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Helene, you make a good point that dancer victims of discrimination would be afraid to speak up. But on average dance careers are relatively short, shorter than the tenures of a lot of current artistic directors. If prejudice exists, why don't we hear about it from retired dancers?

As for exclusion based on skin color, I think the key question is whether or not it's done to preserve "purity," as you put it, or uniformity. The former has ugly historical overtones. The latter is mere aesthetic preference, and if we factor out race for a moment, everyone understands that preference whether or not they share it. The corp swans wear the same costumes and do the same steps. No one dresses in brown. If the convention was that everyone wore blond wigs as well, it wouldn't be prejudiced for an AD to refuse to cast a dancer who refused to wear one.

In my opinion a corps with a brown-skinned swan is equally beautiful as a uniformly white corps, but it is a different picture. I can understand how some people could prefer the old picture, especially at first. We can argue that it's imperative, for sociological reasons, that they put their taste aside, but we have no grounds to presume they're racist for having that taste in the first place.

"Racist" is such an ugly charge. I know there are many other insidious forms of racism, and that we need to talk about them and discuss whether or not something's racist, but I wish we could find other terms, and not call a preference for an all-white swan corps by the same name as we refer to Bull Connor's hate crimes. Of course I know no one's equating the two, but in matters like this the charge has an unmerited rhetorical force anyhow, and that force can cloud our thinking.

Also, of course no one wants to lower the standards of ballet, and 2dds offered some intriguing ways to include more minorities in dance. But several people speak of minorities being underrepresented right now, and as I tried very simply to show, bumping up representation right away would lower quality.

omshanti, thank you for that beautiful and moving post. Given your experiences, it's completely understandable that you became prejudiced in the first place. I really admire your courage in trying to change.

I'd like to address a couple of 2dds' points:

Just as men are not ideally positioned to fully appreciate the ins and outs of gender discrimination, our lived experience definitively differs and determines our racially defined realities in this country.

Victims of discrimination notice it more often than other people do, but they can also, understandably, become oversensitive and sometimes imagine prejudice where none exists. This may be true of Aesha Ash, for example. She cites only one example of racism in all her years of dancing, a repetiteur who said she didn’t want any brown bodies in the Swan Lake corps. That’s an extremely insensitive remark, and it may have been racist, and of course Ash would be hurt. But if we presume without further evidence that the remark stems from racial prejudice, then perhaps we ought to presume that the cardigan sweater designer who doesn’t want one brown button in a line of white buttons is racially prejudiced.

the exclusionary practices incorporated in the history of ballet

Elsewhere you say that intent isn't the issue, but "exclusionary" clearly goes to intent. I've asked for evidence of exclusionary practices in ballet today several times. Given the wide knowledge and experience base of so many posters on this board, I think the quality and quantity of examples given in reply pretty much demonstrate that if these practices exist, they're rare.

I think it would be good to first agree that we want ballet to be more inclusive, more representative, but I'm not sure everyone agrees this is desirable. I do think this needs to be an acknowledged desirable goal. Whether we think there is discrimination or not, can we agree there is underrepresentation.

I think underrepresentation is a loaded word in this case because it suggests that 1) proportionately as many minorities and whites want to be in ballet and 2) proportionately as many minorities as whites are currently talented at ballet.

1) is clearly not the case. This may change as more minorities are exposed to ballet, but for now it’s safe to say that a significantly smaller proportion of minorities has even watched a ballet on television, much less wanted to dance one. Minorities too have their cultural comfort zones. Also, a significantly smaller proportion has been able to afford to go to the ballet, or to put a child in ballet classes (and here fear of racism is probably a factor too).

And because 1) is not the case, 2) almost certainly isn’t either. Because the pool of ballerina wannabe’s is proportionately considerably smaller among minorities than among whites, the pool of topnotch minority ballet dancers is probably considerably smaller than that of whites. Because this is so, working to meet racial quotas (by any name, including "inclusion") will in fact lower the quality of the art. If companies shoot for equal opportunity, they’ll attract more and more minority dancers and minority dancers who become choreographers, and enrich the art. But if they measure racism inversely by the number of minority dancers, as some do here, and shoot for mathematical equality, at least in the short run they’ll lower the quality of the art.

