Helene

We'll have to agree to disagree on this one. Exhibit 1 is hip hop, both music and the exquisite specialized dance forms. And hip hop artists didn't need a Renaissance court to birth the art form. Opera was once a popular art form and considered just as accessible as hip hop, but that doesn't make either of them any less complex. I don't accept this "either/or" argument as relevant. People have been reinterpreting Shakespeare's plays -- and abridging them, changing the endings, adding in pieces that were current and popular or specific to the performer, etc. -- for hundreds of years. I don't see a compelling reason to stop or to stop interpreting "Giselle."

I didn't realize you added your translation to your original post. Thank you so much for it. Unfortunately, what she writes does not make anymore sense to me than it did through Google translate. First she makes the analogy between this year's graduates and the graduates from three years ago, where the two graduation performance Nikiyas went to the Bolshoi and Nemirovich-Danchenko Theatre. They were offered corps contracts, but, at the same time, management didn't make an effort to hire them in the first place, which sounds like a contradiction. If so many graduates are languishing in the corps, I can only conclude that most top graduates start in the corps; please let me know if this is wrong, as the Mariinsky website gives only a join date and for Principals, the date of promotion to Principal. Is the "trial period" unusual for an entering corps member, who is almost always (if not always) a Vaganova graduate? Is it insulting because she's being treated like the other graduating members of her class, or were these special terms that applied to her? This is not clear. As Zozulina said about the earlier class stars, "One may think, of course, that the girls were unable to resist the temptation of dancing in the capital city. Not so: they simply chose what looked as a superior path of developing their careers, sensing the interest expressed by the art directors of the respective troupes, and the lack of that interest displayed by the management of Mariinsky Ballet, in person of its acting director Yuri Fateev." That means that other companies made them better offers, something that the ballet equivalents of the University of Michigan -- the Mikhailovsky or the Stanislavski -- do on a regular basis to attract students who would normally head for Harvard. (The proper analogy for the Bolshoi would be Yale, which has its own advantages over Harvard and needs to offer no explanation when chosen over Harvard.) They compete for those dancers, whether through opportunity to advance quickly and dance better roles earlier, or through a management that recognizes them -- much to the chagrin of dancers already in the company who will lose opportunities to those being recruited, especially those at the Bolshoi who might expect that their competition comes from their academy, and they know the lay of the landscape -- just as the University of Michigan is more attractive to a student who might not want to leave the university with six-figure debt. It's up to the dancers to decide whether to slog through the levels at the Mariinsky, because there are no guarantees that every top graduate who enters will rise through the ranks or get the great roles under the most competent of AD's, just as it's up to dancers at Paris Opera Ballet to subject themselves to the promotion tests, with intense competition and years where there aren't any spots. If they feel that going anywhere else is failure, then they stay in a frustrating situation. If they don't, they go to ABT like Part or SFB like Froustey. They obviously do get offers from "lesser" companies, because they are going to them. As Bob Dylan sang, "The Times, They Are A-Changin'." Dancers who don't fit the mold that the Artistic Director is looking for or just aren't what the company needs at the time can remain in the corps of the company they consider worthy, or they can look at the "lesser" companies or, in the case of the Bolshoi, a different Ivy, as an opportunity. If the Bolshoi had to pay the Mariinsky (or the Vaganova Academy) for Zhiganshina's training when they hired her, it would make sense that if Fateev wasn't interested in her, he'd want her featured prominently with the company -- like baseball teams bring up minor league players as trade bait -- either to get money or another dancer-to-be-named-later, but it makes little sense to me otherwise. Fateev could have buried her rather than give her those opportunities. (He couldn't hide her from the graduation performance.) If he's so uniformly incompetent, why would she have had those roles with the main company? It's also hard to imagine Academy head Tsiskaridze encouraging Zhiganshina to join the Bolshoi, if he thought Filin would be in charge of the company. The Mariinsky Ballet is the Mariinsky Theatre's cash cow. The Kirov Opera, even before the breakup of the Soviet Union, when the theater's singers could freelance and earn hard currency instead of slaving in a rep company in turmoil, was not as great as the Kirov Ballet. The opera suffered long under the thumb of the ballet. With Gergiev in charge, the tables have turned. It's unfortunate that rather than simply raising the level of the opera while funding it with receipts from the ballet, he's hired someone who seems to be bringing down the ballet. The Mariinsky Ballet is like a big oil tanker, though: since the bulk of the company is so good, and the school keeps pumping out great dancers, it's much easier to change artistic directors than to build it. The Mariinsky was in a much worse situation when the Academy through a doldrums period. If the top graduates are either leaving or wallowing in limbo once they reach the company, the pattern is that Fateev is looking for something that the Academy isn't providing. In those graduation clips, Zhiganshina looks much more like a Bolshoi dancer than a Mariinsky dancer. I think she's landed where she belongs.

