Helene

I don't want PNB to go mostly modern -- I think that would be tragic -- but I wouldn't mind a piece thrown in every year, if only for the dancers to work with interesting people. Some of the dancers have talked about training extensively in modern dance through their early to mid-teens, and they might do justice to some of the modern pieces. The Company does a wonderful job with Nacho Duato's Jardi Tancat. (The music itself is worth going to the performance.) I think it was Julie Tobiason's best role, and that the dance world lost a great modern dancer when she turned to ballet. Maynard Stewart was superb in it, too. I think that there are some PNB dancers who take to Forsythe like a fish to water. If PNB were to perform Tudor, I think that another niche of dancers in the Company would be cast. The Leaves Are Fading isn't my favorite Tudor, but it might work for the Company. Paul Gibson has done a few works for the school, but I don't think PNB has been a great lab for developing choregraphers. San Francisco Ballet has developed at least three in recent years (Julia Adam, Yuri Possoukov, Christopher Stowell). Kent Stowell has been prolific, but as he said, he choregraphed the full length works because the Company need them, and having a resident stager and choreographer made it cheaper to do new works. An Artistic Director who is not as prolific will have to go outside to fill the new work "quota."

I spoke too soon. I just read that Carolyn Carlsson choreographed a ballet performed by POB, so the beginning of my wish list for a new PNB artistic director would be: Carlsson Mark Morris, preferably a new work, although I wonder what the company would do with Dido Twyla Tharp, not because I think her ballet works are her best work, but because it would be an experience for the dancers Karole Armitage Graham, maybe Diversion of Angels DeMille's Rodeo, Fall River Legend Kudelka. I kind of liked Julie Kent's section of Cruel World Robbins More Tudor and Forsythe

My top 5 (not in order): Premiere of Liebeslieder Walzer, primarily for Verdi and Ludlow (Talk about greed!) Tanaquil LeClerq in Symphony in C (2nd movement) Lew Christensen in Apollo Henning Kronstam in Apollo Premiere of Agon (More greed!) Next 5 (not in order): Farell with Balanchine in Don Quixote Tallchief with Moncion in Firebird Plitsetskaya in Swan Lake Bruhn -- I have to defer to people who saw him to tell me what role I should choose. I want the best one, because I'm greedy! Marie-Jeanne in Ballet Imperial. (Hard choice between that and Concerto Barocco)

I don't like dancers who pose for the snapshot, exaggerate extreme positions, and milk applause. To me the opposite are dancers who move with the "as written" musical phrase and impulse. This is probably why I never liked Nureyev, even when he was young with brilliant technique. I also don't like dancers who go for big effects at the expense of line and balance, or who sacrifice mobility in their arms, backs, and necks for leg and foot speed. I prefer cool to theatrical, but detached and unengaged is bad. Then there are dancers who have a quirk that goes against my grain -- for example, Nichol Hlinka used to make me crazy by hunching her shoulders and starting at her feet until her last years of dancing, when she stopped, and I loved her. The rest aren't quite rational, but I chalk this up to the opposite of the Quaker phrase that Nancy Reynolds used to describe Antoinette Sibley: [the dancer] did not speak to my condition.

I didn't see McBride live until she returned to the company after the birth of her daughter when she was in her late 30's. By then she was no longer dancing the virtuouso roles like Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 2, Theme and Variations, Four Seasons, Allegro Brilliante, Tarantella (at least not often), roles which NYCB histories and memoirs and reviews record her as having danced brilliantly. Lincoln Kirstein said that she "saved" NYCB during Farrell's absence from '68-'74. Her technique was somewhat diminished in the last four years of her career, but I can't remember her ever dancing without energy or a sense of the stage space or the other dancers on it. I did see her perform in some of her original roles -- she was hysterically funny in "Costermongers" in Union Jack, delightful in Who Cares ("The Man I Love" and "Fascinatin' Rhythm"), Scotch Symphony, Vienna Waltzes, and Rubies, strong in Opus 19/The Dreamer, and lovely in Baiser de la Fee and Brahms-Schoenberg Quartet (2nd movement). She was also a radiant Sugar Plum Fairy in the first performance of Balanchine's Nutcracker that I ever saw, a tough Novice in The Cage, moving in Liebeslieder Walzer (Hayden's role, one she took over soon after the premiere in 1960), and lovely in Sonatine (created for Verdy). The only roles I didn't love her in were Valse Triste (Martins), Pavane, Shadows (a 1986 Bonnefous piece), and the "classical" role in Cortege Hongrois, mostly because, except for the latter, I don't really like any of these ballets. I envy those who saw her in her prime. For me, the way I remember her is at her last performance, which ended with the piano solo from Harlequinade. It was the humble bow at the end that was the perfect gesture, and the audience clapped and screamed and threw flowers, many with tears running down their faces.

