Helene

Reviews of professional ballet companies -- large, medium, and small, from all over the world -- are always welcome on Ballet Talk, in addition to reviews of student performances by the Professional Divisions associated with professional ballet companies, and school "Nutcracker" performances where professional dancers guest. We don't have a lot of members in the Pacific Northwest, regardless of country. We'd always love some more, and we'd love to hear from people who've seen the new and smaller companies in the region. You may have to break ground on Goh Ballet and Canadian Pacific Ballet and tell us about them

I hope you feel better soon, chiapuris.

The Mariinsky uses this system. A glimpse of it can be found in the movie "Sacred Stage," as Makhalina both coaches and is coached.

Now it's clear I got all of the women mixed up. Many, many thanks Natalia, for posting the cast list

My schedule is: 4/23: London-Serenade/New Brandstrup/Homage 4/24: Antwerp-La Sonnambula 4/25-4/26: Ghent-Stravinsky Triple Bill 4/27: Paris-Triple Bill (matinee), Le Prisonnier (evening) 4/28: Paris-Triple Bill 4/29: London-Sleeping Beauty 4/30: Home 5/1: not to SF

Many thanks for your review, mmded It is great to hear about performances by companies that few Ballet Talkers get to see in person.

From the criticism I've read, it seems that "Rubies" was the first of the three to be embraced, but then it became fashionable to put it down as too accessible -- not "Agon"? too much frolic and not enough pain? -- and to appreciate "Emeralds," especially in retrospect after Violette Verdy was no longer dancing the lead. "Diamonds" was the ballet that didn't get much respect: too derivative, not up to "Theme and Variations" or "Symphony in C" snuff -- too much Farrell, not enough substance -- not enough formal architecture, boring ensemble work. I've always loved "Diamonds," and my favorite part of the Paris Opera Ballet "Jewels" DVD is the movement with the corps, for the way those dancers make it live and breathe. I love the authoritative statements that ballerinas can make in the role, each one different, and it certainly doesn't hurt that I was able to see Carla Korbes instill it with her style and grace. The music isn't as eerily evocative as the Faure -- last night, when "Pelleas et Melisande" started to play on XM Classics, I got chills up my spine, even though I was working on something drier than a desert and mind-numbingly dull -- but I love the symphony as well, and I'm always happy that the ballet is an excuse for its being played.

Many thanks, carbro (I hope I'll have a chance to see these at some point.)

The Kolpatkova/Berezhnoi "Sleeping Beauty" DVD (Kultur) has extensive credits, down to the gamekeeper. From there, I found the following overlaps: Queen: Angelina Kabarova, and I'm assuming she's playing the Queen in "Raymonda" as well Catalabutte: Gennadi Selyutski, who dances Abderakhman (both named) Canari and Golden Fairy: Olga Iskanderova. I didn't think the Golden Fairy and Canari looked like the same dancer, and I would have matched each to a different friend. (Maybe I need new eyeglasses.) Violente: Olga Vtarushina. I didn't see any of the other women in the "Raymonda" listing in "Sleeping Beauty." I loved both of the women in the dream sequence. The only solo I didn't like was the second soloist in Act II. I think that her solo is better than Raymonda's solo (which follows it), but that the dancer's phrasing was awkward.

Pacific Northwest Ballet also performs "Ballet Imperial;" it was on this year's opening program. The staging is by Francia Russell. I believe it is the same version she staged for the Kirov in the late 80's, when Farrell staged "Scotch Symphony." The online program notes say this about the decor: The lead ballerinas did opt out of the original, tall, spiky crowns from the late 90's, thank goodness.

Mary Cargill called out Abergel's performance in "Diamonds" in her review of "Jewels" in danceviewtimes. [ADMIN BEANIE ON] Just a reminder that one of Ballet Talk's cardinal rules is: [ADMIN BEANIE OFF]

Choreographer Alberto Alonso died this past Monday. From The Gainsville Sun: http://www.gainesville.com/article/2008010...30309/1002/NEWS

A presentation of a magnum of champagne to a specific dancer after a performance is "mime" for a retirement, by the usual standards.

