papeetepatrick

This IS a good question, and partially because we want to be sentimental about our favourite dancers and close off the possibility that someone else could even be a candidate. And aside from the dancer, we want to see something ultimate, which may be why we fixate on the dancer--s/he seems to have captured that 'ultimate', and we don't even really want to entertain the possibility that s/he could be equalled or surpassed. And the question is phrased perfectly, because the answer is obvious, even though we resist it. There IS always something new a dancer can bring to a role either 'centuries old' or 'epitomized' by another 'legend'. Of course, it's a bit more subtle, because even if a dancer does bring something new, it doesn't necessarily follow that the old 'idealized' one is 'inferior'. That one is always going to be treasured. It's also that ballets made for a dancer retired, but still living, are harder to see someone else do if you have a strong attachment to the original--say, all the original Balanchine dancers in 'Jewels', especially 'Diamonds' perhaps. But when they're gone, as all the original Petipa Swans and Beauties are, we already did make the transition away from the original performance to 'ideal Odettes' and 'ideal Auroras' in the late 20th century. I don't see how Sizova's Aurora can be improved upon, but part of that is that I am so fond of it I don't want to. I hadn't thought ot it this way before, and that part I have to be aware of--and get over, because it's not really a meaningful perception.

There's a lot about how the machine itself remembers, but, interestingly, it doesn't always lead to a forgetting by certain avid users of the medium. I have found at least one user who has a 'memorization gift' that is much like mine, from having memorized much music, most likely. In both cases, we remember almost every word with which we're both familiar from back to 2004, when we both started, from online texts, viz., certain forums and blogs (and not just correspondence with each other, but which both had read.) So it works in strange ways. I'm interested in this book, too, although what has been said here is of a sort that is more well-known but very important: People put a lot of personal things on the internet that they ought not to, because they don't think it will backfire later. But it often does. But the 'letting the machine remember' is also exactly like when the clerks at the grocery store no longer had to figure out the change they had to give back. I rely on my online banking for nearly everything in terms of remembering things for me in that way. As for what bart says about Fellini, there are many PoMo types who seriously reinvent their personas on blogs, of course. I think this is pretty deadly unless behind it there is something ultimately even more fantastic. In fact, that does happen, but it's much more frequently the opposite, and so there are those addicts who 'live' this way.

Running out, but not sure you were responding to me or not, but no, of course not 'trashy'. I meant by 'vulgarity' something else at least some of the time (there is definitely 'bad vulgar', most of 'vulgar' is 'bad', but some is humorous and even arresting), and there's also the not small matter that they are those who will find something vulgar that others do not. What you've brought for me, therefore, is the difficulty that defining terms means (and a dictionary definition won't do in this case, at least not for 'vulgar', it won't be enough), and 'trashy' is definitely more clear-cut in its meaning: Maybe some use of 'trashy' in pop art is appealing to some, but I can't ever see a ballet being done trashily as being anything other than worthless. As for a vulgar ballet, that one would probably need even more fineness of performance, there's enough vulgarity written into it already, god knows. I think the POB Don Quixote tape with Aurelie Dupont is very good in this way, although it may have ended up a bit mechanical-looking as well, not sure. But 'hokey' can sometimes be the same as vulgar, just as 'vulgarisms' are sometimes a matter of local dialect in speech, they can be slang that is 'common', but not lewd or offensive. 'Yeah, right' is pretty vulgar as far as I'm concerned as is 'you gotta do whatcha gotta do', but they're not going to offend the Morals Police.

