Helene

It's funny: if you asked me in the '80's or early '90's for a list of my favorite NYCB dancers, I would not have had Stephanie Saland on my list. Until the day I realized that except for "Episodes," I can't say that I saw anyone surpass her in any of the roles I saw her dance. Equal, yes, but surpass, no. I didn't see her in some of the early experiments -- Arlene Croce said Balanchine cast her in "Square Dance" -- but I did see her a lot when she was still a Soloist and was cast prominently, like Joseph Duell and Maria Calegari, at Saturday matinees. I haven't seen a lot of Reichlen, but I remember being impressed with her Lilac Fairy. Carabosse was going on and on and on, and she stood there, still, until she gave that little bow that cleared away the fire and dust, and I loved her Titania when I saw it in 2009.

Plenty of dancers have issues with simple steps over the course of their career. It's hardly rare.

I've seen weak dancers in my decades of ballet-going and dancers that I didn't like, but I've never seen a soloist or higher in a major company who has not pushed out retirement that fits kaskait's description, let alone Copeland, whom I've seen dance. There are many great dancers with hyperextended knees. PNB's Patricia Barker described in a lec-demo how this made it difficult for her partners to balance her on pointe, especially in supported pirouettes.

That must warm the hearts of his American dancers

I would have guessed that the Hyltin/la Cour heights would be similar to the Mazzo/Martins, but I've only seen Hyltin and la Cour separately.

As mentioned in other threads, five dancers central to Arizona's last decade (at least) are leaving the Company at the end of this season: Paola Hartley, Astrit Zejnati, Tsu-Chia Huang, Ilir Shtylla, and Michele Mahowald Vagi. There was a very nice article about Hartley and Zejnati in the "Arizona Republic": http://www.azcentral.com/story/entertainment/arts/2015/05/08/ballet-arizona-stars-paola-hartley-astrit-zenjati-take-final-bows/70905868/ Both are confirmed as retiring. Zejnati

In her review of the International Ballet Festival Dance Open from St. Petersburg, Margaret Willis wrote: There's a great photo of him by Stas Levshin in the review. When Cuban National Ballet came to Vancouver, I saw him dance a spectacular Basilio, all big, plush movement. He's now dancing with Norwegian National Ballet. His last name was spelled "Gounod" in the program.

There is a very detailed description of "The Taming of the Shrew" in Margaret Willis' review of this year's International Ballet Festival Dance Open: http://dancetabs.com/2015/05/international-ballet-festival-2015-dance-open-and-tsiskaridze-at-the-vaganova-academy-st-petersburg/

I agree with abatt: aside for rare family performances where the educational part is there to speak to kids, I think these presentations should be optional. There are plenty of companies that do pre-performance presentations.

I know dancers are supposed to be professionals and cope with everything that happens in live theater, but what a shame to have a prop mishap in a debut, when there are so many things to think about and get right. I hope he has better luck with the next one, now that he has experienced it on stage.

Is this a new role for Catazaro?

Cumberbatch might have been brilliant in the material he was given, but the material he was given was hardly so. I loved his performance and enjoyed the movie as a formula, but I had to treat it like a fictional account to do so. (Like in "The Hunt for Red October," there was plenty of male eye candy here.) There's a big difference between robbing a book, when the original source is still there, and misrepresenting a real person and making it into a sob story, when what happened to him was morally reprehensible and deserved more than a placard at the end. Hollywood has little faith in the dramatic appeal of real, but more subtle and incremental, progress that doesn't lend itself to the standard soundtracks. But I knew that going in and took it as a "based on a true story" movie.

Part is scheduled to dance Myrtha in the last "Giselle" before "Sleeping Beauty"'s first three performances and then again the following Thursday, as Nikiya.

The Mikhailovsky Theatre tweeted: There's a photo in the tweet.

After PNB posted this photo today: https://www.facebook.com/PNBallet/photos/a.439537898951.224264.21358443951/10152986006418952/?type=1&theater I sat scratching my head, trying to figure out why PNB would care about Super Bowl XXXI, until one of my favorite stores in Seattle, Math 'n Stuff, sent out an email saying it was Star Wars Day.

[Admin note: kaskait's original post was deleted accidentally. To quote, please start with "kaskait wrote" and copy and pasted from this post.] It was clearly a fling. However, the point is not whether the relationship between Seymour and Martins was serious, any more than the point was that Tharp's whatever-she-had with Baryshnikov was serious. The point is as long as sex and/or the relationship was portrayed in a positive light, especially when the man shows sexual prowess, few feel the need for an apology for disclosing intimate details.

