SandyMcKean

PNB just posted the TV ad spot to Facebook via YouTube

Interesting how they used footage from some previous performance (Dutch National Ballet, I presume) to show the scenery and wide angle scenes, but then superimposed images of PNB dancers in full costume on top of that footage to give the impression that this promo was shot on the PNB stage with all PNB dancers (which is, of course, impossible at this early phase of the process).

Woopie!

Like you say.....something really cool could happen with this.

Sandik, has Morris ever choreographed anything of significance with his home town of Seattle as the direct inspiration before??

In the interview innopac cites above, Stephen Manes makes a powerful observation when asked what he found that was extraordinary in the world of ballet:

So is the teaching. What surprised me in the PNB school was the authority conveyed by the instructors thanks to their professional experience and knowledge. I also found their total absence of condescension toward their students noteworthy. I suspect there are lessons to be learned from this by teachers of almost anything

It struck me (as it obviously did him) how different primary education in this country might be if it had the aspects of: "hands-on" by teachers that really knew their subject from experience, truly loved the subject themselves, and always put the students and the subject first. Some sort of intra-country "Peace Corps" perhaps?????

Gilbreath, Kitchens, and Dec are the three demi-soloists in the section before the jumping diagonals.

My favorite comment in this video is when Ratmansky stops the dance (at 0:54) commenting to the pianist (Christina Siemens) that the tempo is too fast for the dancers to do the steps properly -- indeed Ratmansky says that at that speed it is almost impossible to do......then Ratmansky goes on to say: "They did it actually."

One on my most beloved aspects of our PNB company is its speed (I smell the ghost of Mr B ........thanks Francia).

P.S.

While he's speaking about 2/3 in, Sarah Ricard Orza is to his right, and I think that was Margaret Mullin to his left

Yes, it's Margaret.

Here is a video from a photo shoot with Carla Korbes and Karel Cruz; Angela Sterling is the photographer:

I have no qualms whatsoever in declaring that Angela Sterling, Carla Korbes, Karel Cruz, and Alexei Ratmansky are all exceptional artists at the top of their game, but after having seen this show stopping video of a photo-shoot no less, I have to wonder if the videographer Lindsay Thomas hasn't almost surpassed them all. Remarkable!

P.S. It's her creative and dramatic editing that blows me away. (She always seems to match to the music.......even in those clips where the music isn't even from that ballet.)

Thanks, 4mrdncr, for the very informative history. I'm sort of the techie-geek, so I like this stuff.

......for me it's about being in and part of an audience.

I too clap at the Met Opera performances in a theater.......and thinking about it (the "why" of it), it is, I think, for the reason above. Performing arts simply don't happen without an audience. No performer any of us know could possibly excel with no audience. In that lies the "magic" of the performing arts. I think I simply miss being part of that audience. Clapping to a screen is technically dumb, but emotionally satisfying.

Here's another strange one for you. Sometimes when I see a Met Opera there are only 3 or 4 other people in the theater (especially at the encore performances). I am always disappointed when the "house" is so small. It affects my mood during the entire performance. I far prefer when there are dozens or hundreds of people there (altho not a full house). I suspect I have these irrational feelings because the "power" of an audience isn't restricted to just the performers themselves feeding off it (ask any performer and they will tell about how they "feel" the audience's attention and appreciation), but all the human beings in the room feed off it.....and that includes the audience itself.

When I and others clap at a Met performance, we form a community IMHO. So I guess I disagree with the premise that there is no point in clapping since the performers aren't there......the audience is there.....and they are alive and communicating (it's no accident it seems to me that "community" and "communicate" have the same root).

If they go back to someone or some institution that has the a copy made in BETA format of tape (rather than VHS, which became prevalent after 1985), it should be sharper than anything on VHS.