Nanarina...if a Cuban dancer doesn't get the screams and the whistling, he or she would be probably very worried and thinking..."OMG, am I being THAT boring...? No, do whatever you want in a Cuban theater BUT being quite-(unless you are disliking the dancer, and this mantra applies specially for Miss V ) I agree with Cristian. A lot of ballet is even hokey, like 'Le Corsaire' and 'La Bayadere', that's not Noh Drama or a Palestrina Mass performed at St. John the Divine. And if it's typically Cuban, that means that's what the culture wants it to be. 'Quiet and dignified' is not for everybody, and not for most of us all the time. I want lots of rawness, I don't want only 'refined things'. Frankly, vulgarity is itself not something you can decide on as an inferior thing; sure, you can say so, but anyone can disagree by either saying or just going ahead with some sort of vulgarity. It's according to where you do it, which is to say that vulgarity has to be done with taste just like everything else--or else it becomes tacky (that's different). Some ballets are frankly vulgar, and certainly the horsey music that goes with some of it. People enjoy Minkus, but it's often vulgar. Audience reaction is not vulgar if the culture accepts it. Lots of opera is vulgar, 'Pagliacci' is vulgar but tasty, 'Carmen' is vulgar in some ways but gorgeous, you could easily describe 'Le Corsaire' as vulgar, or even 'Slaughter on 10th Avenue'. These elements of vulgarity are part of what make these works singular, although it's another question whether the more non-vulgar sort of work like 'Parsifal' or Bach's B Minor Mass or 'Chaconne' is therefore necessarily greater. I'm not sure, but probably usually. I'd definitely say 'Chaconne' was greater than 'Slaughter', but I don't know if 'Parsifal' is necessarily greater than 'Carmen', even if it appears in some ways to be, since more 'pristine'. As for dancers themselves, you could say some have vulgarities sometimes, as with Nureyev perhaps, but I like these. Then you have dancers who never seem vulgar, like Verdy or Fonteyn (except maybe moonlighting a bit in it with Rudi in that film of 'Corsaire', although it's mainly just sort of adorably naughty), and maybe Baryshnikov never seems vulgar. I don't think certain vulgarities make certain of these dancers less great. There's a whole range of things to be expressed. There's a lot of talk of Somova's vulgarity, but I like some of it when it's not totally out of control.

It's something about HER, I think. I've always loved her, she's warm, exquisitely beautiful, dances beautifully (if not on the very highest level), and she's the thing in 'Davidsbundlertanze' in terms of the greatest depths. But I remember her wonderful in many things, 'Ballet Imperial', the siren in 'Prodigal Son', I even like her in 'Emeralds'. Croce writes about the years Balanchine tried to make her a substitute for Farrell in her absence in the early 70s, but later you'd see the two of them on the stage at the same time, and there was not any sense of competition (I'm not talking about their different gifts, but rather the way they interacted with each other, however slightly). She had a maturity and beauty which made up for not being the most stellar of dancers IMO. Balanchine loved her, of course. She was bright and self-possessed, she knew she wasn't Farrell, and never really tried to be.

Godard's 'Contempt' is great, IMO.

Happy Birthday, Brigitte! We love you!

Oh dear me. Don't take it personally, but there is a LOT fun about getting older, I was just talking to one of my best friends about it last night. And I don't mean just getting better-lookiing. Also, adore both of these ladies, but do love term 'mobile contours' for Bardot, especially as in 'La Parisienne', because she knew how to flesh-shake just right, it was a little quicker movement than Monroe's. But that's not the only woman-look I like, dirac. Hope this doesn't sound too 'object-oriented', I think men tend to be like that whichever gender they're eyeing. Mashinka, thanks for posting, although another friend had mentioned Bardot out of the blue yesterday, and when I saw your post, I was alarmed for a second, you know! Oh well, this part I totally must dispute. Of course it's quite possible that when Cynthia imitated Bardot, it came out cheap-looking, but you know, we don't all think of one of these kinds of girls as 'nice' and the other 'cheap'. And Cynthia didn't have to do it. Clearly though, it was Brigitte's and John's fault more than Cynthia's somehow? And it's possible there are many meanings to 'liberation', no matter what the subject-to-be-liberated is.

Those aren't traditionally what we look for in the ballerina mystique, which obviously didn't originate in the raw U.S. The crepuscular ballerina is a hothouse thing of Old Europe. But I thought this all-Americanism worked well in things like 'Allegro Brillante', and I saw her do this live numerous times; I always thought it was spot on. Otherwise, the absence of 'true ballerina' mystique is truly in evidence in the tape of 'Emeralds', it frankly even seems 'bad'. Somebody recently quoted Croce talking about 'Ballo del Regina', and saying something like, since it was Balanchine, 'who cares if Ballo isn't that great?' And I think that's the ballet made for Merrill, and I do care that it isn't that great, and it does bore me to tears, maybe the only Balanchine piece that does.

