vagansmom

So would I. Dream on!

So true, dancerboy90210. That's exactly the kind of action that promotes excitement, enthusiasm and good will. Crazy not to use the moment. Maybe McKenzie should hire Copeland's agent.

Is there a way to prove this? Or could it be this is the way Copeland chooses to spend her time off whereas other dancers might spend it with family? She has an agent or publicist or whatever she calls that person who's paid to do all the promoting work, so she would just need to show up. I'm not arguing that Copeland deserves to become a principal dancer; I haven't even seen her in performance except for a few youtube videos, so I can't say. I just notice that people are more vitriolic, of her than of any other dancer except for poor Hee Seo, whose worst "fault", IMO, is that she's chosen constantly to replace others.

I'm in agreement with Aurora about fouette ability. Quite frankly, Julie Kent's fouettes have never, in any of the performances I've attended (spanning 14 years), been up to snuff. She travels a lot. Also, there's lots of criticism about Copeland's inability to act with her face. Again, I find it necessary to point out that I've always considered Kent to be an ice princess when it comes to facial expressiveness, so much so, in fact, that I finally began avoiding her performances. So on those two points, at least, I think we have to be fair to Copeland. I think some arguments about her "body type" border on racism. Sometimes the very same people who denounce Copeland's muscles were silent on Wendy Whelan's when she was still performing. If ever there was a body that causes one to suck in one's breath upon first (or second or third or fourth, etc.) encounter, it was Whelan's. I found it excruciating to watch her perform, even while I recognized her genius. I think that we all have body type preferences in ballet, and that's fine, but I do think we need to be fair about them. I think the issue - the reason why Copeland's dancing is criticized so much down to every last detail - is that people feel she's "bought" her stardom via indefatigable self-promotion. It's regarded by many as being unfair. I'm not entirely sure what to believe, quite frankly, but I've been leaning in one direction lately. I know it's supposed to be all about the dancing itself, but let's face it: That disappeared when ABT began its sponsor a dancer program. If I were to find fault, it would be in the board's decision to turn ballet dancing into a money contest among dancers. A wealthy person can, and does, easily hold powerful influence over an artistic director. And sometimes that sponsor has a mission that has nothing to do with ballet, as is often seen in the Russian ballet world. Is ABT drawing closer to that ethos? And let's always remember it's who you know. Copeland is doing, in this modern age, what many other ballet dancers have done in the past and present. The difference is that she has a particular distinction - her color - from the other dancers, so people most certainly take note of her. As a parent to someone who went on to become a professional dancer, I have personally witnessed, at the pre-professional ballet academy level all the way up through auditions for ballet companies and then roles within professional companies that "What can you do for me?" holds considerably more weight than the dancer's actual dance-ability. The dancer with a famous parent and/or very wealthy parent will invariably be chosen over a dancer with slightly better technique because the ballet school and ballet company must think of finances first. Misty Copeland isn't doing anything that hasn't already been done before. She's just using modern technology to do it. Do I like it? No. But I don't find her offensive for it.

nice to hear that about Perron, Amour. Thank you.

I wonder if she's just generally biased against fairy tales? Her background is as a modern dancer whom I have often found to be very dismissive of the ballet fairy tales. Like abatt, I go to the ballet for beauty, for escape, for the scenery, the costumes, hair and even the makeup, but especially for the lush, gorgeous dancing. And I'm not biased: I also love to attend contemporary dance companies' performances. My only criteria for dance is that I'd like it to be done well.

Amour, I'm not going to address the dancing because I wasn't there (although I'm not a fan of her dancing - she's not ready for the big roles), but I do want to comment on 2 points you made about Misty's appearance: her "extreme musculature" and "Misty, due to her very womanly body does not look in any way like 14 years old." I remember when comments about Wendy Whelan were split between her dancing and her extreme musculature (and thinness). In the latter years of her career, I rarely saw those comments - it was all about her dancing. And then there's this: http://dancemagazine.com/issues/July-2008/Is-Muscular-the-New-Skinny Most of the article is about modern dancers, but ballet dancers are also represented and interviewed. Re your comment about Misty not looking like a 14 year old because of her womanly body: Have you seen 14 year old girls today? I work with middle school students all the time and most of them look like women in their 20's. I think it's truer today than in Juliet's time. However, as a local history buff, I've gone through hundreds of old class photos from my town and the surrounding towns. I'd say that the 14 year olds from the late 1800's were at least evenly split in looking either like a child or a woman. The exceptions are ballet dancers and gymnasts who nearly always look much younger than their years, but that's not true of the general population. I think Misty's "womanly body" is just fine for a 14 year old, even in Shakespeare's time.