According to the SFB website: http://www.sfballet.org/performances/season/program8/

Surely Christopher Stowell would have known about his parents' intention to retire years ago -- they said their intention was to retire after 25 seasons, but they postponed to do a few seasons in McCaw Hall. If he wanted to be in the running for PNB, he would have had to have started managing companies a few years before he did or have had a more longstanding relationship with PNB as choreogrpher. (Only his Zais, which will be revived next year, is in the active repertoire.) As impressive as his OBT season has been, he hasn't had a track record for which I would expect the PNB Board of Directors to be looking. Whether he'd want to run the Company five or ten years from now is another story. I think OBT is a more fun challenge, certainly at this point in Stowell's career: there he gets to reshape the repertoire and to build a company. Plus with his connections to the Balanchine world -- OBT is the only West Coast company that has permission to perform Balanchine's Nutcracker, which they did quite wonderfully -- he has a marked advantage to other non-former-NYCB Artistic Directors running smaller companies in the building phase. (I'm still crossing my fingers for Ib Andersen for PNB...)

During the recent post-performance Q&A's Russell and Stowell said many times that they felt that they hadn't accomplished everything they set out to do, back when they didn't feel there were limits. In other contexts they talked about wanting to do specific projects, from new productions and new choreography to replacing the $12K camera that they use to record performances for archival purposes, so money, money, money is a common theme. It would be grand if, indeed, the increase in subscriptions plus the $500K in unexpected Nutcracker ticket sales does go a long way to eliminate the deficit the Company incurred during the two season in the Arena, thus giving the new Artistic Director(s) a clean slate. (Russell said that 70% of PNB's revenue comes from ticket sales, which made them particularly vulnerable to the audiences who didn't see much magic in the alternate venue.) Once the announcement was made, they said that the Company needed a new Artistic Director who would come in and believe that anything was possible, and having some money, or at least no or little deficit, would help a lot in that direction. Having one Artistic Director who was a resident choreographer -- full length through one-act neoclassical -- and another who was a stager of Balanchine's works, really kept the budget for new works down. Nonetheless Stowell and Russell have hired many of the usual suspects to choreograph/re-stage works: Forsythe, Duato, Fonte, Rushton, Tudor, Caniparoli, Taylor, Baynes, Taylor-Corbett, Dumais, O'Day, Byrd, Tetley, C. Stowell, Hynes, van Manen, Limon. How many lauded contemporary classical choregraphers did they miss? Wheeldon is the only one I can think of off hand, with Julia Adam and Yuri Poussokov having had successes on the West Coast. Ashton would be a stylistic stretch that would challenge the dancers. There are modern choreographers whose works aren't in the active repertoire, but PNB is primarily a classical company, and I hope it will stay that way. Do we really want Stroman, or ABT's Harrison ballet, and a lot of what comes out of the Diamond Projects? Not from what I've seen of the early attempts at the latter or have read elsewhere on this Board.

On the San Francisco Ballet's website, Nancy Goldner's program notes on the six Balanchine works that comprise SFB's Balanchine Celebration are posted: Serenade, Four Temperaments, Apollo: Program 5 Notes Square Dance, Stravinsky Violin Concerto, Who Cares? Program 6 Notes In the Program 6 Notes there are quotes from living originators of the roles. Notable are Bart Cook's description of working with Balanchine on the new "Sarabande" solo in Square Dance and short comments by Martins (Stravinsky Violin Concerto) and McBride and von Aroldingen ("Who Cares?).