True, if such an old BETA recording exists. But this would be true if they had any other recording at a higher resolution than standard VHS (BETA always had a higher resolution capability than VHS). There were other standards in use too such as Super-VHS which had approx the same resolution capability as BETA did; plus plenty of others. There's nothing magic about BETA (BTW, the actual name is BetaMax), there are lots of recording standards; all that matters is the resolution capacity of the standard whether you call it Beta, VHS, Super-VHS, or Mickey Mouse (the MM standard I presume,,,).

P.S. Since some folks seem interested in the details, I will need to correct what I said above somewhat. Analog TV resolution is actually 525 lines of which about 480 are visible. However TVs did something call "interlacing" so in reality only 240 of those 480 were displayed at any given moment (in the next moment the other 240 lines were displayed between the previous set of lines -- your brain combined them into what appeared to you as 480 lines). VHS and Beta only recorded 240 of those 480 lines (altho beta did it better and therefore looked better). So when I said that if you recorded off a TV in the old days that you would only capture 240 lines, that was because of the VHS or Beta limitation, not the TV's limitation. When DVDs came out, there was finally a way to use all 480 lines that an analog TV was capable of (in the USA), so that's why DVDs looked so much better. Today digital HDTVs can do the equivalent of some 1300+ lines -- which only Blu-ray can deliver in a consumer recorded product. (Yeah, I know....probably more than you wanted to know.....).

There might be a misunderstanding here. When I say "original recording" I mean the recording that was done in the theater, or studio, or where ever the live dancers were when someone used some sort of recording device to capture the live action onto some sort of media. When someone like Nonesuch makes a DVD, or whatever, I have little doubt they go back to that original recording -- assuming it has not been lost.

I suppose that in some situations the only existing recording of some performance is some old VHS derivative copy or what have you. If that's true, then no matter what they do in re-issuing the recording, the quality can never be any better than this old derivative copy.

P.S. Now this is not to say that in re-issuing the recording in a new format, the creators can't mess around with how the audio and video relate (in all recording techniques the video and the audio are recorded separately and the play back device uses various time codes etc to sync the video with the audio). This can be messed up, not only by the creators, but by your play back device at home if your device doesn't understand these sync codes properly (there is a lot of incompatibility in the world of digital media techniques). I suppose the creator could even attempt to substitute a different audio track if they could find or create one at the same tempo. I've seen this done in a Russian release of an opera where it appears that the creators had some singers lip sync a new audio track in a studio to replace the original audio track.

I have a large collection of DVDs which I have transferred from the original tape to DVD. Lately, many of these have been issued commercially. I have bought a few and I am usually disappointed in the quality---they are rarely better than what I have, apparently nothing is done to improve the quality.

Actually, that may not be surprising. Altho it is possible to degrade the original recording quality when making a video tape or a DVD, it is unlikely anyone would do that (at least not on purpose). So the quality of what you see is usually dependent on the quality of the original recording device and media. In buying the DVD, all you've likely done is given yourself a different vehicle for playing it back (i.e., DVDs are far more convenient that video tape). The DVDs you purchased were likely created using the same quality original. Altho DVD is capable of higher resolution than video tape, there is no way that simply using DVD as the distribution media can improve on the quality of the original recording.

Now perhaps you mean that the video tape you have, you yourself made by recording off of a TV broadcast back when TV was an analog signal. In that case, I would expect the DVD to be of a better quality since analog TV is 240 lines and DVD is 480 lines, so the DVD should show a marked improvement (unless the original source was so bad that 240 lines was good enough in the first place).

Lesley Rausch and Jerome Tisserand........This pairing will be incredible in the full-length version.

I couldn't agree more, and I'd certainly bet (speaking of betting ). that we will be get to see just that next season.

You might do a search of the forum....I remember at least one quite comprehensive thread on this subject a few years (months?) ago.

Hey, does anyone know which performance of Nutcracker is the "black Nutcracker", or whatever they call it, when the company purposely makes mistakes and generally spoofs itself?