Canbelto, I wondered if she requested that she not be asked about herself. Her life was so difficult at that time, wasn't it? The interview was in 1984, so it was 5 years after she retired. Her husband was quadriplegic and had many medical bills. From what I've read, that was a sad and anxiety-ridden time for Fonteyn. Just a few years later, she was diagnosed with cancer and didn't have the money to pay for her own medical bills, so Nureyev did. I can see why she would rather have herself be off limits. Also, the interview was to promote her book about Pavlova that had just come out.

Move Arron Scott up to soloist. He's been doing those roles for many years as a corps member. Also, I second Imspear on the more coaching at all levels.

Oooh, exciting! Now I just have to find someone with a TV!

Sandik, that's what cements my attendance to a dance company. I too love to watch the dancers develop. It's almost like watching your family grow up. I think that's what draws so many people to NYCB. We get to know so many dancers so well over the years. I love noticing when a dancer who maybe has had trouble with certain aspects of technique finally masters it. It's like having a favorite baseball team. I followed the NY Yankees for decades, only quit when I gave up the TV. But I loved watching the team players grow in ability and in the most human way, I considered them "mine" and felt proud. I have the same response to ballet dancers. But I've always found that ABT doesn't offer up enough of that to me, whereas NYCB is a follower's dream.

Helene, my post wasn't meant to be a discussion of where and when dancing students go to summer intensives, but a statement of why ABT's corps can never, under present conditions, look like NBC's corps, and about why many ballet companies in the USA have ballet schools. Unlike NYCB, who regularly hire from their school, most ballet companies don't. Maybe they do for trainee or apprentice programs (which are often unpaid, and many of them even require the "trainee" to pay school tuition), but not when it comes to hiring directly into the company. The company basically gets free or close to free labor. So, in discussing ABT's school, I wondered if the training is good enough to be hired into ABT (I've heard pros and cons, but it's encouraging to know that a couple beautiful dancers from JKO are now apprentices with ABT). As a a member of the board of directors of a well-respected ballet pre-professional school and as mom to a former serious ballet student who had a professional dancing career, it's been hard not to notice how many summer programs and year-round schools have sprouted up in the aftermath of the economic crash. And how most ballet companies now require students to attend their summer programs as a long-term auditioning process for filling their trainee/apprentice ranks. Rarely are those dancers actually brought into the corps. So dance students are required, when they are in the 17-18 year old range, to put all their eggs into one basket whereas the ballet companies benefit tremendously by being able to fill their summer school rosters. It wasn't like that in my daughter's day. I think it's a terrific marketing plan on the part of ballet companies because it provides a steady cash stream, but it makes it that much harder for students on the verge of professional auditions to get noticed by more than the one company whose summer school they attended. I am hoping very much that ABT will follow NYCB's hiring model. NYCB has never been known for a perfectly synchronized corps, but their corps is dancing fast and at levels at least equivalent to that of soloists and principals. It's a different animal. But with ABT's repertoire, it seems to me that if they hire dancers who've been in their own school for a good 2 or 3 years (after all, even SAB is a finishing school since they weed out most of their homegrown students at around ages 11-13 to make room for talented students from elsewhere in the world), then there will more synchronicity of their corps.

Volcanohunter, I believe that the National Ballet of Canada hires most of their dancers from their school. So, with the identical long-term training, it would make sense that they'd have the kind of unity you speak of. Dancers at ABT come from various schools and have had different training backgrounds: Vaganova, Cecchetti, Balanchine (yeah, I know there's no specific Balanchinian syllabus, but you can still always tell if someone's been trained in the B. style). I think it's impossible for ABT, without enough corps rehearsal time and maybe even with, to be able to achieve such unity. It would be nice if they would start using their JKO school (assuming the training is up to par) as their method of hiring dancers. But right now, I see the school strictly as a cash cow for them ala their ballet summer intensive programs that are now all over the USA. Their "brand" name (everything and everyone is now a "brand," right?) is golden, but there are loads more summer intensives with better training.