2007 Through 2006 2008 Marie Jeanne, Publicity Shot for NYCB Tour of San Francisco (Added 3 Jan 08) Galina Ulanov, Curtain Call in Florence, 1957 (Added 7 Jan 08) "The Nutcracker" (1892) Costume Sketch of Hoop/Trepak Dancer by Vsevolozhsky (Added 14 Jan 07) "The Nutcracker" (1892) Costume Sketch of "Waltz of the Flowers" Couple by Vsevolozhsky (Added 14 Jan 07) "The Nutcracker" (1892) Costume Sketch of Merlitons Dancer by Vsevolozhsky (Added 14 Jan 07) Jacques d'Amboise in "Filling Station" (Added 8 Feb 08) Tatiana Toumanova and Igor Youskevitch in Fedorova-Fokine's "The Magic Swan" (Added 8 Feb 08) "Symphonic Variations" (Added 17 Feb 08) Natalia Bessmertnova as Giselle (Added 19 February 08) Richard Reed, Eugene Loring, and David Nillo in Billy the Kid (Added 14 Mar 08) Daphne Vane (Added 15 Mar 08) Emma Vladimirovna Minchenok (Bregvadze) in The Bird and The Hunter (Added 15 Mar 08) Tamara Toumanova as Odile (Added 17 Mar 08) Olga Nikolaevna Moiseyeva as Odile (Added 22 Mar 08) Publicity Photo of Alicia Markova and Anton Dolin as the Firebird and Tsarevich (Added 22 Mar 08) Alexander Grant as Peter Rabbit in the Film of Frederick Ashton's The Tales of Beatrix Potter (Added 22 Mar 08) Ruthana Boris is Les Sylphides (Added 21 Apr 08) Alicia and Fernando Alonso in Waltz Academy (Added 28 Apr 08) Stage Photo of Waltz Academy (Added 28 Apr 08) Patricia Miller in Trumpet Concerto (Added 10 May 08) A Still from the Film La Morte du Cygne with Janine Charrat and Yvette Chauvire (Added 11 May 08) Viktor Aleksandrovich. Semyonov as Blue Bird (Added 12 May 08) Studio Photo of Tamara Toumanova as Kitri (Added 18 May 08) Liane Dayde, Founder of Le Grand Ballet classique de France (Added 25 May 08) Ulanova in Rehearsal on Set for Lavrosky's Romeo and Juliet (Added 2 Jun 08) Adolph Bolm and Corps in (Mostly) Street Dress (Added 10 Jun 08) Adeline Genee and An Unidentified Man in Coppelia (Added 19 Jun 08) Emperor Alexander II and Empress Maria, after Whom the Mariinsky Theatre Was Named (Added 20 Jun 08) Toumanova, Youskevitch, and Misidentified Dancer (?) in The Magic Swan (Added 20 Jun 08) Alicia Alonso and Igor Youskevitch in Giselle Act I (Added 22 Jun 08) Igor Youskevitch and Diana Adams in Helen of Troy (Added 22 Jun 08) Igor Youskevitch and Nora Kaye in The Magic Swan (Black Swan Pas de Deux) (Added 23 Jun 08) Igor Youskevitch and Lubov Roudenko (Added 24 Jun 08) Detail of Feet in Youskevitch/Roudenko Photo (Added 24 Jun 08) Igor Yousevitch and Alicia Markova in Giselle Act II (Added 27 Jun 08) Diana Adams as Sugar Plum Fairy in Balanchine's Nutcracker (Added 18 Jul 08) Maria Tallchief and Nicholas Magellanes in Balanchine's Nutcracker (Added 18 Jul 08) Diana Adams (Added 22 Jul 08) Soviet Kirov Sleeping Beauty (Added 22 Jul 08) Sergei Golovine as Albrecht (Added 26 Jul 08) Elise Reiman and Dmitri Romanoff (Added 26 Jul 08) Catherine Littlefield (Headshot) (Added 27 Jul 08) Elise Reiman (Added 27 Jul 08) Baryshnikov's as Albrecht in Giselle on the 34th Anniversary of His US Debut (Added 27 Jul 08) Caption to Reiman Photo "In the Ballet La Traviata" (Added 28 Jul 08) Edward Villella and Rebecca Wright (Added 31 Jul 08) Harlequin from "CBS Festival of the Lively Arts for Young People" (Added 31 Jul 08) Edward Villella with Mike Douglas, Herschel Bernardi, and Joey Bishop on "The Mike Douglas Show" (Added 31 Jul 08) Helpmann, Tcherina, and the Corps in The Red Shoes, 60 This Year (Added 6 Aug 08) Moira Shearer with Robert Helpman in Les Sylphides from The Red Shoes (Added 8 Aug 