I'm in a Mea Culpa mood. I need to take back much of what I said in this thread on 11/6 after seeing opening night of this rep. I have now seen it twice more, and altho much of my concerns about the rep remain valid (in my mind), I did find much to praise after more exposure.

First, my 11/6 statement that in a "Gala" constructed rep like this:

.....the drama just ain't there.

I still believe this to be so. The key is the word "drama". Taking excerpts creates good opportunities for dancing perhaps, but in terms of the delivery of character, emotion, meaning (if I can use that word), excerpts just can't deliver. What I missed picking up on in that first viewing on opening night is what a fabulous opportunity a rep like this is to show off great dancing by many dancers of all levels. What the rep loses in drama, it makes up for in pure display of virtuoso dancing and in showcasing up-and-coming dancers. On 11/6 I also made the comment that:

I don't know, maybe it was me, but on this opening night, something was missing.

I stand by that assessment also -- more or less. I "blamed" this "missing-ness" on the Gala quality of the rep. I now believe the confusion and lack of precision and power I thought I saw in the dancing was the product of large numbers of substitutions and chaos caused by a large number of injuries (as Helene reported above, Peter Boal in a Q&A mentioned 11 dancers were injured.....a huge number in a company with less than 50 dancers). Well, this great company and its dedicated professionals, soon made short shrift of that problem. The 2 additional performances I saw the following weekend had none of that. Indeed, over last weekend, I saw some of the most together and powerful dancing I have ever seen.

Once I "got" that the power of this rep is seeing lots of dancers showing their stuff (leaving it all out on the floor), my attitude totally changed. I was lucky enough to have seen all 3 performances of Carrie Imler and Lucien Postlewaite in the Black Swan PdD. I have long claimed that these 2 are the most accomplished male and female dancers in the company. We rarely get to see them together (my guess is that Lucien isn't quite big/strong enough to match Carrie well). What they did over the course of these 3 performances was simply incredible. It was mentioned in a Q&A that these 2 masterful principal dancers, who seem capable of doing whatever they put their minds to, fell into a playful match of professional competition. As each took their turn at the solos in this famous PdD, they challenged each other to "top that!".......and top it they did. They deservedly brought the house down every time. As great as the Ilmer/Postlewaite display was, there was so much else to see over these performances. As Helene mentioned above, overall this rep belonged to Jerome Tisserand. Jerome is a corps man (promoted to soloist just a day or 2 ago) whose day had come. I suspect many dancers take their rightful place fully on the stage when, by chance, they are called on to step up to a challenge almost impossible on the surface. Naturally in ballet, such a calling often springs out of a situation of injuries. Jerome was originally scheduled as the 4th cast for "Afternoon of a Faun" with only a single scheduled performance as the last performance of the rep on a Sunday matinee (often the time that corps dancers are given a shot at a principal role). Well, Jerome danced the Faun 4 times including opening night where he was a sensation. His "carry the company on my back" opportunity was far from being limited to just the challenge of the Faun; Jerome also danced Romeo to newly promoted principal Leslie Rausch's Juliette in Maillot's R&J (Prokofiev) with, as I understand it, a mere 2 weeks to rehearse the role when the original cast(s) became injured. What Jerome and Leslie created (they did not dance opening night) was pure magic. I've been a fan of Rausch's for many years and have been very gratified to see her recent meteoric rise in the company. The characterization and the muscality she displayed in the role of Juliette on the 2nd weekend was nothing short of spectacular. She and Jerome created an artistic combination of teenage playfulness, genuine passion, youthful exuberance, and modern assertiveness that was different than any other pair I've seen do this ballet. I hesitate to say it, but their interpretation is the best I've seen.....and that's saying a lot. I won't go on about so many other dancers we got to see "on display" in this rep since Helene has chronicled that very well above (Davis, Biassucci, Reshef, Clark, etc), but it was a joy to see these young dancers step up to the plate and pretty much universally knock it out of the park.