I've noticed that Maryinksky inspires far more passionate writing, both here at BT and elsewhere, than any other company. It's always been the Gold Standard, hasn't it? except maybe New York City Ballet from 1950-1980, maybe, and periods of the RB and POB (I know I'm leaving out some things, including great periods for ABT, a few others). But the Gold Standard when you take the long view, maybe. Also, think it's important to point out that not nearly all of us at BT dislike Somova and there were dancers writing here that they thought she would fulfill her potential. I don't know whether she will, but the Somova-loathing is not all-pervasive. I thought her marvelous in 'Ballet Imperial', and I was expecting to hate her after reading all the reviews here and seeing awful clips, so I guess I might respectfully disagree with bart that Somova-dislike is a 'given' (not quite, even though there is much Somova-bashing here.) I did find that people were more fierce in their feelings during the 2008 CCNY run than I have ever seen in any NYCB or ABT threads. Maybe Somova even provides some sort of 'modernizing dissonance', god knows she's exciting in one way or another.

Carbro, thanks for the Cynthia Gregory clip--she's not quite 'young-girlish', (maybe a little too horsey and extroverted?) from what I can tell here, to be the Aurora I tend to envision, but it's superb dancing and very musical too. Those devilish balances not as exquisite and feminine as Sizova's, but otherwise, hardly a thing not to admire here.

After a certain point of getting familiar with ballet, I don't think any great dancer makes it look difficult or easy for me, just because one knows that it isn't, although paradoxically there is an ease once the euphoria hits, as Villella demonstrates in 'Man Who Dances' despite the even greater pain he was going through than most dancers even at their most strained. As for that remark, I think Nureyev would say anything, so I don't really take it too seriously. To me, he didn't seem to be working any harder than other dancers, just more fantastically. I've noticed over the few years I've been at BT that I don't find dancers profoundly articulate verbally, with Martha Graham being easily the most outstanding exception (she's often been thought to have been a 'lost writer', or whever the phrase was, although 'lost' only because there wasn't time.) We've a thread on this 'verbal articulateness', sure, there are some other exceptions, Melissa Hayden comes to mind, and Villella is as well (extremely), but I don't find many of them to be that striking when describing dance or themselves. It's well-known the many of these off-the-cuff, flip remarks Nureyev indulged in--harmless, but not really serious a lot of them, I think. But yes, you could see Nureyev sweat, I think that's fine for this kind of animal dancer he was. Most of them do sweat, it's surely not all delicate perfume up close. I never saw Kyra Nichols's Mozartiana, but I realize I've never found her nearly as enchanting as most do. Somebody with a body and talent as unusual as Farrell's would probably be the only one I'd be interested to see, I suppose it could happen even though it hasn't yet. I think I have a harder time seeing someone else do Mozartiana than 'Diamonds', although I haven't ever seen anybody else do that either that excited me.

Saradhev has so much pitch it's more like POST-PITCH! Call it rambling, but this was one of the best threads ever--I doubt seriously I'd have ever found out about these things, and am now going to listen to the pieces with the bells to see whether I can tell how they interact in a microtonally harmonic way with the rest of the instruments somehow. Prokofiev has a thick, rich sound, too, don't you think? I always think of Stravinsky as being leaner and more slender in sound, as in Soldat, and even in Sacre du Printemps there's an elegant suaveness. But there is definitely a true Russian sound, even when largely western techniques are still in effect.

That does prove Hans has a good point, though, that we should always point out whether we've seen something on film or live, both and/or only, etc.. I've never seen any Odette I loved more than Makarova's (except for adoring Melissa Hayden's in the Balanchine equally, but in a different way), and I did see it in person. I only saw the film of the Misha/Natasha 'Giselle', and I didn't particularly care for it either, although I've never seen Bruhn/Fracci live and I love them just on film in 'Giselle', despite all the well-known botchings in the film itself.

