Helene

Thank you, zerbinetta. Actually, cleaning out old PMs that you don't need anymore (note to self) so that they're not transferred to the new server is the one thing that Ballet Talkers can do before the transition to help. (That and being your usual patient and tolerant selves regarding technical glitches.)We're going to clean-up the members list tomorrow, deleted zero post accounts that have been inactive (no logins, no threads read) since 30 June 2005. There probably will be a general recount on the database, so some post counts will go down by duplicate posts that were deleted.

In the US this is not uncommon for chamber music groups, some of whose members are faculty, but where other members are nearby residents. These groups tend to tour, if only locally or sporadically, and I'm not sure how much funding they receive from the universities.

I second, and third, and fourth Starr's post. I've been so engrossed in reading them I forgot to say thank you You've been our eyes and ears for one of the great cultural events of the year. Spasibo!

That certainly explains the references: the opening is a great slow shot of the ornamentation on the roof, which turns into Loudières slowly walking up the rake of the roof, and then walking along a ledge. I'm not sure a dictionary will be completely helpful on "hokey conceit" without the right context, and I may just be more confusing in an attempt to explain it, but I'll give it a try: "hokey" is similar in meaning to "corny" (or "cornball"), but I'm not sure that's any clearer. The closest I can describe it is being a combination of something that is out-dated and sentimental, but is done seriously. "Conceit" in this sense is "theatrical conceit," which is a technique used in the theater where a non-naturalistic element is used as a recurring theme that "frames" the drama, but the audience accepts it, even though it's completely different from the core of the play that is supposed to be accepted realistically. A common one is an angel or dead person who narrates (or in the movie Truly, Madly, Deeply, watches TV and eats crisps). In Autour the slow-motion that Delouche uses at the end to make the dancers more unworldly would be a film version of a theatrical conceit. It is about 8.5 minutes long, not including closing credits. It opens with a portrait of the dancer who might have been the original, with the opening credits, and a metronome in the background. A man's voice is heard giving barre instructions. The camera then shows Lacotte giving a barre exercise in a studio to Thesmar, Denard, and Stephant for about two minutes. From the barre the dancers go immediately into a studio rehearsal, with piano accompaniment. Thesmar is wearing a leotard and Sylph skirt, Denard blue leotard, sweater, and tights, and Stephant a leotard with short skirt. Thesmar and Denard dance, with the cameras at normal level, and there are occasional cuts from a ceiling camera to Lacotte coaching and partnering Stephant. There are several closeups of the three dancers, including one particularly beautiful one of the Sylphide coming between the couple. This changes to the overhead camera filming the three, with a whispered voice-over -- alas I don't speak French, and there are no English subtitles -- a few whisps of fog rising, and to a string quartet playing Beetheoven's op 130 string quartet (according to the closing credits.) The camera switches to back to ground level but with the same dark lighting, and the pas de trois is filmed in slow motion. The film ends with a scene in which Denard is shown from chest up walking and reaching forward, which switches to the Sylphide walking and gesturing backwards, until finally Denard's arm is shown reaching towards her as her image fades into the background, leaving only his arm reaching as the music ends.

We've outgrown our britches, and both Ballet Talk and Ballet Talk for Dancers are moving to a dedicated server together. The move is tentatively scheduled for Thursday morning EST, and it should take 3-4 hours, during which time the sites will be down. The software and URLs for the sites will remain the same. It's possible we will have some glitches along the way, and we'll work with our "hosts" to fix any outstanding issues. This should solve the server-based slowness and latency issues we've been having lately. (For example, the "Last post by" information has been slow to resolve.) If you have any questions, please post them here, PM me, or use the "Contact Us" link at the top of the page to email us.

Although the Vision Scene suffers a little because Korsakov or the Lilac Fairy are sometimes in front of Ayupova and also the camera work gets a little artsy, it is a great excerpt and no one talks during it