The issue with Divertimento #15 is that the applause comes between variations and between the pas de deux, in the middle of the movements. There aren't as many points during the movements of Symphony in C that call for spontaneous applause. Francia Russell in a post-performance Q&A noted Balanchine's request about Divertimento, but did say that the dancers live to hear the applause for their variations. The dancers must have been disappointed with the crowds after opening night was attended by Dance Theater of Harlem, which gave rousing ovations after each one. Goldberg would be impossibly long if people clapped between movements. With two themes and 32 variations, the audience would get "applause fatigue" fairly soon into the performance, and the dancers might have trouble hearing the piano for their next entrances, as well as being demoralized by the fall-off.

I'm not sure who leaked it, but it sounded from comments that Russell and Stowell made in post-performance Q&A's that they had made the decision a while ago, and it was kept secret for a time. The timing of the leak put it squarely in the middle of PNB's Balanchine Celebration, one of Russell's and the company's greater achievements. Neither Russell nor Stowell sounded happy or relieved about the leak or the attention focused on them, instead of on the Company and the program. It's too bad that it distracted Russell from the Serenade staging. The White Nights program sounded wonderful nonetheless, and I wish I had been able to see it. It sounds like Christopher Stowell is making quite a splash with OBT.

Casting is up for The Romantics program: Delicate Balance-Stowell/Chopin: Thu, 18 Mar Sat, 20 Mar (eve) Sun, 21 Mar (eve) Nadeau, Stanton, Barker, Milov, Thomas, Yin, Imler Fri, 19 Mar Sat, 20 Mar (mat) Sun, 21 Mar (mat) Nakamura, Maraval, Vinson, Herd, Eames, Pacitti, Lallone Dual Lish-Stowell/Bolcom (World Premiere) Thu, 18 Mar Fri, 19 Mar Sat, 20 Mar (eve) Sun, 21 Mar (eve) Pantastico, Poretta Sat, 20 Mar (mat) Sun, 21 Mar (mat) TBA Within/Without Fonte-Pärt (World Premiere) Thu, 18 Mar Fri, 19 Mar Sat, 20 Mar (eve) Sun, 21 Mar (eve) Bold, Herd, Porretta, Gorboulev, Ade, Pacitti, Dickson, Foster, Lallone, Wevers, Barker, Vinson, Stanton, Gibson Sat, 20 Mar (mat) Sun, 21 Mar (mat) Bold, Cruz, Vassiliev,Gaines, Spell, Postlewaite, Lowenberg, Chapman, Lallone, Wevers, Eames, Foster, Pacitti, Yin Roses Taylor/Wagner, Baermann Thu, 18 Mar Imler, Maraval, Dickson, Bold, Eames, Ade, Kitchens, Grant, Foster, Porretta, Pantastico, Gaines Fri, 19 Mar Imler, Maraval, Skinner, Herd, Vinson, Postlewaite, Lowenberg, Gorboulev, Ostergren, Cruz, Thomas, Spell Sat, 20 Mar (mat) Nadeau, Gibson, Skinner, Herd, Vinson, Postlewaite, Lowenberg, Gorboulev, Foster, Porretta, Thomas, Spell Sat, 20 Mar (eve) Lallone, Wevers, Dickson, Bold, Eames, Ade, Kitchens, Grant, Ostergren, Cruz, Pantastico, Gaines Sun, 21 Mar (mat) Lallone, Wevers, Dickson, Bold, Eames, Ade, Kitchens, Grant, Foster, Porretta, Pantastico, Gaines Sun, 21 Mar (eve) Nadeau, Gibson, Skinner, Herd, Vinson, Postlewaite, Lowenberg, Gorboulev, Ostergren, Cruz, Thomas, Spell

I think it will be interesting to see what Mark Morris does with the score in his upcoming full-length version for San Francisco Ballet.

