Brice

Nina is dancing at Jacob's Pillow , 6/20-6/24

Having seen bits and peices of rehearsals of several of the peices for Workshop I can say that the level of talent at the school at this moment is astounding, and there are many dancers worth watching.

My DD will be dancing in Twinkliana at the SAB Workshop. There are 2 casts. The performance features 6 girls from the children's Division and 1 boy from intermediate men's class. Each girl does a short solo variation, the boy does a solo variation, then there is a Pas de Deux (my DD is dancing the Pas in addition to her solo),and an ensemble/finale. It is the same peice that CPYB performs. Mr Lavery and Katrina Killian are working with the children. It is a lovely peice.

Forgive the nitpicking, but "unique" only in the US. Kirov, Bolshoi, Perm, Kiev, POB, RB and RDB all have residential programs for their students. Nitpicking forgiven, I actually agree wholeheartedly, and should have stated "in this country", and while criticism's of SAB are legitimate, as no instituion is perfect, it is an academy with the necessary support and structure to train dancers for the company, and the relationship between the school and the company is very solid. It is understanfdable why young dancers wish to train at an academy that not only is attached to a company, but has a longstanding tradition of moving dancers from school to company. And while SAB is not the ony school that does this (SanFran,Miami, PNB...), the relationship between ABT and the JKO school is still not determined.....

And while 90% or so of NYCB's dancers are SAB grads, few of them got all their training there. Not being argumentative, either. Just pointing to the absence, in the US, of a real national academy -- or two -- as in Denmark, Russia, France and to a lesser degree, if I have the right sense of it, England. Yes, but difficult when ballet training begins at age 8, and talent is spread all over the country, for dancers to get all their training from SAB. Very few families are willing to part with their dancers until they reach at least 13-14-15.The JKO school will never truly be able to attract national talent if it does not have the same structure and support that SAB offers - residence hall, cafeteria, etc. The relationship SAB has with NYCB in terms of feeding dancers into the company is unique as well as commendable.

Yes Sander O, I agree. Ashley's performance last night (and I've seen her dance this role several times) was breathtaking-nuanced, right on the music, full of depth, technically flawless-to think what this ballerina will look like 10 years from now! I was in the audience with my daughter(age 11), who appeared in Circus Polka that eveing(and also appeared in Firebird last year). She turned to me somewhere between the 3rd and 4th curtain call and said "mommy, some day I'm going to dance like that I hope...)She has had the privilege of taking classes with Ms Bouder as well. Depsite all it's flaws, the company has a trmendous amount of young talent at the moment...one can only hope that talent will mature and grow. Kudos to Sarah Mearns & Sterling Hyltin as well. And I enjoyed Jonathoan Stafford's sensitive performance also-another young talent to watch.