Vipa, I don't think it's unfair to compare the best with someone who's not. In fact, I think it's very fair. It shows us what one can work on to measure up against the best. Sarah Lane is a very beautiful dancer who, in order to not dance small, needs to develop better musical phrasing. It's not to say she's unmusical. In fact, I find her very musical. But, in my terms, she's too centered. I have found, over and over again in my work on musical phrasing with dancers, that they are unaware of how they sit in the beat and when it's brought to their attention, within a few weeks they've made mighty changes. It's something I also worked on with the ballet dancer I know best, who also happened to be an Irish dancer. She used what she knew from Irish dance musical phrasing in her ballet musical phrasing and was known in her professional life for her attack and charge.

I've never been to a performance Lane has danced in, so I can't speak from that experience. But today, I decided to head over to youtube to see what I could find. Mind you, I never took ballet, so I don't know all the terms, but I'm a musician which makes me see dance from that perspective. I watched Lane and Gorak in Flower Festival and then I watched Cojarocu and Kobborg dance in it. In watching Lane first, I found that I admired her port des bras, but that I thought she danced in a very measured way. She had a way of sinking dead center in the music - what I call sitting in the beat - which is very nice, very pretty, but very unexciting. In dancing to music (I teach musical phrasing to championship Irish dancers), one can be on the beat in 3 different ways: one can be charging, one can dance in the very center of the music, and one can "bring up the rear." The first scenario shows an energetic dancer charging the beat. It's exciting and very crisp. The second example has a dancer performing right in the center of the beat. They are usually very neat, pretty dancers, but there's no electricity. The final way of staying on the beat is what I call "bringing up the rear" meaning that while technically, the dancer is not off time, but s/he appears heavy. In Irish dance, the ones who charge are the ones who win. There's an electricity to that kind of dancing. Cojaracu is that kind of dancer. There's nothing measured about her musical phrasing. It's quick, yet very much well timed musically. There's practically an electrical flow to what she does, whereas Lane, while musically correct, appears bland by contrast. When I work with Irish dancers, I always tell them to charge the beat. It can completely recreate a dancer's look. There's nothing wrong with dancing in the middle of the beat, but it's dull. Maybe beautiful, but too much sameness. That's what I see in Lane. I apologize for the very un-dance terminology. But I have found that every time I love a dancer and find that others find that dancer exciting and very musical as well, it turns out to be someone with that bit of charge. Sitting in the beat creates too much smoothness, too much sameness.

Regarding sitting on the sidelines or dancing a lot, I know that I would have a hard time leaving ABT if I were a dancer with them. It's SO hard to get a long-term contract in ballet that having a steady income with ABT would be worth it. Most companies here in the USA have short seasons. All too many companies are struggling much harder than ABT. I couldn't imagine leaving a paid dancing position, even if I felt I were underutilized, to head for the uncertainties of another company. Not unless I were close to the point of leaving the dancing life altogether. At that point, it would probably be worth it to give it a try elsewhere.

So, there must be a reason other than her dancing that causes Lane to be overlooked or, more actively, ignored? Is it because of her "Black Swan" controversy?

I think, Stuben, it might be a testament to how tight the budget is that ABT won't give their homegrown dancers a chance. It takes a little bit of time for word to travel - not much these days - about how gorgeous this or that new dancer is in a particular role if s/he is not one of the international stars or has managed to market herself up to being one, as did Misty Copeland, who is now a "brand." I think it tells us just how close ABT is holding their budget. Penny-wise and pound foolish if you ask me. They're willing to pay big bucks for these stars, but their own dancers could easily become big stars if they'd give them enough chances. And they'd cost a whole lot less too. Look at NYCB has done that! Ashley Bouder, Tiler and Tyler, Sara Mearns, Sterling Hyltin, the Fairchild siblings, etc. The list is long.

