richard53dog

Alexandra, I hate this too and this dinosaur approach is also very prevalent in the opera. Yes, I go back a fair amount of time, but what's the point of living in the past? It's gone. Memories are fine, and actually a good point of reference, but often they get "enhanced" a bit over the years. So I keep my memories and enjoy today's performers too. It's an apples to oranges thing. Style and technique change and blend over the years. Now I have to say, though, I don't like the Vienna Swan Lake film. I don't really think Fonteyn looks comfortable here. I didn't see her in the role until a few years after this, but she was much more like the 1960 film, stylish, elegant, expressive, and musical. But do I think she was the last Odette/Odile? No! Richard (looking forward to Vishneva's Odette/Odile with ABT )

One question. Do you mean Allegra or Julie Kent? Not to diss either lady but I don't think of either one as a great beauty but somehow on stage they light up like a beacon. I just rewatched The Red Shoes after many, many years and was pretty much swept away at Shearer's beauty. Wow. Richard

In addition to the Gamzatti and Kitri, Terekhova appears in several segments of the release titled Nina Ananiashvili and International Stars. On DVD, she's on vol ! and 2 . She dances an almost frighteningly strong Black Swan pdd among other items spread out over the two discs. Richard

Really? I don't recall that. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Yes, it's in one of the "extras". There is a brief clip of her doing Odile's fouettes, only about six of them but they are all doubles Richard

This is sort of cheating because I saw these two in the bedroom pas de deux only, not the complete ballet, but anyway, Sibley and Ferri Richard

I was at a play last year and they made one of these announcements. But it was really creative. The announcer said, "remember now, we are in 1932, well before cell phones and beepers were invented . So please shut them off so that we have more of the feeling that we are back in the past." Richard

Ari, I see your point here and agree. But maybe Solor could take these three dancers and the video itself and start it up again under the video dept? I would do it myself, but I don't want to "poach" I think it could make for an interesting thread. richard

Accob, I have and I dislike it. I don't want to be in the front row for ballet, opera, concerts, plays or films. I just don't want to be that close, you see heavy makeup, and all kinds of other things that are distracting. And you miss a lot of the stage patterns. For ballet, I'd MUCH rather view from a slight angle above the stage rather than looking up from the very front of the auditorium I would say that the first or second tiers/balconies/rings give the best overall view Richard

Old Fashioned, I do too. First, it has about 1000 fewer seats than the Met (I may be a bit off on that, but there is a significant difference) Then the tiers are arranged so that the seats, even at the very top, seem much closer to the stage. From the top of the Met's Family Circle, the stage looks 3 miles away. Richard

Oh, this annoys me too, like people that take out penlights to read the programs, although this happens more at the opera than the ballet. This is just rude behavior and I have to admit, I sometimes reply in kind. Last Summer I was at a Mostly Mozart concert at Lincoln Center. I sat on a tier so each row is higher than the one before. There were these people playing games on a blackberry, passing it back and forth and giggling. Since I was slighly over them, it was very distracting. I kicked the back of the lead perpetrator's seat until it stopped. Richard

Antoinette Sibley is quoted in Daneman's bio of Fonteyn of being partnered by Michael Somes: "You literally did nothing. Oh, I mean nothing. He would take you through the ballet. All you had to deal with were the acting and the musicality - he did the rest for you. I have never known anyone like that - not even my darling Anthony" The question still remains though, did Somes finish first or last? My take is that he largely retreated into the background rather than particularly shining in his own right. Richard

I recently received my subscription tickets. There is an exchange policy, so that even if buy a series with something that you don't want, you can exchange it either at the box office (priority week is April 3-9) or by mail. I suppose you can also just skip the subscription process and put together your own series, you still get a break on the price. But you don't get the same seats for each performance. For my series, I went the El Cheapo route and ordered Family Circle. I got row B center which is pretty good for the money. I misplaced the mail form but may try an exchange on either the Syvia or Corsair I got. richard

I've noticed the same thing on Hayden. I saw her a lot in her last few years at NYCB and her photos are odd. Sometimes I can't even recognize her. But the few filmed/taped bits of material look more like her. I recently was watching a documentary, Dancing for Mr B and although she is obviously older, she looks like I remember her. I also find her current place in history a bit unhappy. While I would never say that she was the finest dancer of her time, (how can you really make comparisons like that anyway?) I think she was much more important as a dancer than she seems to be regarded today. Richard

I posted on the single ticket brochure on the other thread about ABT's advertising ( I suspect these two are getting a bit mixed together, but I'm sure our moderators /administrators have that on their radar) But it does have more casting than before, including a lot more dates for Acosta plush a smashing photo of him. I just wanted to add that there is yet another brochure ( ABT is sure advertising heavily). I got this one last week; it's the one just before single tickets and includes a second (third?) round of subscription offers but more importantly( to me) offers make you own combos. In otherwords buy three or more dates and get a break on the price per seat. I'll probably try to pick up a few more tickets from this; I can't resist not having to pay retail!