Unless an official source mentioned a potential tour, it would not be allowed here. Official sources don't always have all of the details up front, and plans have been known to change, most notably in that Lotto known as casting, but as more news and changes are announced, they are generally posted here, especially regarding NY companies, tours to the US, and US companies touring abroad.

Please provide the official source for the terms of the offer. If she was offered a starting position like many other Mariinsky grads, then "humilating" is an opinion. It also does not make sense that in Russia she would have received no other offers, if other dancers in the last few years have been offered and have accepted positions at the Mikhailovsky, for example. If the Mariinsky did not make Zhiganshina an offer as good as the Bolshoi did and/or she looked at the preferences, casting policy, and career development approach of the AD, the political landscape, and/or the upcoming closure of the old theater and decided to go elsewhere, she'd be making the same choice that graduates of elite schools worldwide make when they juggle offers. Most are at the schools with the dream of joining the parent company. Others and those who decide the trade-offs make something else more attractive go elsewhere.

"After All" is a beautiful piece. Two of the most prolific, influential, and eminent skating choreographers, Sarah Kawahara and Lori Nichol skated with Curry. Ballet dancer/skaters like Foulkes performed with him, and aside from the guests like Hamill, the company members took on the challenge of performing elements in both directions and skating to an exacting standard. Diana Adams', Margot Fonteyn's,and Yuri Soloviev's dancing looks like it's from another era, but like Curry's skating, displays the best virtues of their respective disciplines. According to the linked article, the book uses his letters as a source and/or quotes them, and these are newly released. The arc of the story was scattered among sources available for those who cared enough to follow, with much reading between the lines. I'm interest in seeing how they were used and, hopefully, in hearing his own voice in them.

Is that different from Norman Maen's "Faun"? I realize this is from the Daily Maul, but I'm not sure what the quality will be: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2706296/Why-Britain-s-skating-golden-boy-died-lonely-bitter-broke-John-Curry-captivated-world-But-new-biography-reveals-bullying-father-wicked-taunts-sexuality-scarred-life.html

Former Principal Dancer of SFB and Artistic Director of OBT Christopher Stowell has been appointed Assistant to the Artistic Director, Helgi Tomasson, and Ballet Master. Here's a link to the press release: http://www.sfballet.org/about/media_center/press_releases/Chris_Stowell Congratulations to Stowell and SFB

I'm not understanding your point, because dance, sculpture, painting, and music weren't revolutionary inventions of the Renaissance courts, either. Opera wasn't invented in the Renaissance, nor was the orchestra, as many other cultures like Indonesia, China, Japan, and India, for example, had similar forms hundred of years before opera was taken up by Europeans. A look at classical Indian dance forms shows that the French didn't invent turnout, and they certainly didn't invent court dances. People painted on many media, including portable media, long before they painted on canvas.