I don't see why not, Hans, because one of my favourite of all ballet performances--Sizova's Aurora--I only know from film. And in my affections, it ranks with anything I've seen live. Maybe we should include disclaimers as Helene and I have done, though. I also only know Lezhnina from film, etc., and most of what I've seen of Baryshnikov and Nureyev is on film, although I did see them in person as well, although I've loved all their work, or at least liked it a great deal.

I've never disliked Heather Watts, but never gave her much thought either way, although I saw her a lot. A critic friend talked about how she was 'the best at NYCB' in the 80s, something about 'in rehearsal more than performance', but that was pretty abstruse to me. I don't know how highly considered Viviana Durante is, but I find her on the dull side. To be honest, I know what a fine dancer Anthony Dowell, but I've never found him exciting even so. I think I probably don't know what I'm talking about here, but I don't care for Plisetskaya's 'Swan Lake' on film, but this might go along with what Helene is saying about Fonteyn, although I do always like Fonteyn on film, even though I only saw her live in 'Poeme d'Ecstase', which isn't representative. Have never cared for Ethan Steifel, too literal and unpoetic.

That answers some of Amy's questions and then some, doesn't it? It's the bells themselves that definitely are used for microtonal harmonic effects, but the rest of the orchestration is traditional major and minor diatonic tonality, which therefore means the basic harmony is still the same as what Schumann, Liszt, and even to some degree Debussy (although you'll find some of the old modes there, even a trace of Locrian, I believe in one of the piano Etudes; but there are occasional uses of the Lydian mode in Beethoven as well, which you wouldn't expect). Another kind of way of answering this is to take a Tchaikovsky score which doesn't use those bells, whether Kremlin or otherwise, like the Piano Concertos or anything in Swan Lake and Sleeping Beauty: In terms of conventional harmonic rules (no parallel fifths or octaves for the most part, etc., after Josquin des Pres and Machaut were outmoded, although I'm not sure exactly where those medieval practices first stopped being allowed), you will have exactly the same harmonic possibilities as in Bach Fugues or Mozart arias. And only when the carillon or tubular bells are used, as I think Mel is indicating something like 'special effects' within the rest of the orchestral texture, will you have these microtonal harmonies--not as compositional practice within the basic harmony and/or counterpoint, which remains traditional even if there are ways to get some exotic effects even there (think of Scriabin for further exotic sounds.) It's not till Cage's prepared pianos, based on Javanese gamelan, and then others like Partch, who really begin to take these essentially Eastern microtones into the foundation music. So you could 'hear microtonal harmonies' in these Tchaikovsky, Mussorgsky, and Stravinsky works (and others), but it is not the same as music whose entire texture is informed and based on microtones, as in Indian music and the 20th Western music that derived from that. Reminds me, with these Russian 'special effects', a little of the recent conversations on Ruth St. Denis, and her 'orientalisms' which were mostly effects, not yet quite organic. Here is some good basic theory from Wiki: Diatonic and chromatic are terms in music theory that are most often used to characterize scales, and are also applied to intervals, chords, notes, musical styles, and kinds of harmony. They are very often used as a pair, especially when applied to contrasting features of the common practice music of the period 1600–1900.[1] These terms may mean different things in different contexts. Very often, diatonic refers to musical elements derived from the modes and transpositions of the "white note scale" C–D–E–F–G–A–B (see details below).[2] In some usages it includes all forms of heptatonic scale that are in common use in Western music (the major, and all forms of the minor).[3] Chromatic refers to structures derived from the chromatic scale, which consists of all semitones.

