Nanatchka

Liebeslieder, Bart Cook and Patty McBride---at least that is what I recall--she was facing upstage, they were in the center, and as she started from downstage to up--that is, moved away from you, the audience--he gave her a little push right between her shoulder blade. I think I would like to go live on the Island of Lost Phrases....

Greetings from the lost Collier sister. Books, clippings, programs, photos, you name it....I am entranced by the entry with a spare bedroom. Please send one. All that scanning sounds excellent, but time consuming. Not that scrabbling around in storage boxes isn't. I have years and years of press kits, too. What a mess.

I can guarantee this test is bogus, because it said I am a "neat freak." I am not. I am The Mess Fairy. I would have given Stravinsky hives.

I can guarantee this test is bogus, because it said I am a "neat freak." I am not. I am The Mess Fairy. I would have given Stravinsky hives.

So as not to prove Alexandra wrong, here is a writer jumping in. A review is an opinion, but it is also an historical record of an event. You will want to include the following: Who What When Where Some questions you can ask yourself to gracefully incorporate these questions and your opinions in a logical sequence are: What was done? Was it done well? Was it worth doing? I too have covered both dance and theater, and they are more alike than different. Things to keep in mind: Known works, as for instance "Hamlet," or "Nutcracker," require less explanation (though not no explanation) than new work (new ballet, new play). Non narrative work is harder to write about than narrative work (where a story line carries you along), but is challenging and interesting. Try thinking of yourself as a translator--you are translating the language of dance into English. Since you are writing for a school newspaper and perhaps are writing about people you know, you are in a harder position than critics working on big city newspapers where they don't cross paths with their subjects on a daily basis. I suggest that, if possible, and your location and publication permit, you cover one or two professional events in addition to school events. Or perhaps you are already doing that? That is what the theater critic does on one of our school newspapers here. He has a lot of fun! Finally, although you are writing about what you see, what you know matters, too. The more background you have in the subject you are covering, the more confident you will feel and sound. Knowledge may not change your instinctive and intuitive responses, but it will put them into an intelligent context. Maybe you can post one of your reviews here someday. Good luck!

PS I kept on thinking about this last night, and I think I really have it this tmie: 1. Maria Tallchief 2. Tanaquil LeClerq 3. Tamara Geva 4. Vera Zorina Alternates: for 1, 3, 4: Mme. Alexandra Danilova. For 2: Suzanne Farrell and Karin Von Aroldingen. The first cast is variously partnered by Balanchine at the age he was married to each of them . Danilova dances with him at the time they were with Diagaliev. Farrell dances with him at the age he made Don Q., and Von Aroldingen dances with him at the time he made Davidsbuntlertanze....I would have proceeded chronologically, but I wanted to see Tanny in her original role.

PS I kept on thinking about this last night, and I think I really have it this tmie: 1. Maria Tallchief 2. Tanaquil LeClerq 3. Tamara Geva 4. Vera Zorina Alternates: for 1, 3, 4: Mme. Alexandra Danilova. For 2: Suzanne Farrell and Karin Von Aroldingen. The first cast is variously partnered by Balanchine at the age he was married to each of them . Danilova dances with him at the time they were with Diagaliev. Farrell dances with him at the age he made Don Q., and Von Aroldingen dances with him at the time he made Davidsbuntlertanze....I would have proceeded chronologically, but I wanted to see Tanny in her original role.

I loved the dance (I am not calling it a ballet) to the Gavin Bryars (a piece known here in New York because Steve Post used to play it on WNYC fundraisers). I always admire Forstyhe's company and his intelligence, not not what and the how of his work. But this dance--which basically was about love and death--was simple, evocative, flowing, non-recarinated, deeply felt, and had marvelous duets.

Is this ballet the same one that was made on the Washington Ballet by Septime Weber?

I think I would like to see the original cast: Maria Tallchief, Tanaquil LeClerq, Beatrice Tompkins, Elise Reiman, Nicholas Maggalanes, Francisco Moncion, Herbert Bliss, and Lew Christensen. Otherwise, I'd like Merrill Ashley with Eddie Villella, Suzanne Farrell with Jacques D'Amboise, Maria Calegari with Bart Cook,and Wendy Whelan with Sean Lavery. . Alternately, Violette Verdy with Peter Boal, Kyra Nichols with Peter Martins, Melissa Hayden with Ib Andersen, and Patty McBride with Jean-Pierre Bonnefous. Now if you really want to make it heaven, just take the casts and do Liebeslieder instead.

I think I would like to see the original cast: Maria Tallchief, Tanaquil LeClerq, Beatrice Tompkins, Elise Reiman, Nicholas Maggalanes, Francisco Moncion, Herbert Bliss, and Lew Christensen. Otherwise, I'd like Merrill Ashley with Eddie Villella, Suzanne Farrell with Jacques D'Amboise, Maria Calegari with Bart Cook,and Wendy Whelan with Sean Lavery. . Alternately, Violette Verdy with Peter Boal, Kyra Nichols with Peter Martins, Melissa Hayden with Ib Andersen, and Patty McBride with Jean-Pierre Bonnefous. Now if you really want to make it heaven, just take the casts and do Liebeslieder instead.

