brbropus39

Hi. I've been looking for a book or collection of the ballet librettos by the French playwright Jean Anouilh. He wrote several ballets for Roland Petit, including Les Demoiselles de la Nuit (The Ladies of Midnight) and Le Loup (The Wolf). I've searched online and in several major and used bookstores, but no results. Thanks.

EvilNinjaX, I can't find your post where you mentioned the two sites that sell the Kumakawa dvd's. I don't know if it was somehow deleted or if I just can't find it for some reason. Can you please post them again? Thank you. Whoops. I just realized that you emailed the web addresses to me.

What dvd's do you have of Tetsuya Kumakawa? Do you know if they're sold commercially? If so, where did you buy them? I saw a tape a while ago that had a few variations by Kumakawa: Corsaire, two different filmings of Solor's variation from Bayadere, and some jumps and turns in a studio. I also saw him last summer in New York perform Ashton's Rhapsody with the K-Ballet, originally made for Baryshnikov. He was so incredible. He did a series of 540's like they were a walk in the park. And his turns, my god, his turns.

Wow!! I've never heard those versions before; they will be a great help to me, I'm sure. Thank you. "I am not sure that this is anything other than what some dancer made up in an effort to make his divertissement make sense" It's interesting that you should say that, Steven, because that is exactly what got me interested in Bluebird in the first place: I read an article in Ballet Review about Yuri Soloviev, whose interpretation of Bluebird was supposedly venerated by a great many audiences. He said, "The Blue Bird is a prince who has turned himself into a bird in order to see the princess, and when he dances with her he is singing to her and she listens to his song." I'm not sure what style ballet it will be if I pusue it. Right now, I'm trying to be open to whatever ideas come to me. It might become anything from a very Petipaesque (haha. I don't know if there's another word for that) ballet to something more contemporary. I kindof like the idea that it would be a romantic and poetic scenario/character-study type of ballet (e.g. Le Spectre de la Rose, Le Jeune Homme et la Mort) rather than following the older formula for pas de deux: having them dance together, a male variation, a female variation, and a coda. Thanks again for your insights.

Has any choreographer ever made a ballet about Blue Bird, a sort of Sleeping Beauty "Spin-off" if that makes sense? I was thinking of making a ballet with that premise, expanding upon the Blue Bird character, and was wondering if anyone thought that was a good or bad idea. I'm open to any suggestions. Thanks, W.B.

Thanks, BalletNut. You answered my question perfectly.

BalletNut, I usually only buy classical story ballet videos for a specific performer or performers. Do you think that Kumakawa's performance is worth getting the tape for? Who else is there in the video? I admit that I've never watched an entire Bayadere before. I have seen the variations, including the bronze idol, but I'm not very familiar with the ballet otherwise. Could you give me an idea of what the dancing is like, and how much there is in comparison with the character and pantomime aspects of the ballet? Thankyou.

Does anyone know of any videos featuring the Japanese dancer Tetsuya Kumakawa and where I could purchase them? There were several variations that he danced (corsaire, quixote, and 2 bayaderes) on a homemade/mixed video I saw a while ago, but I couldn't tell if they were filmed for video or television. Any info would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

I just bought To Dance By Valery Panov at a used bookstore and can't put it down. Of course I'm not holding it as I write this, but it's still right by my side. I always enjoy reading autobiographies of dancers. I've read Villella's, Robert LaFosse's, Bruhn's, Nijinsky's, and biographies of Nureyev and Baryshnikov. I like them because they're like windows to what it's really like to be a professional dancer. For those who haven't read this book, I really reccomend it. It's a very intimate account of Panov's struggles and happiness as a dancer, child, man, husband and, most importantly, lover of life. P.S. Does anyone know if there is a biography of Yuri Soloviev? Thanks

I save all my programs, even though they usually don't have much historical or sentimental value. The most recent of mine that has any meaning was ABT's Romeo and Juliet this summer, which was Ashley Tuttle's final performance. I also have a program from this Summer's Ashton Festival at Lincoln Center, signed by Sylvie Guillem, who performed in Margueritte and Armand. I got to meet her because my friend performed with her once and went back stage to say hi. My favorite program was from a performance that I'm too young to have even attended. It is the world premiere of Baryshnikov's Don Quixote or Kitri's Wedding on March 23, 1978 at the J.F.K. Center for Performing Arts, with Baryshnikov and Gelsey Kirkland. I got it when I bought the book Baryshnikov at Work online and the program was enclosed in the book. Too bad it wasn't signed. It was a nice little treat, though.

I'm reading The Sybil right now. I'm definitely enjoying it, and it's very well written, but it's a lot different from Lagerkvist's other books I've read so far. I didn't read Barabas just because of the description on the back of the book. it sounded too depressing for me. His most well known book is probably The Dwarf, and it's also my favorite of his novels. I really liked The Marriage Feast, which is a bunch of his short stories, some really short, and most of them share the same macabre undertone. When I read his stories, even though his writing is very literal and easy to understand, I get the feeling he's not always saying what he seems to be saying.

Has anyone here read anything by Par Lagerkvist. I had never heard of him before, but I started reading a collection of his short stories not long ago, and am already almost complete with everything he's written. While reading his books, it occured to me that many of his stories would make great ballets, literal or abstract. Most of his short stories and novels have a sort of fairy-tale feel to them, but also deal with very important subjects, almost political even.

Mr. Johnson, in what way did Loie Fuller and Jean Borlin incorporate film into dance? Or was it the other way around, incorporating dance into film? I had trouble finding much information online about Fuller's use of film in her dance. I did find out about her innovations in stage lighting and her other explorations in the field of science (she was even a close friend of Marie Curie), but no luck with with her usage of film. Do you know where I could learn more about it? Thank you, W.B.

Ginastera sounds familiar to me for some reason, and I'm wondering if it has anything to do with the older ballet, Painted Birds, which was choreographed, I believe, by either Toer Van Shayk (spelling?) or Rudi Van Dantzig, but I'm not sure. Do you know if there's any connection?

There is an exhibit of works by the German painter, Gerhard Richter at the Deutsche Guggenheim in Berlin. I didn't have a chance to see it first hand, but a friend showed me pictures he took of the exhibit. He has a very modernist and post-modernist approach to art, and uses a varied assortment of mediums. Recently he has created a collection of mirrors. I thought it was really interesting how such simple objects as mirrors can be turned into art. It makes me realize how just about anything can be made beatiful or interesting when approached artistically.