Helene

I'm not sure why Acosta believes that full-length ballets must be the new masterpieces. Balanchine, Ashton, and Tudor had their large share of shorter ballet masterpieces. Company directors continue to create full-lengths, from the original -- Ib Andersen's Mosaik -- to original takes on traditional ballet stories -- Kent Stowell's The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet, to lesser-known Tchaikovsky scores -- to original choreography to the standard ballet scores. There have been commissioned full length-story ballets as well based on Dracula, Alice in Wonderland, and Peter Pan, to name three that are scheduled for the upcoming season in North America. Very few companies are going to throw several million dollars or pounds at an unknown or unproven choroegrapher, unless a commitment has already been made and original plans fell through. Neither Ashton nor MacMillan nor Balanchine started with the equivalent of a multi-million full-length production. They honed their craft in opera, revues, plays, and/or one-act ballets before being given a big budget commissions. I think Deborah MacMillan's comments at the end of the article were salient: I think there's a difference between choreographers who are new to a company and aren't familiar with the dancers and those that are raised within a company and can have long-term relationships with the dancers. They both have strengths and weaknesses. The advantage of someone who hasn't seen the company is that s/he -- assuming s/he is given casting choices -- can look at the dancers with fresh eyes. The questions then become whether the dancers and choreographer are temperamentally suited to each other and whether that first judgement was comprehensive enough to know if the dancers can fulfill the choreographer's requirements. The advantage of someone who has worked with the dancers long-term is that they can choose those who can fulfill their vision and with whom they like to work. The disadvantages are two-fold: the inevitable cliques that form among long-term collaborators and having fixed ideas about specific dancers. I like the trend I'm seeing on the West Coast of nurturing more in-house choreographers from among the dancers, although I wish they were getting more opportunities.

Welcome to Ballet Talk, lovesjoyajm. Ballet Talk is a board on which to discuss ballet performances, music, history and issues. For questions about dance training, that is the mission of our sister board, Ballet Talk for Dancers. You'll need to register separately there to post and to see the full content of the board, and if it's not taken, we'd appreciate if you'd use the same username on both boards. Good luck! (I'm going to close this thread now.)

Daaa, da da da da daaa, da daaa, da daaa, da da da da da daaaaa... It could be like "Sing Along with The Messiah Night," except we could all hum to a full length Swan Lake and argue about the order of the music and what should or shouldn't be cut.

This has got to make the subscription programming puzzle much easier. In the past, with all of the combinations of programs, the company had to figure out how not to repeat any given ballet on a given series (and to account for people who bought both Tuesday or both Saturday matinee subscriptions), and how to distribute the premieres equally. If you have 9 weeks and 11 programs, it makes it that much easier to schedule subscription series. You don't have to worry that Ballo della Regina, for example, is played on two Tuesdays, even though the rest of the program is different. It also may make it easier for the technical teams to plan how to hang and light a night of ballet, perhaps reducing overtime costs, or at least reduce the amount of planning.

It would be great to have as many Ballet Caravan ballets as possible. Maybe some could be performed by SAB. In addition to repetoire, the promenade rings could be filled with his interests in art and architecture.

If the season is a hit or a flop, how do they know whether it's due to programming a strong Balanchine season or due to the new programming approach? If ticket sales remain flat, how do they know if the programs themselves and the approach to programming have offset each other among ticket buyer preferences? (My old direct marketing hat has freed itself from its mothballs...)

It may be hard to judge usability across the site until all of the functionality and content is added, but in my opinion, the new site looks beautiful and airy -- the old site was very cramped -- and speaks intelligently to the viewer.

The advantage of programming one program at a time is that the focus of rehearsals and performances is on a fixed and limited set of works (the current and the next), which makes the performances that much sharper. Looking at the NYCB schedule, the programs are intermingled. I'm not sure how that will help to make the ballets better rehearsed. Working on the calendar, I can see that there is definitely a marketing trend to create catchy titles, but the only ones that don't make me roll my eyes are "Director's Choice" and "All-Balanchine". Luckily most of Petipa is full-length ballets, which are immune to marketing titles.

Thank you so much for these -- she's so beautiful.

I'm working on the calendar, and while I haven't finished US companies yet, I haven't seen his name anywhere on US ballet company rep lists yet.

I've been watching the rep over the last decade, and it looks to me like Tomasson has replaced Balanchine with his own work and, lately, Robbins'. I don't see an overwhelming number of European contemporary; if I don't feel it's worth traveling to SFB to see a program, it's more likely to avoid Tomasson's work than not. He is trying to develop and encourage choreographers from within his company, notably Adam and Possokhov. (I think Christopher Stowell's style is a little too similar to Tomasson's for that to be a great fit.)I do think the Company's ability to dance Balanchine well is a gauge. In the late 90's, I saw a stunner of a Liebeslieder Walzer with Julia Diana and Evelyn Berman, and over the years, a few wonderful Stravinsky Violin Concertos, as well as superb relatively recent performances of 4T's. I was less enthralled with the recent Apollos than most. I don't think they do a good job with Who Cares?, but, then again, I hadn't seen very many good performances of the ballet by NYCB in the early 90's, and I can't remember any outside the company, including Durante's guest turn in the 1993 Balanchine Celebration. ETA: There must be something in the water in San Francisco, with choreographers Possokhov, Adam, Christopher Stowell, and Paul Gibson all coming out of the SFB dancers ranks.

Excuse me.... but what??!! NYCB performs how many great Balanchine ballets and good Robbins' ballets during each season compared to SFB's rep? Diamond Project seasons are one thing, but... Balanchine is a neo-classical choreographer. NYCB dances very few strictly classical ballets (mime and Candy Cane from Nutcracker, first two acts of Coppelia, Swan Lake pas de deux, sections of Sleeping Beauty), unlike the Kirov. NYCB, through substantial Diamond Projects and the American Music Project, commissions works that range from neo-classical to contemporary. If anything, SFB dances more strictly classical ballets than NYCB, with two full-lengths a year (not counting Nutcracker) -- although it sounds like Martins is trying to catch up -- with the occasional ABT piece, like this season's Rodeo. The majority of their repertory is firmly rooted in the neoclassical -- the majority of new work is choreographed by Tomasson and Wheeldon, as well as work by Julia Adam, and now that Possokhov is resident choreographer, I'd expect more from him. I don't know whether Morris' piece Pacific was intended as a ballet, like Sylvia and Maelstrom. For next season, the balance of the repertory consists of Paul Taylor's Spring Rounds, Lar Lubovich's Elemental Brubeck, David Bintley's Dance House -- the one time I saw his work, it wasn't memorable, and I don't recall his style -- and works by Wayne McGregor, who has choreographed for NYCB and according to this interview is a self-styled "contemporary" choreographer, and Matjash Mrozewski. I haven't seen either, but the latter is creating new work for SFB, Royal Danish Ballet, and National Ballet of Canada this year, with works in the rep of Royal Ballet, Houston Ballet, West Australian Ballet, and Royal Swedish Ballet as well according to his website. That alone doesn't guarantee style, but he seems to be one of young "hopes" among classical ballet companies worldwide, with a resume deeper than many Diamond Project choreographers over the years.

Maybe not the Kirov, but SFB has always had it's share of full-lengths, even before Peter Martins started presenting his full-length Swan Lake and Sleeping Beauty, and I think there is little difference between today's NYCB and SFB repertoire in terms of type of work performed. (SFB performs fewer works each year.) Helgi Tomasson is firmly in the neo-classical school in his own choreography.