There haven't been many new masterpieces in ballet or any other art form because art no longer has the patronage of Renaissance courts and their coffers. Bournonville, Coralli and Perrot, and Petipa choreographed most of their major works a couple of centuries after the Renaissance ended. I'm sure Balanchine and Ashton would have been surprised to learn they could full-length and/or story-based create masterworks without Renaissance courts or royal patronage. I'm sure composers like Beethoven, Stravinsky, Shostakovitch, Verdi, Ives, Ravel, etc. and Van Gogh, Whistler, and Picasso... "Like" in itself means that at worst, the people running theaters perform what the leader likes and casts to the leader's taste. However, it's a different story when a political leader reads social and political import into works, whether or not this reflects reality. If a leader says that a character reflects values that a nation should strive to emulate, for example, or equates a slave revolution to his or her own people's current situation, that's important information to know. I think it's silly to not see a work simply because it appeals to someone I don't like. That is by no means a consensus opinion. Some critics have argued strongly that a limited number of characters in Wagner's operas, most notable Klingsor, Alberich, Beckmesser, and, occasionally, perhaps by family relationships, Mime, are anti-Semitic characters, but the majority do not. For example, Wotan and Alberich are referred to as "Dark" and "Light" Alberich, Wotan is far from a perfect character, Alberich says to him outright, "I know who I am and act accordingly, but you are a master of self-delusion" -- a point Fricka slays him on in their famous argument in "Die Walkure." Wagner may have hated Hanslick and made him the model for Beckmesser, but that was a very specific hatchet job. Also Sachs' big monologue at the end pf "Die Meistersinger" about great German art was something that Wagner had second and third thoughts about leaving in, and he caved to pressure to do so. Even he understood on some level that it didn't fit, and Jews wouldn't have been the only targets of that monologue. Mime's guilt-throwing passive-aggressive nature could be a caricature of many ethnic mothers. ("I gave my limb for you.") I don't know enough about the theology behind "Parsifal" to follow the Klingsor arguments. Wagner had two male character that I can think of who are remotely heroic: Hans Sachs and Siegmund. Most of his characters carry the weight of their flaws -- or, if they are female, often their powerlessness -- and behave like people laden with emotional baggage. Wagner was an anti-Semite and wrote vile, anti-Semitic screeds. That doesn't mean that this filtered down into his operas.

"Spartacus" is so over-the-top and so far on its way to parody that while the Trocks would dance it spectacularly, the only way they could send it up would be to do a 180 and turn it into "La Sylphide."

Happy Birthday, Jacques d'Amboise!

Laura Cappelle tweeted: And:

Tenor Carlo Bergonzi has died, just past his 90th birthday: http://www.operanews.com/Opera_News_Magazine/2014/7/News/Bergonzi.html NPR did a tribute to him for his 90th birthday: http://www.npr.org/blogs/deceptivecadence/2014/07/11/330406372/a-voice-of-velvet-and-bronze-carlo-bergonzi-at-90 Tributes are flowing in on Twitter from singers and pther music professionals and fans, some posting links to their favorite recordings. Here is one from Elizabeth Caballero: https://twitter.com/LizCaballero/status/493073477935824896

With July 31 looming, Gelb has threatened a lockout: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/24/arts/music/met-opera-prepares-to-lock-out-workers.html?smid=fb-share&_r=0

She may or may not ever be able to dance full-time again, but she said she was looking for a company with a less strenuous schedule -- like Weese, Korbes, and Orza did when they came to Seattle -- which she also said was something that Martins' "no" allowed her to consider mentally. Psychologically, it's not that unusual for people to have a fixed and focused goal when overcoming a life- or career-threatening illness or injury, and a return to NYCB maybe have been a single-minded way of getting through the worst. Being a college student with the kind of fatigue she was suffering is not a recipe for learning well. She has been dancing locally, and that's a continued option if a full-time company does not take a risk on her. She has plenty of time for college and/or re-training.