I bought this DVD from dancebooks in the UK, and it is now my "if you could only take one DVD to the desert island" choice. Not only does it have precious archival footage of Verdy in Emeralds, Tchaikovsky Pas de Deux, Liebeslieder Walzer, Dances at a Gathering, and In the Night, there are her remarkable coaching sessions with Elisabeth Maurin, Isabelle Guèrin, Lucia Lacarra and Cyril Pierre, Elisabeth Platel and Nicolas Leriche, and Margaret Illman and Vladimir Malakov, in which she passes the Balanchine flame through her verbal evocations and physical demonstrations. But that's not all!!! Included on the CD are four other films by Dominique Delouche. The other major film is Comme les Oiseaux, with what I find to be a rather hokey conceit of Monique Loudières walking on the roof and around the Opera House, sometimes with the birds of the title, and with sections of ballets staged in the public areas of the theater, but with an extraordinary series of coaching sessions with Jerome Robbins (In the Night), Yvette Chauvire (and Cyril Atanassof) (Les Mirages), Violette Verdy (Sonatine, with archival footage of Verdy in the role), and Vassiliev (Giselle). There's also a chapter of Kylian teaching Loudières and Manuel Legris in what I think may be Nuages, which I found less illuminating. Giselle has never been a favorite of mine, but to see Vassiliev, who would have been about 50 when the film was made, in a lilac button down shirt, belted to appear peasanty, over black slacks, and black patent leather street shoes transform into Albrecht made this my desert island chapter. The short films are Autor de la Sylphide, with Ghislaine Thesmar, Michaël Denard, and Yannick Stephant rehearsing the Lacotte La Sylphide; Aurore, in which Rosella Hightower coaches Elisabeth Platel in the Rose Adagio from Sleeping Beauty; and Pas à pas, danced by Patrick Dupond and John Neumeier. I've played this on my Macintosh laptop with no trouble, but it does not work on my US DVD player.

I think what looks good depends on the shape of the foot and leg of each dancer. I think, for example, Gillian Murphy's shoes look just fine. I've never seen Cojocaru in person, and can't judge by the photo, since angle in photography and film can mean everything. But the most critical thing for me is that the shoe support the feet of the dancer. If a shoe can help a dancer to save her feet from debilitating injury, I'm willing to forego any differences in aesthetics. (Speaking as someone who gets incredibly crabby at the slightest shoe pinch...)

In the 27 March 2006 issue of The New Yorker, there was an item about a political fundraiser for the former attorney of Rhode Island's senatorial campaign that took place in the home of director Martin Scorsese and his wife, Helen. In describing their home, Nick Paumgarten wrote: He then goes onto cite examples, one of which is (Talk of the Town, p. 31).

Last night, there were several debuts in the "Points of View" program. There is no asterisk by Rachel Foster and James Moore as Couple 5 in The Bridge to indicate a debut on the PNB website, and neither was in the Company when the work was first shown. Perhaps a debut on tour? They were sharp and vivid in the opening, establishing the precariousness of the situation instantly and made an immediate impact, and their final scene, before they are shot, was very moving. Lindsi Dec and Kiyon Gaines were listed as debuts as Couple 2. To me this was the most all-out dynamic performance of the run. They threw themselves into the choreography, so much that they took a tumble on the first iteration of the famous folk tune rendition, but they recovered quickly and didn't seem to miss a beat through the end. Dec, who reminded me of Susan Jaffe in her first prime in Stanko Milov's piece in the Choreographers' Showcase last Wednesday, here made me think of Hagar in Pillar of Fire. What a terrific dramatic dancer. Three dancers were new to roles in La Valse: Carla Körbes, Lucien Postlewaite, and Batkhurel Bold. Körbes and Postlewaite gave a younger interpretation than the other two couples I had seen previously -- I missed the cast with Pantastico, Yin, and Cruz, who are more their contemporaries -- which made a different dramatic statement: while not naive by any means, these characters were less experienced in face of the societal maelstrom in the period in which the ballet was set. In the post-performance Q&A, when discussing the moment where her character becomes aware of the Death figure behind her, she said she didn't count it, but that she felt it. Peter Boal then said that she is a dancer who's never needed to be coached, that she intuitively understands. (At that, Körbes waved his comment off with a little, "tsk" gesture ) Körbes was like a conduit for the changing colors of the score, from the romanticism of Waltz 7 through her reeling reaction to her face in the mirror through the death of her character at the end of the ballet. Postlewaite was an ardent partner. Bold, as the Death figure in his only role in "Points of View," was an eerie presence from the moment he stepped on stage, an entrance that dropped the temperature by 10 degrees. I'd like to mention the orchestra, which was superb again in all three pieces. The Shostakovich, one of my favorite pieces, was ravishing, the Lang, precise and so live, and the coloration in La Valse splendid. Stewart Kershaw and Allan Dameron conducted.

One person's caviar is another's icky fish. The general rule is that if a topic doesn't interest for whatever reason, please skip it. People who do find it interesting will comment. I don't think there's much else to say about having a civil discussion.

[ADMIN BEANIE ON] I've split of Robert Gottlieb's comments on the recent NYCB promotions from the main thread, in which Ballet Talkers can post their comments and opinions on these. I've also removed posts that violate Ballet Talk rules and policy. There are very few things that are bannable offenses on this board, but shutting down the discussion with put-downs is one of them and won't be tolerated. Well-reasoned arguments that further the discussion are welcome. [ADMIN BEANIE OFF]

We've moved Robert Gottlieb's comments on the promotions to a separate thread found here and reopened this one to discuss Ballet Talkers reactions to and comments on the recent promotions.