One final comment, and here I must make an apology to Balanchine. May the Ballet Gods strike me down cold dead if I ever doubt Mr B's genius again. After opening night I made the rash statement upthread that:

Even "Le Baiser de la Fee" .........I just didn't like it....a rare thing for me to say about anything Balanchine.

Well, of course it was me, not Baiser that was the problem. I just didn't "get" the music that first time. I wanted to hear Stravinsky since I absolutely love his music. I knew there would be Tchaikovsky influence, but I just wasn't able to find a place in that music to stand. I was neither here nor there. For me, when the music doesn't click, I almost never like the ballet.....the two are just too intertwined in my being. Well, leave it to Mr B and his genius for educating one "to see the music"......and "see" it I did that 2nd weekend. For the thousandth time....thank you Mr B. Baiser is different, more cut into short exploding gems, but how Tchaikovsky, Stravinsky, and Balanchine blend in that piece is truly remarkable. As I think Helene said above, it is a piece for aficionados. It was like seeing a cubist painting for the first time: at first, it looks like boring nonsence, but in time its bits and pieces blend into a whole that could not be expressed with more traditional methods. Strangely, the piece "I just didn't like" on opening night, in spite of the other spendors in this rep, is the very piece I'd most like to see again. Mr B moves even higher in my pantheon (if that's possible).

Thanks Helene.....I'm trying to figure out when to go again during the 2nd weekend. Your spreadsheet saves me a bunch of time trying to figure out casting. I wasn't smart enough to look at the website.....my plan today was to call the box office! (I bet that would not have gone well .)

I only have time for a quick comment.....hopefully, I will post a longer review later -- perhaps after I've seen the program again.

I wasn't thrilled with this program. I haven't really thought about this before, but constructing an entire program out of tid-bits from large, or at least larger, ballets may be a mistake. It works, and works well, for such things as a Gala or an end of season retrospective encore evening, but as a stand alone program, I now have my doubts.

In a word, the drama just ain't there. The Black Swan PdD is wonderful of course (and Carrie Imler paired with Postlewaite were the highlight of the night -- see exception later), but the PdD comes so out of context that it loses much of its power (no Odile/Rothbart plotting for example). That's fine, even desirable, if such an extract is used to fill a need for a short piece to fill out an otherwise well thought out program, but when the evening is extract after extract.....something is missing. I thought it was missing for the dancers too. They seemed lack luster and even confused. If I'm right about that, it could have been the result of the many injury driven substitutions; but I wonder if a program like this deflates the inspiration and motivation of the dancers. Maybe a program constructed like this has the dancers focused on "doing the steps" rather than on being something other than themselves as inspired by the piece as a work of art.

I don't know, maybe it was me, but on this opening night, something was missing. The exception was Robbins "Afternoon of a Faun" danced superbly by Jerome Tisserand and Kylie Kitchens (great casting BTW). I was captivated by this piece (my first time seeing it). From the moment when Tisserand lifted his torso to stretch like an animal waking in the afternoon sunshine, I was hooked. What I saw in that piece was artistry -- maybe it isn't chance that this was the one piece that was presented as created. (Even "Le Baiser de la Fee" was once a longer, more fully designed piece. I guess one could argue that Baiser was presented as a complete work of art that night. But for me, I just didn't like it....a rare thing for me to say about anything Balanchine.)

Sandy has since replied that this is no longer happening, and that there is a lag time.

Yes. At first going to "View New Content" reset the list of listed posts to zero on every visit (even 2 minutes later). But that has since changed (maybe when the default was made to be "Since Last Visit"). Whatever the case, I have been doing some testing over the last several days, and I can report that over 30 visits or so, with time intervals from 1 minute to 24 hours, I have not missed a single message, and the system behavior is consistent except that I can't figure out how it determines when to reset to a new last visit. Sometimes it resets in an hour, sometimes in 4 hours (I don't think I saw an instance of a reset time outside those bounds). Perhaps in addition to lapsed time, the reset also depends on how many posts are posted, or some other variable.