Before the Saturday matinee performance of the Royal Ballet's Sleeping Beauty in D.C. last month a young woman behind me expressed surprise that the Prince would be interested in a woman "100 years" old.

Kate Lennard @ Jul 27 2006, 04:14 AM)

There's a huge amount of evidence anecdotal and documented about the difficulites faced by black dancers within traditional ballet companies.

Kate, I keep asking what it is. The Wilkinson tragedy is ancient history in terms of race relations in America.

Andrea Long and Aesha Ash talk feelingly and with much pain of their struggle to achieve promotion with NYCB, Ash, most powerfully being told not to stick around if she wanted to make soloist, it wasn't going to happen.

Relatively few dancers are promoted even to soloist. What evidence did these give that race held them back?

Yes, the evidence is scant, because the number of black dancers who have risen to any kind of position of worth or note within a classical or neo classical ballet company can, as a previous poster so rightly said, be counted on two hands.

I'm afraid that's circular reasoning.

it's a wonderful magazine, but they're not really running a business.

If they ran a business, they'd sell back issues, and then I wouldn't be able to afford ballet tickets for awhile.

It is important, I think, to honor differences in the way that people of good will and good intent approach these issues.

And once one does, a lot of perceived racism disappears.

(Kate Lennard @ Jul 27 2006, 01:14 PM)

The unacceptability of the adjective colour has its roots in the US. But it is unacceptable and causes offence amongst the black community.

Except among the ones who use it.

The day that a corps is composed of an eclectic mix of ethnic backgrounds, and this must be based on dance ability and nothing else, is the day that allegations of racisim, founded, unfounded, unsubstantiated etc will be utterly specious.

All allegations are specious without evidence, and requests for evidence have produced one example from the 1950's.

the fundamental issue is that a black man/woman/child visiting the ballet for the first time will see little or nothing relevant to them in terms of their ethnicity.

Should they? No

In that case, there is no basis for the charge that ballet is, consciously or otherwise, racist. If we're talking about trying to reach out and introduce more people to this great art form, that's another subject.

papeetepatrick, thanks for the example, but one example of one ballet company backing down in the face of a racist town in the 1950's doesn't tell us anything about race in ballet today, does it?

As for acceptable terms, I don't think we'll have a colorblind society until any term not meant as a slight is accepted in the spirit in which it is used.

I suppose the sad truth is that ballet will always be racially biased. I noticed and I'm sure this was a slip and not intentional that a previous poster described ethnic dancers as dancers of "colour" and this is the crux of race issues. The term colour to describe ethnicity is regressive if blacks, Asians, chinese etc are "coloured" what are caucasians, colourless?

Kate, I believe I used that term and I used it intentionally, as a sign of respect, because it's a term often used by African-Americans and other non-whites in the West, particularly by people who often think they see racism where some of the rest of us see people just benignly being people.

One wonders were he to have been selected within the criteria of a major international school POB, RB, SAB, Marinsky etc Would he even have made it to audition or had the will to go.

OK, but why do you wonder? It seems to me that this thread has suffered from a lack of evidence and an abundance of speculation. If we had concrete examples of good dancers and choreographers denied the opportunity to work, we would have something to go on. You mention Raven Wilkinson, Aesha Ash, Andrea Long and Jerry Douglas. I hope you'll tell us why you think these dancers have suffered from racism.

My second husband was black, and before we married I'd had a good thirty plus years of ballet going, and at the start of our relationship I tried to instill my love of ballet into him and I remember his first visit with myself, under duress, to the Royal Opera House. And his verdict - it's all white. There was nothing there which he felt spoke to him, to his ethnicity to his experience either on stage or off.

I wish your husband could have talked to Arthur Mitchell. But leaving aside the question of whether or not there was something there he could learn to relate to, I'm trying to understand why you see it as ballet's fault and problem if he didn't. Why are artists or why is an art form required to make a conscious effort represent everyone? Should soul food restaurants be required to serve Thai cuisine? Whites have taken an interest in blues, jazz, reggae, and other ethnic musics made by artists of color with no concern for white listeners, with no interest in representing whites. Were those artists morally obliged to take whites into consideration? Would that have made their art better? I'm really trying to understand this point of view. "Why is ballet overwhelmingly white?" is a legitimate question, even an important question. But "ballet is overwhelmingly white so the cause must be racism" is, in my opinion, one-diagnosis-fits-all presumption.