It's also available on VHS as part of The Balanchine Library, along with The Steadfast Tin Soldier and Tchaikovsky Pas de Deux with Patricia McBride and Mikhail Baryshnikov, and Elegie (1st movement of Tchaikovsky Suite No. 3 with Karin von Aroldingen and Sean Lavery.

Maria Calegari has a head of gorgeous red hair.

Jane Eaglen, who is a very heavy woman, recently saved Seattle Opera's production of Ariadne auf Naxos by cancelling her vacation and replacing Mary Jane Wray at the very last minute. (This was after headliner Angelika Kirchschlager, the original Composer, cancelled, citing exhaustion.) She learned the German text, which she had never sung before, over a long weekend. During the broadcast of the opera last Saturday night, General Director Speight Jenkins raved about the maroon/red dress she wore as Ariadne, which sounded like they made for her from scratch. I can't imagine Jenkins ever hiring a production team that would sacrifice a voice like Eaglen's for a little black dress; the big red one was just fine, and she sounded like a dream. I was lucky to hear the broadcast, because she swapped this Saturday's performance with "Silver" cast Ariadne, Monique McDonald for last Sunday's matinee, so that she could get to her "Ring" rehearsals at the Met. That made two Ariadne's in less than 24 hours. I'd cast her in any role she wanted to sing, after what she did for Seattle Opera these past two weeks.

Boal would be on my list. I'm not sure how many others would agree, but so is Bart Cook. When he was on stage, I couldn't keep my eyes off of him, regardless of with whom he was sharing it.

I was rather offended that they brought the Petrovsky character down so low to justify why Carrie chose Big, when the obvious reason is that they have the same level of superficiality and the maturity of a pair of 16-year-olds. On the way to Cape Fear, Petrovsky had to pass through Jeroen Krabbe's chracter in Crossing Delancey. Could he have been any more manipulative and passive-aggressive, at least in a 30-minute comedy? I think it's ironic, though, that Baryshnikov's character turned out to be an older version of the cad-about-town that he portrayed in his early dance movies, Turning Point and Dancers. The character could have had so much more stature in exposing Carrie to a bigger world without being condescending to her and her friends. Or to her city, which she vowed in the Fleet Week episode, she would never let anyone bad mouth. BTW, there was a news item on IMDB.com under "Celebrity News" for 9 March 04 that It goes on to say that the series will be watered down for general syndication. (I wonder what will be left of the earlier episodes.)

I usually love Altman films; I think Nashville among the greatest films I've ever seen. I finally saw The Company and found it dull. I think the soap-operaesque things -- ex: the ridiculous, drunk of a stage mother, the bathtub, the bland but cute boyfriend, Campbell's and Franco's actoriness, the silly storm -- countered the slice of life sharpness, quirkiness, and irony that works so well many of Altman's other films. Between the mostly appallingly bad choreography, the tediousness of Antonelli's ego and self-performance "art," and the "I am an artiste"-ness of Desrosier's character, I wondered why these superb dancers woke up in the morning. Only Lar Lubovitch's character showed a combination of calmness and professionalism. No wonder dancers liked working for Balanchine, even before he became Balanchine. Campbell was in wonderful shape, and she certainly showed dedication for many months to try to appear believable. What wasn't was the inflexibility of her back and the squareness of her upper body. What was believable was, in a small company, having a young, imperfect dancer be one of the few healthy ones available as an understudy, and stepping in because she was such a quick learner who remembered and absorbed what she learned. Because Campbell was injured and left ballet in her mid-teens, she wouldn't have had a lot of experience with partnering to fall back on. Despite this, I thought she was credible in the partnering; regardless of how good her partners were, without her active participation, she would have looked like a sack of flour. There were a few things that I really liked about The Company, though: as mentioned before, I thought the performances of the ballet masters, Mark Goldweber and Chartel Arthur, were wonderfully sincere in quite opposite ways, contrasting his apprehension and her wryness. Apart from the crotch shots, I liked the ways that a lot of the dance shots were filmed, both overhead and straight on, mostly because it emphasized what good, strong partners the Joffrey men are in this choreography. I also loved the dancer with the beard who had a scene with McDowell; what a wonderful face and brow he had. For me the film gave only a glimpse into two things I find most fascinating about watching dancers work: figuring out the technical aspects of the choreography -- how to lock the arm during a partnership move, where to place the body on the swing to be able to perform the cartwheel move -- and watching the rehearsal turn into actual performance.

