nysusan

Dear Megan,

Welcome back to NYCB. You will dance Theme twice in your first week.

Love,

Peter

[ Casting is up for Week 2! - Choriamb ]

Shades of Ashley Tuttle coming back to ABT from Movin Out (but I'm sure Megan will handle it better than Ashley did)!!!

Stella is one of the nominees for Dance Magazine's 2015 Reader's Choice awards. Cast your vote by 9/25:

http://dancemagazine.com/inside-dm/your-2015-readers-choice-nominees/

I think they have held back from sale most of the available orchestra seats for the Somogyi farewell. Additionally, I noticed on their website yesterday that there is a special going on for people paying with Mastercard, so some of those seats may have been blocked of from sale for that reason.

I think that they may try to play the dynamic pricing game for the Somogyi farewell.

The MC special sale ends 8/8, so if you check back on the 9th there will probably be more orchestra tickets available. They are also holding back 3rd and 4th ring seats again, for the whole season at this point. I hate playing that waiting game with them but this is what it has come to.

On the bright side, if you are a subscriber your seat prices are locked in so you don't have to worry about dynamic pricing. You also don't pay the $7.50 per ticket service charge, although you do still pay the $3 per ticket facility charge.

Monotones II is one of my favorite Ashton ballets. I love it's other worldly serenity, it's minimalism and those long, fluid phrases.

I feel like it's usually cast tall, and I'd love to see Part & Abrera alternate in the sole female role with some combination of Gomes/Stearns/Foster/ and another tall man. Mantei or Gray Davis would be interesting but unlikely casting for ABT - Whiteside or Hammoudi would be much more likely and they'll probably cast Seo in all the performances.

I also like Monotones I. I don't think its in the same league as II, but it's a good ballet and I love the two of them together. I've only seen this cast short, and ABT certainly has plenty of short dancers now to fill those roles. I can see Paris & Copeland or Brandt & Trenary or Kochetkova & Lane with Cornejo, Simkin, Gorak, Lendorf, Cirio or Scott.

Figures the one I'm most looking forward to is one of the few they haven't released casting for...

Putting Company B on fifty percent of the programs is a big negative for me. So far I have avoided purchasing any tickets to programs with that work as part of the bill. They are overloading the season with Company Bt and to a lesser extent, the Green Table. In contrast, why so few performances of Valse Fantasie and Piano Concerto.

I agree with abatt and fondoffouettes - way too much Company B & Green Table. I love them both (though I also WAY prefer Taylor's company in Company B) but I don't want to see either of them more than once in a 2 week span.

Problem is that even without casting, I want to see as many performances of Monotones as possible. So far I've bought tickets to 4 performances, which he means I'm forced to sit through multiple performances of Co B & GT.

The Gem Hotel Chelsea is a nice boutique hotel. At 22nd & 8th it's 3 blocks from the Joyce

http://www.thegemhotel.com/promotions.html

JMcN, can you tell us how long the program ran and if there was an intermission?

So I guess Company B was created for Houston Ballet, not PTDC. Interesting that it was created for ballet trained dancers. I wonder if they danced it more like ABT or the Taylor dancers.

Company B may have been made for Houston Ballet, but Taylor always creates his work on his own company, his own dancers. And then he has someone go to the commissioning company & set it on them. So even though it was commissioned by a ballet company it was created on PTDC dancers, not ballet dancers.

Oh my gosh, Monotones 1 AND 2 Thank you, thank you, thank you ABT!!!!

Although I prefer Taylor's version I wouldn't mind seeing ABT do Company B again, and I'd certainly like to see the Green Table again (especially if they give it to Foster!) but both on the same program, and with a Mark Morris piece rounding out the program? No, definitely not. I'm not any more interested in seeing ABT turn into American Modern Dance Theater in the fall than I was in seeing them turn into Hee Seo Ballet Theater at the Met.

ABT misses the dark undertones of Company B. When you see the PTDC do it you get how this is not just a perky dance with jukebox melodies. Not so much with ABT. I'd recommend seeing the PTDC do this.

I agree, ABT doesn't really perform the steps in the Paul Taylor style. How could they? Most of his dancers have studied his style for quite some time before they are taken into the company, its really not ballet. And if you read Paul Taylor's writings its clear that he doesn't consider his choreography to be ballet - he makes his dislike of ballet clear.