Yes, between the ordinary 12 tones, which proceed in half-tones. Between a whole tone is one of these pitches, making three within any single whole tone. 1000 microtone would be between a half- or semi-tone, so that would be the reference point, although you'd just double that for a whole tone, which is like C to D, a semitone is E to F (no 'black keys' in between, as it were.) Well, we can all 'sense 1000 microtones', I guess, very vaguely, this is probably a sort of idiot savant who can actually hear specifically 1000 pitches between two pitches of the chromatic scale. As I had mentioned when talking about Partch, these microtones that he could hear (many more than the usual Western scales, but certainly not anything like our carilloneur), often just sound to us as though the instruments are 'out of tune', because we are used to the diatonic scales and traditional tuning. Oh yes, much more than rhythmic, it's not rigorour counterpoint for one thing, just brushing past that which is the case in fugues, but harmonically different also--but then the progressions undergo evolution even by the time of Haydn and Mozart, not to mention Beethoven; then Chopin and Schumann and Wagner and Debussy, on up to Schoenberg's discovery...but PITCHWISE it is the same. What you quoted about the 1812 Overture would probably mean that the carillon itself had the microtones, just because that's its nature, but it would be limited to the carillon itself for the microtonal effects. At least I think so, not 100% sure because Mel mentions microtonal carillon effects in Mussorgsky and Stravinsky, but were these written into the rest of the instrumentation, the other instruments that are the strings, brass, winds, etc., so I'm not sure whether he means that a carillon is also itself used in these scores. You have to do tuning in such a way to get the carillon effect literally, because when instruments are out of tune, you really are hearing microtones. It is probably possible to get something that approaches microtonal effects in harmonic choices and progressions, with some dissonances that are unexpected within the style even if they are not literally microtones. That could be what you are hearing, but then there's a lot of brooding music in Tchaikovsky too, and the deep romanticism would necessarily attract him to things like the carillon. But it's still primarily cosmopolitan music, like Liszt is 'Hungarian', but not quite as 'folk-oriented' as Bartok, who is much later. But it would definitely have its own 'Russianness' to it, in the same way all that French influence at the imperial courts is unmistakable, but even though it has not been always synthesized into a new kind of esthetic that is more 'its own' outside the cosmopolitanism, it is still arranged differently, because it's not possible to duplicate another culture in an alien one--you can do it superficially, but no further. I'm thinking right now of an exhibition I saw at the Met, I think last year, of some of these imperial treasures, which look very French-volupte, but the emphasis is more on the opulence rather than the subtleties (just a basic parallel example.)

Here's a little article I just found online about the Harvard Russian Carillon, but not much detail beyond mentioning the Eastern scale of harmonies. This is interesting, though. Music Professor Rings Lowell House Bells Since Imported Russian Ringer Drank Ink in Stillman Set of «Zvons» Incomplete After One Off-Key Bell Was Exiled To Business School The 26 tons of metal that make up the bells of Lowell House will not ring out next Sunday morning to shatter the exam period silence, guaranteed Arthur T. Merritt, associate professor of Music and present incumbent of the office of bell-ringer, yesterday. Tuned to an Eastern scale of harmonies which require a certain amount of experience, appreciation, and patience before it can be fully appreciated, the bells now ring at about one month intervals, the concerts coming on the day of rest and effectively warning residents of the Houses that dinner time has arrived. 13 Tons to 22 Pounds There are 16 bells, ranging from a metal monster of 13 tons to a woo rascal mere pounds. There should be 17 to fill up the set in the true Russian manner, but the fourth from the largest was found before their installation to be in a different key from the others, or a one inhabitant of the House put it, «even more out of key than the others,» and so it was sent across the river to the Business School, where it now rings for the end of classes. The bells are a true Russian Zvon, or carillon, and once were the pride and joy of the Dansilovsky, or Danailov Monastery, in Moscow, and they were given to the University by Charles R. Crane, former United States Minister to China. Crane Fond of Russia Crane, who rose to fame as the nation’s leading manufacturing of plumbing, traveled widely through Europe after the War and was struck by the charm of the Russian bells. On his return to this country he offered a set to President Lowell who, grateful for a chance to add a little English atmosphere to the Cambridge scene through the means of a bit of change-ringing, accepted. Through the efforts of Thomas Whittemore, keeper of Byzantine Coins and Seals in Fogg Museum and Fellow for Research in Byzantine Art, Crane was able to obtain the bells, after assuring the Soviet government, which was unwilling to let the carillon out of the country if it was to be used for religious purposes, that Harvard was not a religious institution. Russian Bell Ringer With the bells came a Russian bell-ringer, one Saradjeff, who was commissioned to direct installation of the Zvon and then to teach their playing. Now Zvon-playing is more an art than a science, and the true Zvon-player learns the trade from his father, who learned it from his, who learned it form his. Saradjeff was the son of a father and mother both of whom played the bells, and when he came to this country, he had already composed 132 symphonies for the Russian carillon. It was said that he could recognize any of the 4000 bells in Moscow by its tone. Tendency to Fits Besides a lack of anything like an elementary knowledge of English, he had a tendency toward fits. He got the bells safely up in their tower in the fall of 1930 and had a fit soon after. When installed in Stillman he thought, quite naturally, that he was being poisoned, as he was a Russian and used to better things. And one morning when the doctors found him drinking a bottle of ink as a remedy, it wad decided that he had best return to the land of caviar. With Saradjeff gone there was the problem of finding someone to play the bells. For a while tow professors from Columbia and Smith alternated on successive Sundays (in those days the bells were played every week, if not more often). Mason Hammond '25, associate professor of Classics and History, and at that time head tutor of Lowell House, who had acquired a penchant for playing the bells, performed between times when occasions arose on which it was deemed fitting for the bells to be rung. Source: The Harvard Crimson Online