Re the NYCB "mouse," I remember feeling duped when I first discovered that it really wasn't Darci Kistler (my first NYCB Sugar Plum) being amazing. ....Well, she was. But it took me a long time to accept that little contraption.

Re Copeland's fouette traveling: Julie Kent may have been a beautiful dancer, but I couldn't bear to watch her fouettes. She traveled all across the stage (well, that's an exaggeration, but it sure felt like it - no straight lines the, albeit, few times I saw her do them live).

I think that the evolution was in the viewers' minds, not her development (although of course she improved - it's the rare dancer who doesn't over time). I was lucky enough to see Reyes dance her first week with ABT and fell in love with her then. To me, she was a complete dancer. No awkward upper body, no evident effort in what she did. She had beautiful lines, port des bras, was highly musical and could act. To me, the complete package. My admiration only grew over time as I saw her in more and more roles. I'm so glad that she didn't get stuck in the demi-character world. I will miss her enormously.

Amour, thanks for explaining that comment. I hadn't realized the Mariinsky had declined that badly! If a dancer doesn't have beautiful epaulement and port des bras, I can't watch. In fact, I wince the whole time. I can't even think of them as dancers.

" And he still has the gorgeous epaulement, carriage and refinement of a Mariinsky dancer. It's just, it's the Mariinsky of a decade ago." Amour, I am really curious about the second sentence in this statement. Can you please explain it to this "bear of very little brain"?

Re the term "Native American," my son, who documented in pictures a Rolling Thunder motorcycle trip from California to Washington D.C. for a book on patriotism in America a few years ago, spent two weeks on reservations out west. He asked various people at these reservations what terminology they preferred. Every single one said "Native, not Native American" as the word "America" comes from the Italian explorer/navigator Amerigo Vespucci.

Surprisingly, technique can be hard to acquire once a dancer becomes professional. Ballet students in the pre-professional schools spend many hours a day in ballet classes: 1.5 hour technique class followed by 1 hour (or 45 min.) pointe class followed by a variations class followed by rehearsals is quite common 5 or 6 days a week. Sometimes rep and character classes are interchanged (or maybe pointe and variations), but suffice it to say that ballet students spend far more time perfecting their technique than do ballet professionals. Additionally, they spend that time under the watchful eyes of their teachers who constantly feed individual and group corrections. By the time dancers are in a ballet company, they are expected to be fully formed technically, or at least very close to it. It is expected that they will, throughout the rest of their career, continue towards mastery, but their technique needs to be solid enough for that to happen. What I've seen is that all too often (in the last 15 years or so) a young phenomenal but not yet fully matured ballet student - perhaps due to beautiful feet or line or high extensions - is hired by a ballet company. But the dancer is really a good year or perhaps more away from being able to study on her/his own without the intensity of a full training program. And they seem to then get stuck at that level, not developing to the level of their potential. I always want these students to spend that extra year or so in training: WHAT a difference when they do! I feel that way about Hee Seo. I've always felt that way about Paloma Hererra (I'll probably get vilified for saying so), but for different reasons. They each need more of the other's talent. I don't think either was "finished" as a ballet studentwhen they became a professional dancer . Certainly, Paloma was rushed into ABT. I feel that, had she had another year or two, she would have developed more of the artistry - the upper body development - she's always lacked. But she was a phenom and ABT wanted to cash in on saying they hired a 15 year old. I feel that way about SO many dancers. In my tenure as a "ballet mom" to a ballet dancer at a pre-pro school who later danced professionally for 8 years, I've watched some amazingly talented, but not yet "finished" dancers get hired and then never grow much, whereas while at the ballet school, their technique and artistry continued to develop. Some professional dancers - the most conscientious perhaps - recognize this in themselves and set about to get more training, successfully doing so. But in fairness to those who don't, that is very hard to do with the kind of schedule a ballet company maintains. Ballet class is the warm-up, working on rep is the job. Ballet masters and mistresses do their best, but funding and time is limited. I had many conversations with a former ABT ballet mistress who spoke strongly about how much they all would have loved to spend more time with certain dancers because they knew exactly what needed to be worked on, but there was no time or money to pay them. So I'm all in favor of the slow boil.