Jazz is very much an American music. It's roots are from the African American communities and probably the most well know jazz performers are black males. But there are white jazz musicians and many famous and talented onces. Jazz, albeit modern, and "improvisational" seems to be open to the influence of different forces and not as closed as more tradition based performance arts such a ballet. Notes are colorblind... No?

It's not that jazz is more open and ballet is more closed, it's that whites of their own accord began playing jazz (and blues, and reggae, and other "ethnic" musics), which African-Americans had been playing for themselves, having no thought for sharing it with whites or reflecting white taste or experience. When whites took it up, in some rare cases (Artie Shaw, for example) they played it as well as blacks, and in other cases they took it in new directions. I'm not aware of any African-American choreographers working primarily with the language of classical or neo-classical ballet.

But it appears to me that Ballet is a Euro-centric experience which by definition is racist.

DefJef, it seems to me that if it's racist for Europeans and descendents of Europeans to have Eurocentric taste, then Alvin Ailey must have been racist to focus on his own heritage. Sometimes people just love what they love without hating or looking down on what other people love.

My feeling about Balanchine is that he was attempting to achieve in 20th century dance what "modern" composers were attempting to do in music and artists attempting to do in the visual arts. That is free the art form from the slavish imitation of reality and explore abstract pure forms and compositions. America with its embrace of new technology and speed and its openness to new ideas was a good place to do this.

Balanchine ably explored abstraction, but he was an intuitive artist rather than an intellectual, and I've seen no indication that he consciously set out with that goal, as opposed to just going where the music and his taste in steps led him. The tendency to abstraction was already evident in his art when Kirstein brought him over, but that wasn't the sort of thing Kirstein was dreaming up for him -- in other words, it isn't a goal he'd mentioned to Kirstein. We know that Serenade was composed as a teaching tool, an extension of class.

In regards to politics, he was a conservative, but the closest thing to a political Balanchine ballet that I'm aware of is Stars and Stripes. As an expression of patriotism in the immediate post-McCarthy era, I suppose S&S could be seen as political statement, but that's a stretch. So my guess is that politics would not have been a factor in his career if he'd stayed in Europe either.

Then the teacher asked him to do the jump again, this time adding an element of "tailbone down/ stacking the torso to attain greater sense of height" that had been practiced at the barre.

He did so -- and remained, apparently, suspended in mid-air for a split second. It was an entirely different sensation for the viewer -- and very thrilling to watch.

Is it possible that such simple technical corrections can yield such dramatic and apparently magical results?

I wish I'd seen that, Bart.

From Bernard Taper's "Balanchine": "The dancers [in company class] went on to leaps, and he reminded them of how upflung arms pull the body into the air, and of the composition they must make in space at the top of their leap, and of the crucial importance of coming down softly. . . . He called [Violete Verdy] back and had her try [this] again, telling her that she must push forward on the glide, not rest on it. Miss Verdy, who was dressed in a bright blue sweater and black tights, with her golden hair in a shining topknot, nodded eagerly as she listened. As she went through it again, Balanchine cried at the start of her second leap, 'Stay up in the air' and, incredibly, she seemed to obey this command, hovering momentarily in space like a hummingbird."

As a side note, anyone who has seen the documentary "Violette et Mr. B" can easily picture Verdy's eager nod, which sounds very much in character. And early in that film we watch Verdy's delight as the Taper passage is read to her.

What are some specific "things" dancers do which personalize a role? They cannot change the choreography... yes or no?

DefJef, you might find it illuminating to watch dancers rehearsing with a coach. There are a number of commercial recordings that show portions of rehearsals. If you're interested, the Dancer's Dream series, featuring Paris Opera Ballet productions of Sleeping Beauty, Raymonda, and La Bayadere, would be a good place to start.

For the most part I like Lacroix's costumes and sets in this production, but the ruffle at the top of the skirts Dupont and Gillot wear in Rubies seems inappropriately fussy for that ballet, and doesn't flatter their midriffs.