But, as canbelto & others have noted its not just that ABT doesn't do the steps in the Taylor style, their emphasis is totally different from his. The Simkin example from Black Tuesday & Rum & Coca Cola from Company B are good examples. Another one is Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy from Company B. When Cornejo dances it with ABT its all about how high he jumps and how fast he turns but the jitterbug foundation of Taylor's choreography for the piece doesn't come through, Cornejo looks like he has no feel for the idiom. And in ABT's version you completely miss the fact that the Bugle Boy is killed in a hail of machine gun fire at the end of his dance. Its subtle when Taylor's group does it, its nonexistent with ABT.

What about the use of soft shoes in the first act of "Swan Lake", for example. Are these dancers not doing"ballet"?

Are you talking about the national dances in the 3rd act of Swan Lake? Cause those are character dances, which are often part of a ballet (also see the Mazurka in Raymonda), but they are not ballet, they are character dances (except in the Bolshoi's version where Grigorovich puts them on point and turns them into kind of a mash up of character & ballet). Also, the Prince's Mother, Bathilde in Giselle - those are character roles, they dancers portraying them are not dancing ballet. In these two cases they aren't even dancing, they are walking & acting.

The Boston Globe is reporting that both Jeffrey Cirio and Whitney Jensen are leaving, though Jensen hasn't made public where she is heading. She would be a wonderful addition to ABT's roster - medium size, great technician, lovely presence on stage. Just sayin...

https://www.bostonglobe.com/arts/theater-dance/2015/06/30/dancers-jeffrey-cirio-whitney-jensen-leaving-boston-ballet/zBIevCnXDg1TKc6j5MXI7I/story.html

Congrats to all, especially Scott, Forster and Abrera! Copeland's promotion is already "Breaking News" on the Times:

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/01/arts/dance/misty-copeland-is-promoted-to-principal-dancer-at-american-ballet-theater.html?action=Click&contentCollection=BreakingNews&contentID=36778831&pgtype=article

I know this is blasphemy, but I really LOVED today's Boylston/Simkin Swan Lake. I thought they each individually gave performances of great technical accomplishment, great eloquence and great emotional impact. It was both beautiful and moving. And they have wonderful chemistry, I love this partnership

I think it has been a foregone conclusion for several years now that Gorak will be made principal at ABT - it's just a question of when. As long as he keeps getting new opportunities I am happy to see them let him develop without rushing him.

I am confused again. I thought Copeland was doing fouettes started to travel, fell out of one and then switched to turns from fifth. Is that the case or did she do pique turns in a circle?

You are correct. She did not do pique turns in a circle, or at all. She fell out of her fouettes and switched to turns from fifth

Posted Today, 10:18 AM

I saw the matinee and evening performances so I can't swear that it was Teuscher and not Paris but I'm pretty sure that I noticed it first at the matinee and then again in the evening performance.

The part I'm talking about is at 8:21 - 8:26 here:

I'm so glad this was taped, Xiomara was lovely and Herman and Erica were both just AMAZING.

I thought Misty's first lakeside scene was a mixed bag. There were aspects that I liked - I liked her musicality and thought her upper body was lovely, she used her arms, her back and her head and even her hands to great effect and gave us a very eloquent, passionate Odette.

The main problem for me was that I disliked the line of her legs intensely. This has never bothered me about her dancing before, but the white swan attitudes & arabesques are so iconic and it just never looked to me that either of her legs were straight. Her standing leg never looked straight, and her working leg never looked like it opened out into a full arabesque (as opposed to an attitude or bent knee arabesque). I don't know if it was because of her hyperextended knees, or bulky calves or the combination of the 2 but I thought it really diminished the beauty of those iconic white swan images.

So at this point I was giving her a B, maybe even a B+, I liked her but didn't love her in the role. Then, on to the 2nd act. As noted by others her Odile characterization was pretty one note - just a glaring angry look. I didn't find that too surprising or disappointing, I didn't expect her to have a fully realized characterization of either role at her 3rd ever performance of it. Characterization aside, her technique at the start of the Black Swan was fine and she took one beautiful, long balance. Then came the fouettes and that's where it all started to unravel.

I had heard that her fouettes were terrible, that they traveled badly to the side so when she was about 5-6 in I was pleasantly surprised. They were not the most controlled fouettes and they did travel forward & to the side but not too much and I felt they were completely within acceptable bounds. Then after 10 or 12 ( I really don't think she did 16 - maybe 16 revolutions because she did some doubles but certainly not 16 fouettes) she fell out of one and started doing those single pirouettes, which continued to veer torward and to the side.

Let me say that I do not and cannot believe that this was an "artistic choice" - this was a mess.

And I really think that excusing her by pointing to Plisteskaya and several NYCB ballerinas is off the mark. That's like comparing apples to watermelons - it is not remotely the same thing.