I smugly assumed that if I looked at the numbers, they would show that ABT should be tarred and feathered. Imagine how surprised I was to find that the stats for San Francisco Ballet home-grown -- started at SFB and rose through the ranks, without regard for school training -- Principal Dancers are dire: 9-hired directly 7-hired as Soloists, and all but Sarah van Patten promoted to Principal within 0-3 years. (It took van Patten five years). Six were hired from other companies; Yuan Yuan Tan went straight from school and competitions to a soloist position. 2-hired into the corps. It took Frances Chung eight years to rise through the ranks and Vanessa Zahorian, 17. 1-hired as an apprentice. Jaime Garcia Castillo rose to Principal in seven years. Total: 19. 3/19 can be considered homegrown (16%) ABT, without guest principals 3-hired directly 4-hired as Soloist from other companies. Two promoted within a year. It took Simkin four and Part seven. 5-hired into the corps, from 1986-1997. They went through the ranks in four (Herrera)-seven (Kent) years. 4-hired from the Studio Company from 2000-2005. They went through the ranks in six (Hallberg)-nine seasons (Boylston) Total: 16. 9/16, not counting guest artists, can be considered "home-grown" (56.25%) Trying to quantify Principal casting, based on the roles listed on the website calendar, as of today: Mixed Bills (Total: 66, after factoring-22): 45-ABT Principals 15-ABT Soloists 6-ABT Corps Otello (20): 14-ABT Principals 4-ABT Soloists 2-ABT Corps Giselle (24): 16-ABT Principals 3-Guest Principals 5-ABT Soloists Sleeping Beauty -- only two leads listed (22): 18-ABT Principals 2-Guest Principals 2-ABT Soloists La Bayadere (24): 12-ABT Principals 9-Guest Principals 3-ABT Soloists Romeo and Juliet (8): 11-ABT Principals 3-ABT Soloists 2-Guest Principals Swan Lake (24): 18-ABT Principals 4-ABT Soloists 2-ABT Corps Cinderella (16): 10-ABT Principals 2-Guest Principals 4-ABT Soloists To be conservative, I'm counting the mixed bill roles to be the equivalent of 1/3 of a lead in a full length, and even though I think counting von Rothbart as a major role is questionable, that's at a least offset by the lack of listing for Lilac Fairy, for which I haven't heard of any guest artists coming in. The mixed bill roles after factoring by 1/3 total 15 ABT Principals, 5 ABT Soloists, and 2 ABT Corps. Total Roles (168): 114-ABT Principals--68% 18-Guest Principals--11% 30-ABT Soloists--18% 6-ABT Corps--4% (Due to rounding, that's 101%) For full-lengths only (146 roles): 99-ABT Principals--68% 18-Guest Principals--12% 25 ABT Soloists--17% 4-ABT Corps--3% Aside from any consideration of who gets promoted because of what roles they dance, like Nikiya vs. Gamzatti -- I have no idea how to quantify that -- if 10 guests are dancing 11% of the Principal roles, or 12% of the full-lengths, taking into consideration how few repeat performances there are in general -- ie how casting tends to another cast, rather than any dancer having three of a full-length -- that translates into, at most, three more Principal spots (or opportunities for Soloists). Even if I translate those three into ABT Principals hired directly, we still have only 6/16, or 38%, compared to 56% for San Francisco Ballet. While I understand that having full-time Principals in the Company is not the same as having guest artists, nor is the perception by their fellow dancers the same (for better or worse), I sit here astonished and ashamed that I thought ABT was the worst of the lot in terms of hiring and promoting from within. San Francisco Ballet, with i's overwhelmingly foreign-born and foreign-trained Principals who came in directly from other companies (47%), another five who joined as soloists -- soloists who came from other companies (26%) -- has no claim on America's anything. Of course, in Canada, we have "National Ballet of Canada," which feels that a yearly trip to Ottawa -- thank you Federal government! -- and an occasional foray into the sticks (aka "Western Tour"), makes the name meaningful.