That's very interesting, although my guess is not 'harmonies', because it's still the same scale. I just tried to find the NY'er article, you can't read all of it without subscribing. If there's a paragraph or so that describes specifically what you mean by microtonal, I'd appreciate your putting an excerpt, in the meantime may do some googling. I believe we were talking about some microtonal pieces about 8 or so months ago, but more along the lines of scales with 19 tones, I think that was one, then I brought up something about the Indian 'srutis' and the microtones in Harry Partch's music for which he built special instruments. I wonder, before doing any research myself, whether you might be talking about certain harmonies that give exotic impressiona of something perhaps a little oriental a la russe, etc., more than actual microtones, though. Tchaikovsky is pretty traditionally tonal, even though he's a genius, of course, and found his unique expression harmonically and as a great melodist. Microtones per se are not even to be found in 12-tone music, which still uses the same pitches, but under different rules and regulations. You're probably talking about some kind of exoticism you hear in the chords and progressions, but I don't think that would mean microtones, at least I'm having a heard time 'envisioning' it. Anthonynyc, mel, and others may know more about this than I do, though. I am going to look up something about the carillons though.

I have an active dislike for 'The Piano', absolutely loathe the original music. Thanks for warning about 'Portrait of a Lady', I had intended to finally catch up with it. I'm trying to think if I can think of any Henry James adaptations I like, other the both the Kerr and Bergman 'Turn of the Screw', don't like 'The Bostonians', because of casting all wrong, I thought.

Love the attitude But now that we've gone over the top, I must respectfully submit that, in addition to the Sleeping Beauty, there are also the 9 Beethoven Symphonies, Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier, The Ring Cycle, The Iliad, Graham's Herodiade, and the Bible and the Baghavad-Gita for good measure. Then there's Shakespeare and Racine, we'll have to fit them in somewhere...

I can't think why I thought it was, Hans. It's mine too, of course.

Thanks for putting up the clip, bart. It's really too short and mainly too dark for me to have any real impression of any kind, other than that one really does hear the toe shoes, as you noted. That doesn't bother me at all, in fact might be the one kind of sound that really does give a kind of 'percussion-only music' sound to it. Made me think of the Tiresius's staff in 'Night Journey', which really does add an unexpected, and very effective, percussion instrument to the William Schuman music.

Farrell Fan, permit to say something about this too, and I'm sure Bart will answer as well. I think we had talked about this before, but I also have thoroughly enjoyed doing this, because both see the dance movements in a different way, more nakedly perhaps, but you also learn the music that goes with it, because sometimes you can't remember exactly where you are in the music. So it's a very good exercise in several ways. I especially loved doing this with that old RB recording of Ashton's 'La Valse'. I thought it would be much easier than it is to 'hear' all the music in your head with the volume down than it was, which proves how passive we can be as listeners and viewers.