Bottom line is that in my testing, "View New Content" works, and works just like in did in the old version of the software (with some additional bells and whistles).

bart, just a tweak.....

On my system the icon that shows up for each thread one hovers over on the "View New Content" screen is a down pointing arrow. Once one clicks on it to see the previews, then the icon turns into an X

Just to throw another 2 cents in the pot........

1. Overall, I loved the way MCB dances: quality, joy, technical skills, spirit, interpretation of Mr B........(I guess with a company like this, I could live in Miami after all ).

2. I more or less hated the camera work. Maybe this isn't so much a problem of the director and the other camera influencing folks, but rather that it is just impossible to capture dance properly on video. But having said that, frankly, I still think the direction could have been better. You can't cut it up so much; you can't restrict us, the viewers, from so much of the action so much of the time. (P.S. I remember when I first saw the MET-HD operas in their first season and into the second, I didn't like the camera work. I kept saying myself...."STOP moving the camera.....just sit there.") Well, I got used to it, and I think the directors got MUCH better at it. Now I love how it works at the Met. But you can effectively go in close in opera since the action is so often in just one spot.....dance is a whole other ball game.)

ARGH, KCTS, the Seattle PBS I get, doesn't have this anywhere on their online schedule--unless I somehow missed it.

Oh no!.....you missed it. It is in the KCTS schedule. You just missed the re-broadcast today at 2pm. Below is from their website:

PBS Arts from Miami: Miami City Ballet Dances Balanchine and Tharp

Air: Friday, October 28, 9:00 pm on KCTS 9 HDSeattle/Yakima

Future Airs: 10/30/11, 2:00 pm KCTS 9 HDSeattle/Yakima; 10/30/11, 2:00 pm KYVE 47Yakima

always have to sign in from scratch, even with that box checked

I'd bet dollars to donuts that this "automatic login" facility depends on you allowing your browser to form cookies on your machine. If you have disallowed cookie formation, then that might explain what you see. (BTW, I am on a PC.)

A couple of other things........

1. Deleting a post - I take it there is no way for a member to delete their own posting (even if it is the last post in the thread).

2. Mark ALL as Read - the software allows me to mark threads in a forum or subforum as read, but I can find no way to mark ALL threads in a particular forum, and in all its subforums at once, as read; nor can I mark all posts across the entire board as read.

P.S. Perhaps this is as it has always been, but I don't remember that.

The change was made because of so many complaints that the list was too far behind in the updates and showed content that was already read.

OK.....I can live with that. (I guess I'm in the vast minority on this one .)

Helene,

I'm wondering if there is a system-wide configuration setting for determining messages "Since my last visit" under "View New Content"? The current situation on BA seems to mean this literally. That is, if I go to the board under this option, I naturally see all msgs since the last time I was on the board. What's different is that if I leave the site, and then come back just a minute later, I see no msgs under "Since my last visit" for "View New Content". This is literally correct of course, but most boards I'm familiar with (including the old BA software) give a grace period (an hour maybe).

I wonder if there is a setting where the current 0 minutes grace period can be changed? The reason I find this useful is that sometimes I leave the board only to find that I wish I hadn't (something forgotten perhaps). By going back to the board just a few minutes later, I like to find myself right back where I was, not have the entire list of new content reset to zero. I will admit that having a 30 or 60 minute grace period can cause problems too, since it's a bit inconsistent to come back to the board and see not the true new content, but the content that was new when you went there initially, say 10 minutes earlier. But for me, that inconsistency is worth the ability to go back to the board quickly and not "lose my place".

have to go through the hassle of a login

I presume you know this, but just choose not to use it, but just in case......

One can select the option ("remember me") of having the logon be automatic....then it is zero hassel. I just click on my "BalletAlert" link on my desktop, and I am instantily into the site and logged on. I'd hate to have to logon everytime.