit organization called Candid. Foundation Center + GuideStar = Candid All GuideStar products and services will continue to operate as usual. Your account or subscription will not change. Please be aware, you may receive communications about and from Candid in the future. If you subscribe to a GuideStar product, Candid’s name will now appear on your bill. We remain committed to ongoing enhancements and you can follow updates at candid.org. If you have questions or want to learn more, please visit us at candid.org or email us at answers@candid.org. We look forward to connecting with you. Thank you, Brad Smith President, Candid Former President, Foundation Center Jacob Harold Executive Vice President, Candid Former President + CEO, GuideStar

I listened to Margaret Mullin's third conversation with Theresa Ruth Howard for her "Beyond the Barre" podcast, in which they discuss ballet training aesthetics, social media, and more. I found it a very interesting discussion. I agreed and empathized with a lot of what they said, so this is going to look disproportionally like disagreement, but a couple of things pressed a bunch of buttons, so I'm responding to that. Unfortunately, it's not yet linked directly from the website, but it's available on iTunes and the usual podcast suspects. When it is linked, it should be from this page:https://www.premierdancenetwork.com/category/beyond-the-barre/ First off, I want to say that as far as classical ballet is concerned, Mullin walks the walk: in Sleeping Beauty, as Fairy of Purity, not only did she know what ballet she was in, she understood and conveyed why she had been invited to Aurora's Christening. She was exquisite. While I understand that competitions can bring out extreme, trick-filled performances that makes fellow dancers scream and try to emulate them, the younger the louder, I think that, aside from Prix de Lausanne, which comes with great training opportunities, even a competition like YAGP, which encourages more screaming for my taste, has some tremendous benefits, not in any order: a. Personal coaching in variations. I get that this is a double-edged sword psychologically, since a coached dancer is the center of attention, and it doesn't ready a dancer to be in the corps, where they will be given 50 seconds to learn a role and be in the back line. However, while working deep into a variation, dancers can absorb lessons in style and technique that they might not even be able to implement right away, but need to have in their brain to pull out when they are given 50 seconds to learn a role or are shadowing in the back of a rehearsal or are working on their own in a studio. b. Working with choreographers. They might be doing traditional (more-or-less) versions of classical variations, but, more typically, they do original work for their contemporary choreography. They can learn what it's like to work with different personality types and working styles, and they can get one-on-one instruction in contemporary style through the choreographic process, which they might not have much time for when immersed in daily ballet classes. c. Master classes. Part of YAGP and other competitions is being able to take master classes with a wide range of teachers in a short period of time. Getting exposure in class to teachers affiliated with many companies and/or schools can be invaluable and, for example, can point to a summer intensive, that the dancer may not have considered, a choreographer that appeals to a contestant, and/or a more specific movement style than the student gets at home. d. Scholarships. Not every kid will win a prize, but important judges, who have scholarships and places in their summer and year-round programs, are watching them. e. Stage experience in a new/bigger/higher stakes environment. f. Open-mindedness. On the whole, company-affiliated schools mostly discourage participation in competitions, and it seems to me that success and self-esteem is measured by whether that student is chosen by that company. I don't have stats, but, anecdotally, from listening to many dancers speak at Q&A's and in podcast and print interviews, dancers who talk about participating in competitions seem to be ess single-minded about only wanting to be in one company and more open to opportunities to create a different career path, sometimes deliberately performing with more than one company, sometimes doing so by chance/luck, and often choosing to perform with companies outside North America. They might even have a broader career, including dance outside of ballet or other arts outside of dance. Which leads me to my second quibble: I think it's great that Misty Copeland and Francesca Hayward are getting and taking opportunities to perform in film, and that a slew of dancers and choreographers are, like Balanchine, and many of Balanchine's dancers, creating dance for musical theater and performing on Broadway. This is nothing new, and it has nothing to do with Instagram or any other social media, and it didn't just happen when there were few or no ballet companies: Jacques d'Amboise took leave from dancing with Balanchine at NYCB to do "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers" (1954) and "Carousel," (1956) for example. Almost all ballet dancers have so few opportunities to earn a downpayment on a home and have some money in the bank doing only ballet, and maybe even to make connections into their next career, to allow their bodies and minds to take a well-needed break, and to see if the grass is, indeed, greener, elsewhere. If I'm sad I don't get to see them dance ballet, that shouldn't be a driving factor in their decision. IMO, each one should be able to do an individual cost/benefit analysis without being thought lesser: they know what they put into their ballet careers and the trade-offs involved. Fame might be tricky to navigate, but it isn't inherently bad, either.

Ricard Orza is too injured to dance Aurora. This was confirmed in two parts: the Seattle Times published an article in which they listed Ricard Orza among those who were cast originally for Aurora. They published an update, removing Ricard Orza and adding Angelica Generosa in the list of Auroras in the body of the article, with a notice of correction at the bottom of the article. At the panel discussion and Q&A with Auroras Lesley Rausch, Rachel Foster, and Generosa, Rausch said that sometimes people get opportunities when someone is injured, and then she pointed out that this happened to Generosa. Orza is okay enough to perform Countess, which she did Opening Night. So I hope it is something she recovers from quickly. I agree about Murphy's Lilac Fairy.

There was a Seattle Times article this week about different careers former PNB dancers have gone onto: https://www.seattletimes.com/entertainment/dance/former-pacific-northwest-ballet-dancers-with-unconventional-second-careers/ Among them: Brittany Reid and her husband have a small farm raising grass-fed beef and chickens and they also sell eggs and are planning to add pork! Rebecca Johnston was one of my favorite dancers at PNB, and she's now a lawyer for the NLRB From the Sleeping Beauty program: Jessica Anspach McEliece and her husband Ryan have a daughter -- born December 10, 2018 -- and her name is Evelyn Grace (Evie). to them! There was a photo of Carrie Imler coaching Sarah Ricard Orza in The Sleeping Beauty, and she is expecting a second child this winter. There's a second coaching photo in the lobby display case that contains programs and photos from past productions and the current one, including one of Imler in mid-jump in one of her great trifecta of Sleeping Beauty roles, the Gold and Silver pas de trois. It's winter now, and she looks pretty ready in the photos!