I don't think anyone has claimed that no former dancers coach at NYCB. However, most of the living dancers for whom Balanchine choreographed, re-staged, and re-choregraphed his greatest ballets are not coaching there now.

I loved how in Elusive Muse Farrell told the exhausted and self-critical Paris Opera Ballet dancer she was coaching in Tzigane that there were many things about her performance that Farrell would have "stolen" had she still been dancing. It's no wonder that Farrell can take second-rank dancers and coach them to first-rate performances. (My sieve of a brain has forgotten the name of the dancer, and Google isn't helping.)

Momentarily off topic, I saw three operas, and there were magnificent performances in all three: Cynthia Lawrence's nuanced Tosca was the best I've heard: every phrase -- words and music -- was imbued with meaning; Dmitri Hvorostovky's rendition of Prince Yeletsky's aria in Queen of Spades was soft, seamless, and achingly sad; and Renee Fleming sang a rich and unique Violetta -- it was like seeing the character through a prism. Ramon Vargas has a wonderful voice and easy technique: his voice bloomed in Alfredo's music; in contrast to Fleming, his interpretation sounded very traditional, which worked dramatically. Samuel Ramey was quite the Scarpia, with his combination of menace and lust and that powerful bass voice. It was a great weekend packed with music and dance.

(Sorry to have taken so long to respond to a good fight -- the friend I stayed with is last week is "cookie-phobic," and I couldn't sign in until I got home.) My comment about length was in response to your comment about how unlikely it would be for an American company to fund a intellectually and emotionally challenging piece. My point is that there are Balanchine (and Tudor) works that reflect emotionally and intellectually charged messages -- including madness, repression, the viciousness of family dynamics -- and are staged across America, at a much shorter length (and lower cost). Dance, on the whole, has a smaller palate to work from than music, by virtue of being performed on a large stage. The pianissimo of a single instrument can be heard clearly in the back row of Carnegie Hall and the Metropolitan Opera; small movement that might reflect the music cannot. There are entire parts of Mahler's 9th Symphony -- slow, structural development, extremely soft dynamics -- that come across as dead in a dance piece. From what I've seen of Neumeier's older choreography to Mahler, I would say that his choreography doesn't come close to matching the emotional and intellectual challenges of Mahler's music, regardless of his subject.

