Amy Reusch

The new upgrade seems to shifted the paradigm yet again. What is the new best option for seeing new and updated rhreads? I seem to be missing updates to the daily news links...

I haven't seen the program yet... Did Mr. Diamond's directing resemble his work on the Paul Taylor Wrecker's Ball of several years ago?

I kind of thought there were many!

I am glad you have been doing it and love when there are video links. I've always felt Limon was the modern dance direction ballet companies should head in.

I saw the Friday evening performance from the nosebleeds (and this show was truly sold out was it not? I saw people in seats who could not have seen much of the dancing). The Carmen? Count me with those who thought the choreography was not top shelf. I liked the percussion in the sc ore but thought it was over-miked or at least over amplified. The stage design was very sticking but then the choreography never quite fulfilled that early promise. I need to read Maya's autobiography... I suspect she was very collaborative in the PDF choreography... Is there any discussion of this? What a tr

By chance, yesterday, I heard that Jeanne Armin had passed away. Unfortunately the obituary seems to have expired. I was hoping I could find out more about her life. I remember hearing, decades ago, that Jeanne used to drive her fellow dancers at ABT crazy because she would come back from several weeks off and her pirouettes & balance would look like she hadn't missed a day. I thought she had danced with one of the Ballets Russes incarnations, but the extremely short blurb I could find makes no mention except of 3 years she was at ABT. For some reason, this lovely program popped up as

Thank you rg, I was hoping you'd sound in... I thought some point was made at the time of the showing of the Shiryaev Trepak animation that Shiryaev had been responsible for many of the folk dances in Petipa's ballets but had not been given credit.... but my memory is always full of misty areas... Thanks Natalia, I was wondering how Cygnets could be a waltz, but the "4 big swans" calls to mind different music... I see my eyes misread cygnes as cygnets in the first post...

For some reason I had thought the character dances were by Shiraev... not sure that's spelled correctly, the one who is considered a father of character dance and set many of the character dances attributed to Petipa? Thank you very much Natalia, that's fascinating! Do I understand that the Cygnets pas de quatre is Valse Bluette? Wikipedia had the original ending has happy, turned tragic with Modest Tchaikovky's permission after Pyotr's death. It's an interesting article. I had no idea what we hear today is Drigo's version of Tchaikovsky's score.

I just came to this forum hunting for the same answer... Who choreographed the Cygnets? It seems so Petipa to me, and yet it's part of the white act. Is there any evidence indicating who it was?

NY Times article on Royal Ballet of Flanders Hope above works...

We dance for the joy of it. When I was very young, I would dance for hours given the chance. Then I became serious and strived for perfect line, mulitple rotations, high extensions, impossible weight, and I strove for a professional level many hours a day, but honestly I was too tall for my generation of dancers, and not quite good enough to make up for the height. Eventually I "retired" my ambition and danced solely for recreation. At that point, honestly, I rediscovered the joy of dancing. In my serious study I had never lost the love of ballet, but the unfettered joy was hampered by co

Why doesn't Toumanova do pas de cheval in the western variation? (Or maybe my question is... why does everyone else do pas de cheval in the western variation?) Toumanova's step really reminds me of the earlier section variation in front of the toreador capes.

I know discussion of how the history of these two versions is somewhere on this board... I almost remember a discussion on one becoming de rigeur on one side of the iron curtain and the other remaining on the other side.. .but alas I don't remember. What brought me here though is the pas de chevals in the "western" version... I ran across an old Toumanova film on youtube and notice for her they aren't pas de chevals at all... but much more flamenco-like: Compare Tamara Toumanova @ 0:39 to Paloma Herrera @ 1:04 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VMOPF4WYYLE Paloma's are very pretty but

yes! Exactly! Now there's something I wish they'd stream off their servers as a service to the community! You lucky NYers!

What I really wish had been preserved was DeMille's lecture demonstrations... I heard so much about how wonderful these are and she certainly had a gift for telling stories... was it The Joffrey who used to present them? I wonder if they aren't in some archive. I heard she would have paintings of dancers projected and then bring them to life... (or perhaps Joffrey brought them to life?)... but I suppose the media of the time wouldn't be so good at catching projections & stage lighting at the same time?

It seems kind of strange to me that ballet & modern dance were so much at odds with each other for so long... I see such reflections of Martha Graham & Doris Humphrey in this work... Graham, Tudor, Humphrey, De Mille... all look so much more like each other than their predecessors be it Marius Petipa or Isadora Duncan...

CUNY has put up on YouTube an interview with Agnes de Mille from their archives Curious set design. Also, Dancers over 40 had a panel discussion amongst former de Mille dancers.. takes a bit to get underway but some charming anecdotes:

And there are some lovely Kristin Sloan videos of the students: http://www.sab.org/videos/?vid=8 & http://www.sab.org/videos/?vid=4

" I was a little surprised at that one myself... if he had them do the deep lunge with the back leg drawing up into retiré instead of bending to push off to retiré... I would have agreed... but I was rather thinking the preparation from an even demi plié in 4th was rather Cecchetti, and there weren't many companies doing that any more... The tendu thing is a speed thing... I've never liked it, but if they're going to do tendu that fast I'd rather they reach a fully extended arch... if it's a "freeze for the snap shot of 5th", then "freeze for the snap shot of the carefully placed tendu" w

Wow! Over $1,000,000? According to the inflation calculator found here: http://www.westegg.com/inflation/ (I know nothing about its accuracy) What cost $1,000,000 in 1866 would cost $14,475,398.79 in 2009. That's pretty astoundingly successful!

I am in no way authorized to say what Balanchine Style or Balanchine Technique is or isn't... but my understanding is that adjustments were made to enable the speed of Balachine dancers in certain steps. I think it's possible to say that a hallmark of Balanchine technique is the speed it enables. I do know that after years of being admonished by Joffrey/ABT/Royal Ballet style teachers to make sure my heels reached the ground in landing every petit allegro jump; when I found myself in a major Balanchine principal's class, he specifically put his hand beneath my heels in little jumps to forc

I noticed a young man who carried himself very well during barre... in the front row, a little left of center (house left rather than stage left)... but then I didn't notice him during the center work. I wondered if Martins was looking to add some young men to the corps, considering how much attention he was giving the the boys (I think at this age, they're close enough still to be called that). Several times Martins called out a boy on far house left... who seemed to have a lot of personality (would like to see him in Fancy Free some day)... but I don't remember the name (will see if my dau

OK.. just checked... if there is a thread on Balanchine style it doesn't come up in a quick search. It was very interesting to see the students. The speed, musicality & frozen diamond aspects of Balanchine style were addressed. i hadn't noticed the difference in the curtsey and thought it was very interesting that they try to bow in a "humble" manner without pointing the foot. I'm not sure I buy that it is more humble, but it does seem very tossed off, very American...a quick "thank you" and now lets' go! I have been noticing lately how sometimes one sees the Russians bow (like perha

And who was the conductor who lead Stars and Stripes? Is that the one that has just been appointed to lead the Hartford Symphony? Carolyn Kuan?

My daughter has an excellent memory (clearly not inherited from me... I had to ask her for the others' names), and Angelica was one of her favorites... wore a french twist & earrings... (doesn't exactly help me)... she was wearing sort of a halter top... Peter told her that she had to get used to being downstage because... (can't remember exact words, but implication she was going to in front of the audience a lot!)... Both my daughter & I noticed how little Mr. Martins said as he gave the combination, indicating in a very few words and gestures what he wanted and how instantly all t