08) M.A. Pomerantseva as a Shade in La Bayadere (Added 12 Aug 08) Mordkin, "Dance with a Bow" (Added 17 Aug 08) Tatiana Riabouchinskaya and David Lichine As the Models for Animation in the Disney Film Make Mine Music (Added 20 Aug 08) Explanation of The Photo, Above (Added 21 Aug 08) Costume Sketch for The Stripper in Slaughter on Tenth Avenue, Created by Irene Sharoff for Suzanne Farrell (Added 21 Aug 08) ID for the Photo Above (Added 22 Aug 08) Hans Brenaa, Margot Lander, and Svend Erik Jensen in Etudes (Added 22 Aug 08) On Your Toes 25-Yard Race on Point (Added 22 Aug 08) List of Participants and Winning Time for Photo Above (Added 23 Aug 08) Joan Vickers and Carolyn George in San Francisco Ballet Fundraising Photo (Added 25 Aug 08) Caption for Photo, Above (Added 26 Aug 08) Ballet in The Phantom of the Opera, Choreography Credited to Ernest Belcher (Added 29 Aug 08) Vera Zorina and William Dollar in Rehearsal for Balanchine's "Romeo and Juliet" for Goldwin Follies (Added 1 Sep 08) Balanchine's The Card Party: Ballet in Three Deals (Added 2 Sep 08) Group Photo, Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo in Poker Game (Added 3 Sep 08) George Skibine and Alicia Markova in Bluebeard (Added 4 Sep 08) Suzanne Farrell, at Home with Bottom (Added 4 Sep 08) Irina Baronova and Dimitri Romanov in La Fille Mal Gardee (Added 4 Sep 08) Alicia Markova and Igor Youskevitch (Added 5 Sep 08) Suzanne Farrell and Jacques d'Amboise in Swan Lake (Added 5 Sep 08) Suzanne Farrell and Conrad Ludlow in Symphony in C (Added 5 Sep 08) Nadezhda Pavlova in The Blue Bird (Added 5 Sep 08) Nadezhda Pavlova in The Blue Bird (2) (Added 6 Sep 08) Nadezhda Pavlova and V. Gordeyev in Curtain Call after Legend in Love (Added 6 Sep 08) "Fire" and "Water" from Moscow Art Theater Production of Maeterlinck's The Blue Bird (Added 6 Sep 08) "Fairy" (Before Transformation) and "Hare" from Moscow Art Theater Production of Maeterlinck's The Blue Bird (Added 6 Sep 08) Adolph Bolm (Added 7 Sep 08) Hugh Laing in Antony Tudor's Romeo and Juliet (Added 8 Sep 08) Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo in Serenade: Lubov Rostova, Milada Mladova, Katia Geleznova, and Igor Youskevitch (Added 9 Sep 08) Paris Opera House on Rue Pelletier (Added 13 Sep 08) Close-up of Stage at Paris Opera House on Rue Pelletier (Added 13 Sep 08) Nora Kaye as Caroline and Antony Tudor as The Man She Must Marry in Jardin aux Lilac (Added 19 Sep 08) Serenade, Last Movement, from an American Ballet Souvenir Program (Added 19 Sep 08) Nadia Nerina, as Lise in La Fille Mal Gardee (Added 7 Oct 08) Nora Kaye as Hagar in Pillar of Fire (Added 10 Nov 08) Irina Baranova as Lysette (Lise) in La Fille Mal Gardee (Added 11 Nov 08) Ellen Price de Plane (Added 21 Nov 08) Album Cover for Commercial Tap of "Appalachian Spring" (Added 22 Nov 08) Portrait of Serge Diaghilev by Constantin Korovine (Added 14 Dec 08) Alexandra Danilova, Frederic Franklin and Nikita Talin in The Bells (Added 21 Dec 08) Suzanne Farrell and George Balanchine in Don Quixote (Added 21 Dec 08) Konstantin Akesandrovich Varlamov as "Grandfather Frost" in The Snow Maiden (Added 23 Dec 08) Andre Eglevsky and Tamara Toumanova in Labyrinth (Added 26 Dec 08) John Kriza as the Green Skater in The Skaters (Les Patineurs) (Added 29 Dec 08) 4 Nov 1949 Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo Nutcracker Program, with Mary Ellen Moylan and Snow Queen and Sugar Plum Fairy (Added 29 Dec 09) New Year's Greetings Postcard from the Soviet Union (1982) (Added 31 Dec 08)