And I don't think Lynn Seymour has ever been asked to apologized for her morning-after glow after her implied night with Peter Martins in her book. I'm not so sure: ABT invited her back with her husband to collaborate on the last "Sleeping Beauty." She may never be able to live *that* down. I don't either: do we even need toes to count all of Balanchine's and Robbins' sweet and/or ingenue roles created before she left NYCB, like Columbine ("Harliquinade"), "Donizetti Variations," Swanhilde, first and second movement leads in "Stars and Stripes," Ballerina doll in "Nutcracker" maybe "Tarantella" and the second lead in "Scotch Symphony"? I guess all periods in SAB and NYCB history are odd in their own way, but she was at SAB during the Farrell years and joined NYCB in 1968 in time for Balanchine's dark times. I'd always read her descriptions of Balanchine in the context of what it would have been like for a pre-teen and teen-age girl, and one of the few locals who made it from the regular to professional tracks, to be in that competitive environment and gossip mill, especially as she describes how her father contributed to her negative body image and sense of womanliness, and having an older, already sexual sister, the extent of which she could only imagine. If I were 14 and were told that the man that everyone worshiped, interviewed, and wrote books about was copping feels in exchange for kitchen appliances, I would have had no idea what to do with that, aside being creeped out. It's not about whether or not it the talk was true: it was that this was how he was being spoken and whispered about, and here she was, entering what was supposed to be the Magic Kingdom and wondering whether or not it was the House of Horrors. How would she know what to believe? The two main things I took away from that book were how unsafe she felt and how little trust she was able to have. That's a horrible place to be, especially with any conscience or sensitivity.

It's unusual for a top year-round student at SAB to want to dance elsewhere, but among the dancers who have, or have switched from NYCB to ABT, the common stated reason for those on the record is to dance the classical and full-length repertoire. It may be too soon to see if Martins' inclusion of "Swan Lake," "Romeo + Juliet," and "La Sylphide" into the rep in addition to his early "Sleeping Beauty" will make a difference to the few who think about going elsewhere, even if NYCB wants them. ETA: If I were a dancer, I would balance the lower odds of advancement with the opportunity to work with Ratmansky.

Unless a company says they "recruited" or "stole" someone, a dancer says he or she was recruited by a company, or this is reported in the mainstream media, there is no official source for this or any other personnel decision. We don't care who you are or with whom you went to ballet class or with whom you worked or whom you taught or from whom you heard -- "I heard" posts are the number one reason for posts being edited or deleted and members being put on "Moderated" status -- you are not official sources. Keep these comments off the board, as the vast majority of ballet professionals who post here do.

Hope dies last. They can look at Isabella Boylston and think that this might happen to them someday, even though the odds are longer than just about anywhere else.

SAB is also recognized as only practical way to join NYCB and a great resume-builder.

Which was not the case when Balanchine was alive, and, for better or worse, this speaks to the institution's increasing insularity. Balanchine generally hired what he needed from those who were available, and what he needed wasn't as narrowly defined as training in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Paris, or sometimes in Denmark and London, or even as narrowly defined as training under RAD or Cecchetti methods: many former Balanchine dancers have explained that there's no such thing as a Balanchine syllabus, and Balanchine famously told SAB graduates once they joined the comapny that now, he'd teach them to dance. He also hired Danilova because she was living in poverty. That didn't make her more or less of a teacher, but his reason was to help out an ex-common-law wife and friend. There can be multiple reasons for hiring, and feeling that there is a need for diversity and role models in the classroom is one, like ballet has hired men who are particularly adept at teaching young boys in Men's classes, when they might not have been considered if the classes were mixed. Particularly when a teacher's training is one more degree of separation closer to Balanchine.