In Plisetskaya's case, as has been pointed out upthread - we had a major, major star ballerina who had proven her ability to knock off those fouettes many times in Don Q
and who made it known that she didn't like them in SL and wasn't going to do them. When you are one of the greatest dancer of your (or any) age you can make those kind
of artistic choices.

In the case of NYCB, they make it very clear that they do the 19th century classics "their way", which includes changing steps & tempos. According to their own website
"Peter Martins’ staging of Swan Lake infuses the preeminent story ballet with New York City Ballet’s signature musicality, speed, and sharpness of attack"

Theirs is not a version that follows Petipa/Ivanov faithfully, while it preserves most of the iconic moments there is as much Balanchine and Martins in it as Petipa/Ivanov. And Martins has gone on record publicly saying that he doesn't carewhether or not his O/Os do the fouettes.

It is one thing to skip half of the fouettes when your artistic director gives you leave to make that choice. It is a completely different story when you are dancing in a production where you are expected to do them.

Does anyone think that McKenzie has ever said to any of his ballerinas - "its ok if you can't do all the fouettes, just throw in something else"? If he had, do you think we'd see Julie Kent doing them every year, or Part or even Hee Seo? I have been going to ABT since the mid sixties. Now I did take a pretty long break from them in the 80s so I can't swear that no ABT O/O has eversimply bailed out of the fouettees but I've never seen one do it. And I've seen every dancer who has danced the role with ABT for the last 10 years. Some have struggled with them, and few actually did 32 fouettes but they gave it their best shot and got in 27 or 28. The problem was usually that they couldn't do them fast enough to get 32 in, but they did them - generally in tempo and finishing with the music. What Misty did was unprecedented at ABT, and I am just not ok with it. If she doesn't have to do the fouettes, why should any ABT ballerina have to do them?

I am officially off the Misty bandwagon. I was so disappointed that I dashed out the minute the curtain came down. I didn't see the bows so I don't know if there was any announcement of Anderson or Wilkinson, there was nothing in the program. One of my friends who watched the bows said Makarova came out and gave her a big hug. I'm guessing he mistook Anderson for Makarova!

And speaking of ABT dancers not being able to perform the steps, I could swear that the pdt variation Devon Teuscher performed usually ends with an entrechat six. What I saw her do was jump, hit her feet together once and come down.Just another in a long line of disappointments at ABT this season.

I've been informed by another (usually reliable) observer that they weren't piqués but rather fast single pirouettes from 5th.

Thank you. They didn't look like piques to me but I wasn't sure how to describe them. They certainly weren't stationary, they traveled downstage & towards house left. I was very disappointed in her choice, and in ABT's choice to allow it.

That was Hammoudi as purple VR. And in my book a soloist doesnt get to choose to substitute piques for fouettes. I have never seen that done at ABT. Never.

Looking at the overall casting for this week, I have to say I don't think I've ever been less excited about a Swan Lake week at ABT. (And I usually consider it one of the highlights of the season, despite its ubiquity.) I'm depressed about the prospects for this company.

That's why I'm spending most of this week watching the RB. There was a time when nothing would have kept me from ABT's SL week. Despite the fact that I don't like their staging, the casts they could field made most performances unmissable. Now they're mostly meh...

Among my ardent balletomanes friends I do not know one who thinks Copeland deserves promotion on the basis of her dancing.. The question is always will her promotion bring in a new audience and, if so, is that worth the trade off.

This may be true, but on the other hand I am one who thinks she deserves to be a principal at least as much as Boylston & Seo do. Mind you, I don't think any of them are at that level, I think Boylston & Seo are both talented dancers who need much more work (on different aspects of their dancing) and should still be soloists.

Obviously, the powers that be at ABT disagree with me. Just as obviously, for whatever their reasons, ABT management doesn't think Lane or Abrera are principal material.

Given those realities I do not think promoting Copeland is a crime. IMO she still needs work, but as ABT has no problem promoting unfinished dancers to principal status and she sells out performances - both of her scheduled NY debuts were 100% sell outs - I don't have a problem with it.

The Wednesday matinee is entirely sold out, except for the very expensive boxes. Remarkable.

Her Juliet this past Saturday matinee was also a complete sell out. In fact, both have been sold out for quite some time now

Ah. I see now we're not. I thought the term "press lift" was referring to the one where he lifts her up and down repeatedly while he's kneeling.

Actually, Amour could have been talking about either one, since the difference in both is very clear comparing the Ferri and Cuthbertson videos to what we saw from ABT.