There's tall and there's tall. It seems like somewhere between 5'8 and 5'9" that there's a tipping point. I believe Merrill Ashley said she was 5'7.5" in her memoir. She also had very small feet, so her rise on pointe might not have been the entire 6" that's generally cited. A 5'9" dancer who rises to 6'5" on pointe needs a man like Stanko Milov to partner her, unless it's a role where the man is supposed to be shorter when she's en pointe, like "Mozartiana." I remember Arlene Croce once saying in a review from the 80's that NYCB was having an attack of the "tinies." If the overall height of the dancers is going down, at least in those roles that are cast prominently, it wouldn't be the first time in the Company's history.

Saland was a stunning dancer, and her performances in "Emeralds" are some of my best ballet memories. With the exception of Jillana in the filmed/taped version of Liebeslieder Waltzer, I never saw another dancer in any role she danced who I thought surpassed her.

Figure Skater Anton Sikharulidze is member of the Russian Duma, and he is now the chairman of the State Duma Sports Committee. The Russian government sees fit to put experts in its government to oversee funding and direction. I don't see why a ballet dancer couldn't provide similar expertise in the arts. She certainly would have more experience than a random friend, donor, bureautcrat, or lobbyist appointed by a government.

It's a VAI release. I would not be surprised if this was an industry issue, with smaller runs being knocked off the presses for restocks of blockbusters that were big holiday buys. I received the same notices for the Met Opera DVD's, which were released on Decca.

There is a marked contrast between the first two acts of the Bolshoi and Mariinsky versions of "Raymonda." It's like watching Balanchine's "A Midsummer Night's Dream" and Ashton's "The Dream" back to back: why are those people dancing now to that music? In the Bolshoi version, Jean de Brienne appears immediately in the first scene, and he and Raymonda dance together, clearly as an involved couple. Tutus and pointe shoes are prominent. Abderakhman appears first in Raymonda's dream in the second scene. In the Mariinsky version, Abderakhman is introduced to Raymonda and the court in the first scene; Jean de Brienne appears in that scene on a tapestry. His first live appearance is during the dream sequence, and the dancing between them is formal and serene. The women in the first scene wear long dresses and dance in heeled shoes. For all of its formality, I didn't get much of a sense of formal corps structure in the Mariinsky version. That may have been partly due to the filming, but the combination of floaty dresses and tutus also made it difficult to see the patterns. The Bolshoi version, in my opinion cruder in most ways, ironically does try to formalize the corps in the dream sequence. The pluses for me in the Bolshoi version: on the whole, I thought the costumes were better, particularly the men's costumes. I love the way the corps in the dream sequence, with the dark silvery tutus, creates a blossom. I also prefer the characterization of Abderakhman. In the Mariinsky version, there's nothing charismatic about the character: in the dream sequence, he's more of a von Rothbartish figure, and in Act II, he does a lot of stalking, but little dancing. (Of course, it helps that Gedeminas Taranda portrayed him in both Bolshoi videos.) Even: I liked both Vasychenko's and Berezhnoi's Jean de Briennes, each a very different character, and Clemence and Henrietta (Maria Bilova and Olga Suvorova in the Bolshoi. In the Mariinsky, there's a list of credits at the end, but not with character names, and there's only basic info on the single sheet enclosed with the DVD.) The pluses for me in the Mariinsky version: Pretty much everything else. Irina Kolpakova She has the most gorgeous arms. She doesn't have the uber-pliant back of many of the Mariinsky Odettes, but her carriage is impeccable, and she dances with diamond-like clarity. Structurally, with the exceptions noted above, I much preferred the Mariinsky. For example, there is much more dancing in the Bolshoi version for Clemence and Henriette, and especially Bernard and Beranger (their partners), but I found that Clemence and Henriette's parts in the Mariinsky had more impact: they were presented as something beautiful and rare, although they had prominent solos in each act.* I hope to read more opinions as the DVD's get delivered. I hope, too, that someone here recognizes the dancers who portray Clemence and Henrietta. One dancer is a little shorter and more muscular than the other*, but I have no idea who they are. *Edited to add: I confused the Clemence and Henriette with the dream and third act soloists.

Is there a contractual reason that this can't be the case? I thought that Ferri had been a Principal at both ABT and La Scala. Vishneva and Malakhov are/have been Principal Dancers at more than one major company.

I always thought that "c" before an "a" was a hard "c", but live and learn Many thanks for your review, dancerboy87. It is great to hear what's happening at La Scala.

My fortune cookie at lunch said, and when I got home, indeed, "Raymonda" had been delivered! I plan to watch it later tonight, to ring in the new year.

After four-five date changes, I finally got a "Shipped" notice on 27 December to say it had shipped Fedex Second Day for delivery on 2 January.

Thank you for your review, PeggyR. This is the right place for it. I'm glad we have your impressions of the live performance; those of us who saw the broadcast know that we had a different experience from those in the house, whose attention wasn't directed by the camera.