From the same place that 8/15 (including school head Kay Mazzo) current SAB faculty got their training: second generation. Balanchine did very little direct instruction for SAB students even in the 60's and 70's when he was healthy; Merrill Ashley, who went to SAB after the Ford Foundation grants, describes Balanchine's infrequent visits in her book. From all of his descriptions to date, the same was true for Peter Boal, who was an apprentice primarily during Balanchine's hospitalization, and whose main experience with Balanchine was being coached in the mime role of the young Prince in "Nutcracker." Boal was one of the most influential teachers for men while he taught at SAB, but his primary experience was during the transition after Balanchine's death. The same is true for Jock Soto, who joined NYCB in 1981, and whose last years at SAB saw Balanchine in increasingly bad health; he was a Martins, Stanley Williams, and Andre Kramarevsky product, the first of Martins. Also Katrina Killian did a 1977 summer program and joined SAB full-time in 1979: it's possible that she had some brief meaningful direct contact with Balanchine, but not that likely, especially as he tended to speak in parables that could take years to understand. Arch Higgins didn't attend SAB until a 1982 summer program. Jonathan Stafford's first summer program at SAB was 1996. Doing the math from her SAB faculty bio and a WSJ article that listed her age as 42 in 2014, she would have joined the intermediate division of SAB after Balanchine's death. Yvonne Borree went to her first summer program in 1982 and not full-time until 1985, after Balanchine's death. Kaitlin Gilliland and Andrew Scordato weren't born before Balanchine died and didn't even get to shake his hand. Jimenez and a couple of generations of DTH dancers would have gotten it from Arthur Mitchell and Tanaquil Leclercq, not to mention Karel Shook, who was lauded as a master teacher, like Stanley Williams. SAB faculty was more diverse during Balanchine's years. Personal recollections other than by ballet professionals posting under their own names are not valid here. I leave this one only to respond that even if your characterization of Jimenez is "shy" and "meek," is accurate, shyness and perceived meekness does not mean a lack of conviction. Which says nothing to her point. From a recent interview in Dance Magazine with with Benjamin Millepied: In terms of frame and musculature, the POB ballerinas trained at the school (nearly all of them), are quite homogeneous, with slender thighs and classical lines to perfection, yet Millepied has issues with the movement quality of among the most beautiful dance instruments who live and breathe. From The New Yorker profile, speaking about the period after her body changed and her first major injury due to calcium deficit: She met her floor barre teacher, Marjorie Liebert, after a Pilates class, and quite obviously actively addressed what she considered body issues to the extent that she agrees with your characterization. First, the lead-in and context to the quote was "Based on numerous statements made over the past few years in both old and new media by several classical dancers of color, it's clear that fair or not, many see the folks". I leave this personal experience post here only to respond that your experience is not everyone's experience, and when ballet professionals go on the record to state their opinion otherwise, it shows this. Unless you were witness to their experience and want to argue why they are wrong or to put it in another context, you can't speak to theirs. I have listened to many dancers in Q&A's, both live and on podcasts, and interviews and read fine descriptions of Balanchine coaching sessions in which there are very varied and opposing interpretations of what Balanchine wanted, what should be emphasized, and what is important, and these opposing opinions are not reconcilable when a decision has to be made. That isn't surprising due to Balanchine's long life, the changes he made on the fly, the way he assessed different dancers and was willing to make changes (or not) based on their strengths and weaknesses, or how he decided one day to cut out major swaths of an acknowledged masterpiece, as well as the capabilities and memories of the people who pass on what Balanchine said and their own personalities and motivations. The most humble talk about what Balanchine told them they wanted, but try to elicit a dance response that is unique to that dancer. Balanchine is a brand name, and there are people who control that brand and appoint The Deciders. It's not just black ballet professionals who've taken issue with the way the official brand is going or the business it has become, especially as the people who were witness and could contradict are getting older and many are dying. In most ways, it is very smart and cost-effective: they don't have to invest in training, in-depth coaching, or internal training, they hire guests on contract and don't have to pay salary and benefits, they get to monitor and "audition" dancers based on their reception elsewhere, there is no classical competition except when companies tour to NYC, and there is seemingly no end to the number of foreign stars who are wiling to fly in for a few performances, sell tickets, and fly back to somewhere else. Russian companies are especially star-driven, with no end of great dancers in sight, and the classics are scheduled there in very short spurts, so that they are used to performing a given full-length a few times a year separated by months, and the ABT schedule is similar to their own in the patterns in which they are cast. Plus there are any number of well-trained, beautiful dancers who would be thrilled to live in NYC, have a paid contract with benefits like ABT dancers, and, however reluctantly, be the background for the stars, so they'll never run out of corps. I disagree that they think people come to see them primarily because they are an institution, except when they tour, which has been far less than in the past. They think people come to see them because there is a foreign star in front of the chorus. It will be interesting to see that if they have regular seasons in southern California whether there will be strong fan factions, but the "Nutcracker" isn't the best test of that, since more than ballet fans bring their kids and casting isn't the strongest pull: schedule during the busy holiday season is. The other exception might be tourists, like the people who get tickets to the Bolshoi when they're in Moscow, whoever is playing or singing, but then their "star" policy wouldn't make a difference to this segment. For the most part, the audiences don't care about the corps or how stylistically integrated the company is: the Baryshnikov experiment of trying to create a company style was an epic fail as far as the business end of the equation went, and they reverted to "star in front of company" like in the '70's. It seems to me that the big difference is that in the last decade, unlike the Makarova's and Fracci's, who spent the entire season with the company and were on the roster, recently the outside Principals like Bolle and Vishneva have turned into "Principal Guest Artists" in title or action, and ABT gets to market-test other outside dancers for a few performances here and there.

It's always great to hear about this company.