Yes, mine came this week. There are new photos and all the performance shots of Nina are gone. Only the thumbnail one with "on leave" is left. Ferri's Giselle photo is on the cover. Richard

Hmmmmm, I got my brochure in the mail yesterday. I'm pretty realistic or, shall I say, aware of the aims of advertising? I don't think a brochure for any kind of arts event is geared to the hard core fans, they already ARE going to buy tickets. So these are designed to attract the attention of the casual or potential new audience member. Unlike the Spring at the Met ABT brochure, which I think can grab the attention of someone who knows nothing or very little about ballet and possibly entice them into ordering tickets, I can't think that the cover of the NYCB Spring Rep could do that at all, maybe if it was opened perhaps, but chances are it won't make it to page 1. If you didn't catch the pointe shoe , who wouldn't just think this is some kind of clothing catalog? I almost tossed it immediately into the junk mail bin, and then I thought "oh, this is the nightgown cover for NYCB" NYCB sure wasted their advertising budget with this one. richard

Marga, The audience weren't the only ones amazed. I was too!!! Thanks, what fun. On the Sleeping Beauty DVD, there is also an impressive clip of her in the Black Swan, but this clip tops that. Richard

Dale, But patience is so difficult!!!!! Seriously, the market demand, in the US at least , seems to be very strong, so all kinds of "cultural" material is being released all the time. This is encouraging. Kultur has on their site that they will be releasing the Kirov Corsair (with Altynai Asylmuratova and Faroukh Ruzimatov ) in April. They are also releasing an ABT in San Francisco DVD. www.kultur.com Pharaoh's Daughter has a spectacular, large scale production, so that may make it marketable. One can hope. Richard

Odette, I don't know for sure, but often the best answer is to look at amazon. UK amazon only offers a Region 1 NTSC version, clearly dispatched from the US. And I doubt this will do you much good without a multi region combo PAL/NTSC player. You might want to check niche sites in the UK for unusual DVDs. It may have been released in the UK some time ago and is now OOP. Just a suggestion. Richard

Agreed; this is a pet peeve of mine. Actually I don't like a pouty look, almost like the dancer is annoyed that there is an audience, in any ballet. I mean I don't want to see a dancer with a perky smile in something very intense and abstract, but there is a kind of very underplayed expression that the dancer can project that adds a kind of "punctuation" to pieces like this. Richard

Yeah, I'm curious too. Let me guess, they are not realeased in the US. This all seems a bit arbritary which DVDs get released where. For instance, I wanted to see the POB Sleeping Beauty, not available in the US but released in Europe, and probably elsewhere, in PAL. I did get an Ebay copy of a Chinese release, MAYBE in NTSC, but it really didn't play well and I sent it back. I finally was able to get a DVDR copy, but a commercial US release would have been so much easier. Richard

Anyone who wishes can now order subscription series for the Spring season at the Met go to www.abt.org and click on the "subscribe today" link. I didn't see casting there, I wouldn't use the brochure casting, what is posted on the caledar is significantly different. Of course we are still more than two months from the opening and casting can change much between now and then. A rule of thumb I use is that premieres are usually well cast, not so much for the principals, we all have our own likes and dislikes there. But the soloist roles are strongly cast. Last Summer the Swan Lake had Reyes and Herman Cornejo in Act 1 , the Don Quixote premiere had Part as the Queen of the Dryads and Gomes as the Matador and the Romoe and Juliet premier had Cornejo as Mercutio. All this was in addition to the usual suspects in the principal roles. Richard

I did recieve my subscription tickets this week. The Met/ABT is offering ticket exchange privledges for subscribers, however there is a blackout period for exchanges from April 10-16. I suppose it is possibly the week that single tickets go on sale, but the material mailed with the tickets doesn't state that, so I'm sure that single ticket sale date, whatever it is, will be announced shortly.This sort of wanders into a new thread, but I noticed that the ABT calendar now lists performances in Japan following the July NYC performances richard Edited to fix quote box for clarity. --Carley

Gina, Something like this is SO subjective. What one person "gets" can be completely "missed" by someone else. I think it would be astonishing if everyone of this board answered this question and even just two people's responses( I am thinking of a list rather than just one or two choices) matched. There can be a relatively tiny detail that colors our whole overall perception of something like this.

OK, I'll bite. There are some of today's dancers that leave me cold, despite good technique. But I'll leave those alone for now. But from the past, despite her very solid technique, Cynthia Gregory left me extremely cold. I mostly respond to very expressive, comunicative performers and I got very little from her in that respect I especially disliked her as Giselle. Richard