Rubies has been in the POB rep since the 1974. Perhaps it was originally done with more abandon. In the documentary I like hearing the dancers muse in typically French fashion. How well spoken they are, and how beautiful, to this English speaker, the spoken French! Another bonus is the photo of Balanchine and Farrell at van Cleef and Arpels, both of them radiant as he puts a necklace on her.

What's strange about this DVD is the way Diamonds is credited in the booklet, with a 31 second "opening" followed by two pas de deux (the second by Ciaravola and Cozette) and then two ensembles.

Thanks, Jack. Much appreciated. I get the impression that when the dancers were comfortable in La Source they took it to higher heights than they did at the Kennedy Center last fall. I'm happy for Shannon Parsely! Were Mahoney- Du and Mladenov cast in Clarinade at all this week?

An earlier NPR piece is available here.

Well, I for one think Streep is terrific in comedic roles, probably *because* of the mask she wears. She's the only reason to see a movie like "She-Devil" or "Death Becomes Her," but I don't mind telling you that I can watch her in those over and over. She doesn't try to make the roles deep, she just has great fun using all her considerable technique to make us laugh. Something about that touches me.

That makes me want to see more of her films. She's sweet and touching as well as funny in "A Prairie Home Companion" as one of the singing Johnson Sisters with Lily Tomlin.

David Denby's New Yorker review: Dressed to Kill.

What a lovely setting, Dr. Coppelius. Could you tell us more? Is that a public garden? A private estate? Is the performance a yearly tradition? Is it part of a festival?

Could McKenzie and company just be thinking of commercial appeal? New York audiences must have a relatively high balletomane to casual fan ratio, but even at the Met does Part's lyricism garner as much enthusiasm as Herrera's technical power? I also wonder, given ABT's current abundance of male powerhouses, if McKenzie is trying to match his women to his men dancers in that respect. I don't say that's a good reason, but is there precedent for that type of casting?

I think Bart asks a fascinating question. I wonder if anyone can think of specific ballets with step motifs of now rarely seen steps. I wonder if there are certain steps, now rare, in the original choreography of beloved classical and romantic ballets that have been omitted in later versions. And I wonder why these steps are disappearing. It's unlikely they're too difficult for today's better-than-ever schooled dancers. Do they not look as good on today's taller, slimmer dancers? Do they look too relaxed and easy, not athletic enough for today's audiences? Or similarly, do they not fit the neo-classical aesthetic choreographers tend to use today?

In the grand pas, Kobborg and Cojocaru looked very comfortable with each other, like they'd done this hundreds of times before,

They sure did. And earlier, I'm pretty sure that he woke her up with a real kiss too. (Of course they're a real life couple). How sweet.

Don't they do that in America? It made me realize how homophobic American society is. Any male behaviour beyond the status quo (sports, getting women in the sack etc,) is suspect to accusations of being gay. In my daughter's ballet class their are 16 little girls, no boys. I find it incredibly sad.

Whacking each other on the butt in football (American football) is about as close as they get, unless there are several layers of hockey padding in that post-goal hug, with the exception of the post-championship pile-up.

Yesterday, some work colleagues were watching the World Cup game between Spain and France over lunch. When the game ended, and the players hugged, I heard at least two comments about "those European guys hugging and kissing." And I don't think he was kidding when one of them said to turn off the TV.

hug.

This is a complex issue. Are European sports fans more accepting of homosexuality that American ones? Perhaps so, but I don't think that American males uncomfortable with hugging and kissing other men are always homophobic. (I presume that the guy who wanted the set turned off wasn't dumb enough to think the hugging players were gay). Many men just aren't comfortable with more physical intimacy than they've grown up with. Their aversion to hugging is instinctual, not intellectualized. Conversely, I've met men who didn't approve of homosexuality but were huggers.

Likewise, while I don't mean to discount the homophobia that does shape some reactions to ballet, I don't believe that male dislike of ballet is always homophobic. I think a lot of guys, especially at first, casual glance, just don't relate to male dancing deportment. To turn things around, how many male balletomanes are sports fans? We wouldn't call them prejudiced for lacking interest in an alien athletic aesthetic.