Me too, but way up front, where I could see Jock Soto just fine. He looked as if he were about to die, but at least it was for a great cause. Millepied was adorable--so Mozartian, and that moment when he just jumps--straight up, like a child at a party--was marvelous. I see no one has much to say here about Monumentum/Movements, which was a large part of the bill. Kowrowski looks awfully pleased with herself, but well, why not? Unfortunately, she makes everyone else on the face of the earth look stumpy,but it's not her fault. What a dish. Speaking of dishes, Alexopolous (still a devastating mix of glamour and elegance) in the second ballet, reminded me that she was in Washintgon (doing Slaughter) when Farrell coached Calegari in the role. Which brings us back to Mozartiana. (I saw the last Farrell and the first Calegari, which was truly a conjuring act.). Whelan gave the most classical performance of this alternately romantic and baroque ballet I have ever seen. She really did just do the steps, and her faith in them and their inherent beauty was for me completely compelling. I have complete faith, always, in her capacity to do anything, and thusI find her performances liberating. I never worry about her, I just clear my mind and watch. I thought, by the way, that the head to knee bit (so memorably photographed with Farrell, and then again with Nichols) was fascinating. With Farrell, the impetus is forward--a fantastic appetite for space. With Whelan, the movement was up, and then more up! and then a drift down.I found it beautiful, and the echo of the bowed head from the beginning was poetic. Back to the end: the reason the ballerinas weren't together at the end of the Bizet was because I think it was completely beyond them, or just beside the point. Their capacities are so different. No corps, they. It's fine with me. [ January 05, 2002: Message edited by: Nanatchka ]

If you really want to see some Cunningham technique classes, there are some video tapes available from the Cunningham Dance Foundation. www.merce.org/filmvideo.html I don't know if you would have the right format on a video tape player to view them, but you can inquire. Cunningham's technique classes are different from ballet classes in many ways, including a different use of the upper body, particularly the spine. I have seen them taught but I have never taken one--the shape of the class would be familiar to a ballet dancer, but the content and emphasis would seem new.

What a nice thing to think about. So in thinking, I got to choreographers. Thus while he's no ballerina, for a humble, true curtain call by a choreographer, I submit Paul Taylor (grandfathered, if Alexandra permits in, via being invited to join NYCB by Mr. Balanchne).

So interesting, RG. Too bad the Kirov set was so dreadful, it really defied those connections one makes among productions, at least it did with me. I was so busy being vexed....Must go see if anywhere in this topic we discuss the Bristish production that changes centuries between acts. When I was little, seeing the Royal here in NYC, I would worry about what happened when people woke up in the castle after 100 years. What if you had gone to the party and your dog stayed home? Etc. I used to pretend that the Lilac Fairy put the whole surrounding area to sleep, too....I used to love her so.

Asks Alexandra: "Another, related query: why is the population of ballet peasant villages 98% in the 17-24 year age bracket?" Because that is the age of the actual dancers?

That's what I was thinking, Dirac. Modern dance can be a hard sell in some places....Still, it is always unfortunate when dance lovers divide into camps based on the old modern/ballet dichotomy, instead of on more interesting, or should I say provocative?, issues. I think I would rather love or hate something than be bored by it, although I do try to blame boredom on some failure of my own attention rather than on a work. Nonetheless, I am bored once in a while, and provoked is better. One might say Ballet Alert is provocative!

Well, Alexandra, I think you have to put that piece in context. It was written for the local newspaper in Amarillo, Texas. And while a bunch of guys wearing only dance belts and pounding around percussively without music might inspire "Oh, that again" sorts of feelings in New York, the Texas panhandle is another story. I know this because I wrote for the Austin American Statesman for years. ("I see where you are writing about those nekkid dancers," one caller complained when Pilobolus came to town. In flesh colored dance belts, I might add.)So either: the dance was shocking or provocative in its context, and the reviewer reported audience opinion while holding his ground (he liked it); or, the dance was merely awful, and people left because of that. It is impossible to tell from the piece. But it took me back....

We are, here in our New York City home, awash in pity and sorrow but we are, having not been in harm's way, hurt.

Social life has changed; business life has changed; family life has changed, to some extent. But I don't think love has changed much since Giselle and Albrecht, do you?

Okay, Mel, since I have perhaps verged on critical thought, I repent by offering: Waiting for the Cable Guy, a Ballet in about 43 Acts.

About 4:33-- it was first performed by David Tudor, who came out and sat at the piano. And you could watch him, and think about how long the time seemed, or how short. When the Cunningham company uses the score (The Merce Cunnngham Dance Company) someone is in the pit with it, at the piano as I recall. If there is no piano, I don't know where the musician sits, but there is a musician. Then they dance for the length of the piece. This might seem like the Emperor's New Clothes, but it does indeed make one think about the nature of time, and our perception of it. [ 08-11-2001: Message edited by: Nanatchka ]

As long as we are casting out of Texas, I think the Kilgore Rangerettes (a drill team) really should do the Kingdom of the Shades.And there should be a debutante in full debutante kit somewhere in there, too. Also there should be a mariachi band. I have been thinking about Texas this week--if it is this hot here in New York City, why not be in Austin? They do hot sooooo much better. Oh, let's not forget Anne Richards. She would be an excellent something. Shrub and the Oil Bidness guys we can save for the Nutcracker...