I was visiting NYC, mainly to see the opera, and when I looked at the cast list for the only performance for which I had time (Sat, 28 Feb matinee), I almost passed. I don't boycott Borree automatically like Gottlieb does -- I save that for my least favorite Pacific Northwest Ballet ballerina -- but I wasn't jumping for joy, like I would have had Bouder been cast. However the pull of the score and the opportunity to see some of the young 'uns that the NYCB crowd has been describing all season were irresistable, and I did something uncharacteristic for a Seattle dweller: I shut myself inside a dark theater on a beautiful, sunny day. Borree played a young Aurora, a little boy crazy among the handsome riches of the suitors. In the Vision Scene, I thought she portrayed the Aurora as she would have been when she awoke. (At least the Prince knew what he was getting!) Although they were rather small-scaled, I liked each of Borree's solos. Hubbe's partnering looked expert and sensitive to me, but she seemed diminished in the pas de deux. I like the structure of the Rose Adagio, because I don't think Aurora's "coming out" party is all about young spontenaiety; the interactions with the suitors and the technical difficulty are, to me, the equivalent of the bows that debutantes practice for months on end, before the ball starts. There is a social obligation to perform as Princess, even if she is the center of attention at her debut. But I find it painful to watch dancers try not to fail in the part, because, as I was dismayed to read about Bouder's fall off pointe, it's a zero sum game, like the rest of the performance doesn't count if there's a bobble. Borree acquitted herself in the Rose Adagio, but I was glad when it was over, and not because she was the one dancing it. I had forgotten how visually stunning the costumes were, and I've always liked the transitional slides on the front scrim. The Garland Dance is a dream of ever-expanding invention; it feels perpetual, like a double helix, and it was performed beautifully, even at the end of a looooong season. I was in the last row of theater, and Hubbe's and Reichlen's mime carried to the back of the house clearly, without fuss. Ashley was a towering Carabosse, yet the unperturbable Reichlen swept her menace away with a gentle, but firm sweep. This reminded me of an example in the book Emotional Intelligence, where Bill Gates was throwing a tantrum in a meeting, and the only one who could get him to stop was a young woman who refused to be bullied, looked him in the eye, and quietly stated her case. Likewise, Carabosse's volcanic tantrum was disspelled by the quietness and merciful reason of Reichlen's Lilac Fairy. After that, she didn't even have to dance, but when she did, she was lovely, with long, articulate legs. The fairies variations are taken with such breakneck speed, and they practically push each other out the door in succession, with not a moment to breathe in what they've just offered. Dana Hanson ended her variation with an attitude pirouette to her knee that looked like she had landed on a cloud. The rest was so fast that I felt like I had just gotten a glance at Glenn Keenan and Rachel Rutherford, whom I loved as Calliope at the beginning of the season. The jewels section also went over my head, as it always has. I never had a good sense of Ruby and Emerald, and at rapid pace, I didn't "get" either Madradjieff's Ruby or Edge's Emerald. Riggins was very crisp as Diamond, which is the only variation that, to me, reflects its name; especially impressive were the sparkling jetes into perfect arabesque plie landings. Sterling Hyltin was delightful as Puss in Boots, with her clear, incisive leg work and impeccable comic timing. Isabella DeVivo was a big presence of Little Red Riding Hood; I suspect that the Wolf didn't know what hit him once he got her home and she took over his house. I thought Megan Fairchild was spectacular as Process Florine; I thought it the most defined and full performance of the afternoon, aside from Hubbe's. This was the first time I've seen the Bluebird pas de deux where it was not at all about Bluebird. When Fairchild danced with DeLuz, I didn't pay attention to him at all. When he was dancing, I was waiting for her. Even though he didn't show the starry flash that others have described in earlier performances, he was just plain sloppy: after each wonderful high brise in the opening sequence, he let his back leg collapse, and he had to regroup after all of the big effects. I didn't see any phrasing in his dancing, just photo highlights. I know that matinees are full of children, and that quiet can't be expected, but it's the parents I'm concerned about. There were times during this performance that I thought I was at the circus. We had the very tall man who got up to stretch from the cramped seats during the orchestral interludes, the full out conversations whenever there wasn't dancing onstage, and complete picnic lunches consumed during the performance, and not just to keep the kids happy. The final score was: Shushers: 2; Coughers 175; Candy/Danish/Peanut-butter Sandwich/Danish/Juice unwrappers: 0000005 (the odometer turned over).

I saw Tchaikovsky's opera Queen of Spades for the first time last week, and found out that it is the source of the "masque" music in the first act of The Nutcracker; according to Kobbe's opera book, the "Mozartean" flavor of the music was deliberate. In the opera the heroine Liza, betrothed to Prince Yeletsky, is in love with and is loved by Ghermann (at least in Act I). The music used by Stowell for the Nutcracker/Mouse King/Pirlipat masque appears in Act II, as a pastoral performed at a ball in honor of the Empress. In this piece of light party entertainment the heroine is betrothed to silly, pompous rich man, but true love wins the day and she ends up with the young, romantic, poor hero. In the opera it provides a marked contrast to the wretched triangle of Liza/Ghermann/Yeletsky. In this context Stowell's use of the music in The Nutcracker parallels Tchaikovsky's use of it in the opera; and although the consequences aren't as tragic in the ballet, it is a wonderful way to foreshadow the relationship between Marie/Prince/Pasha in Act II. It does that without knowing the source, but knowing it gives the piece added piquancy.