She didnt' say that Martins owed her anything: she said that Martins told her to contact her if she could return. Had he not said anything to encourage her to contact him, I don't think she would have had an issue with the email. In fact, she defends him twice, by saying that it wasn't he, but the board, who wanted her out, never to return. The disease manifests itself in many ways. For many, it takes a long while to address. She was not one of the lucky ones who get the answer quickly. I don't remember he saying that she was having trouble getting hired. It sounded like she has just come up with a plan for which companies to contact, after Martins sent his email.

Corella didn't simply say he was planning to use the current roster: he said "but there are a lot of dancers who have been overlooked." Those are fighting words, not a nice PC statement. In fact, it's what every new AD does if he or she is not simply dismissing the dancers, like Duato did the ballet people in Spain -- ie reviewing the roster and deciding whom among them is appealing, appropriate for his or her rep choices, etc. It's just rare when they come out and say it.

The article in the Inquirer has relevant information: I would guess that more than ABT dancers have approached him. He has a wide network. Well, it would only matter if fewer Balanchine works were presented in the future. Also from the article. there is at least one arts person who disagrees, but the key thing is that Corella doesn't: I assume Corella mostly means mixed bill programs, but that would be three times more than is planned for the upcoming season, where there are "Nutcracker" and "Prodigal Son" on the schedule, which also includes a Weiss/Ratmansky, an all-Robbins and a Forsythe/Fonte programs. This is not a lot of Balanchine, but for the previous five season there were three or four Balanchine Ballets in the rep. In 2009-10 they did three: "4T's", "Theme,"and "T&V". In 2010-11 they did "Concerto Barocco," "Agon," and "Who Cares?," the latter two in a "Building on Balanchine" program. In 2011-12 they did "Raymonda Variations" and "Slaughter" in the season opener and "Square Dance" in the closer. In 2012-13 they brought "Square Dance" to Princeton and performed "A Midsummer Night's Dream," Ballo della Regina," and "Stravinsky Violin Concerto." PA Ballet's contribution to "Ballet Across America" in 2013 was "4T's". (Boston Ballet brought "Symphony in Three Movements." I'm still rolling my eyes that PNB brought "Jardi Tancat" the year they were invited.) Last season they did "Jewels," "Serenade," and "Stravinsky Violin Concerto." It's not a if Corella is coming from the Mariinsky: he danced Balanchine, even if he wasn't a Balanchine specialist. I think the question is more what Corella's appointment will mean for the Weiss works still in the rep and Matthew Neenan.

There are three choices at the bottom of the TV block, and it seems to default to "Flash." For some reason that didn't work for me, even though my PC tablet has flash. When I changed to "Silverlight," it worked (Windows 8.1). There's also an option for iPhone/iPad/iPod, none of which I have.

State Academic Opera and Ballet Theater of Armenia production of "Gayaneh" is being streamed now from the Mariinsky Theatre: http://mariinsky.tv/n/e More info, including plot synopsis: http://www.mariinsky.ru/en/playbill/playbill/2014/7/23/1_1930/

There were never great talents at the Mariinsky, Paris Opera Ballet, or Bolshoi who were pushed aside because of who was running the company, or, during Soviet Times, to which generals the others were married? As great as Bessmertnova was, there weren't ever any dancers pushed aside because she was Grigorovich's wife? In Petipa's time, there were no formerly prominent dancers who languished because of the changes he made, the dancers who came from outside Russia, and the style and virtues he emphasized? When the Royal Ballet dismantled the Ashton legacy and replaced it with Macmillan's aesthetic while the School was still producing dancers honed for Ashton's work, were there no prominent and respected dancers who represented the legacy, but were set aside as the company went in another direction? Lifar, who learned at the knee of Diaghilev, never had favorites at the expense of established dancers? Even before the breakup of the Soviet Union, where there was economic upheaval and reinvention, the standard brakes that institutions have on change failed, and the company decided to look outward for its aesthetic, there were the years leading to Vaganova's taking over the company and a shift in the company's aesthetic, based on the demands of the then-current choreographers. The pressure to change came from within rather than the West, but it was still great, and aesthetic changes push noted artists to the side, for better or worse.