volcanohunter

Oh, they are indeed wonderful. Yanowsky's performance is close to immortal.

The POB's Josua Hoffalt has a new web site, in French and English. http://josuahoffalt.com

Ricardo Cervera will replace Edward Watson as the White Rabbit. http://www.roh.org.uk/news/cast-changes-alices-adventures-in-wonderland-on-10-and-16-december-2014

The Arthaus Musik DVD of Hobson's Choice is designed to play only in regions 2 & 5 (Europe, Africa, western Asia, Japan), so that's an additional obstacle a computer set up for region 1 (North America) can't overcome. The easiest solution is to acquire a player that has been hacked to remove regional restrictions. Supposedly, you can hack your own, and the relevant instructions for your model can be found online. I've never had the courage to try it myself and have always relied on companies that specialize in selling "region-free" players. I haven't owned a regular DVD player in more than a decade, and it gives me the freedom to watch any DVD or Blu-ray from anywhere. Of course, nowadays we also need to subscribe to a VPN service that can circumvent those pesky internet geo-blocks. Personally, I think it's worth the investment.

It's the Pastorale from The Queen of Spades, which is set in the late 18th century. I've always thought that Tchaikovsky was especially good at "period" music.

The initial DVD release on EMI was also a region-free PAL disc, and it wouldn't play on all machines. I'm mystified as to why this wasn't changed for this release. Laziness? But yes, I've noticed that such discs will usually play on computers and portable DVD players because NTSC TV sets are not involved. Ironically, for a revisionist production, it's also got the most "authentic" rendition of Ivanov's second act of any production performed today, with the huntsmen, mime and adage as pas de trois all intact.

ABT did take Other Dances into its repertoire several months earlier than NYCB. http://www.abt.org/education/archive/ballets/other_dances.html

Who performed Other Dances at its New York City Ballet premiere?

What I didn't realize until the ballet ended was that this was the retirement performance of Gregor Hatala. Naturally this had much greater meaning for the Viennese audience that had spent the last 25 years watching him on stage. No confetti shower, but a half dozen bouquets were thrown from the audience onto the stage, and there were lots of curtain calls.

This chart from a 1949 issue of Life magazine offers a fun perspective. http://boingboing.net/2014/06/11/1949-chart-shows-difference-be.html

Well my experience today was not especially happy. It seems the movie theater received a faulty disc that would not play. I'd been to previous screenings of content from the same distributor that went off without a hitch, but it also wasn't my first experience with cancellations. Last season I arrived at a rival multiplex to discover that the screening of the Royal Ballet's Giselle had been called off because of faulty technology, and there also wasn't enough time to drive to the next nearest location without missing the first act of the ballet. As for the audience, the crowd was small and overwhelmingly female, but somewhat larger than the group that had come to see the Royal Opera the week before, when the weather was horrendous. I recognized a lot of faces. Nearly everyone who'd been there last week had come back to see the ballet. As for dance students, there was certainly no one there younger than 20. It seemed to me that nearly everyone standing in line to look after their refunds opted to get tickets to the encore screening on January 26, so they're not easily put off.

Via Twitter, competition photos of Kirscher and Melac https://twitter.com/BalletOParis/status/540188790141489152 and Louvet and Marchand https://twitter.com/BalletOParis/status/540189563785084930

I felt the same way. They couldn't have tossed a coin?

The men's competition was held today. promoted to coryphée - Antoine KIRSCHER - Florent MELAC promoted to sujet - Germain LOUVET - Hugo MARCHAND Apparently the jury couldn't agree on the promotion to premier danseur, so the vacant position will go unfilled this year. https://www.operadeparis.fr/blogopera/resultats-du-concours-du-ballet-1

Eons ago, when I was a dance student, it never ceased to astonish me how disinterested many of my classmates were in attending performances. Remember Allegra Kent in Dancing for Mr. B, when she said that as a child she knew she loved ballet, but she wasn't sure she liked ballets? I came across students who felt that way surprisingly often. Sadly, I have seen very few dancers-in-training watching ballets at the movie theaters, even on Sunday afternoons, when there shouldn't be much in the way of time conflicts. You'd think that ballet students should be ballet's natural audience, but it doesn't necessarily seem to work that way.

There is overlap. There have even been attempts to understand the habits of cultural "highbrows" and "omnivores." http://arts.gov/sites/default/files/2008-SPPA-Age.pdf

I don't disagree with you. I'm not planning on going to see the Bolshoi's Swan Lake except in the very unlikely instance that it fields a cast that can overcome the production's limitations. The frontrunners are not it. As for the timing, I'm sure the chain would argue that the bunheads and their teachers have not been attending ballet cinemacasts anyway, and I fear they'd be right. Movie chains may be willing to spare some time for arts programming, but I guess they want the auditoriums clear in time to screen a Saturday afternoon blockbuster. They could further argue that Met in HD audiences routinely go to their multiplexes on Saturdays at 11 am in Alberta and 10 am in BC. Ontarians and Manitobans will have to adapt to watching by "Mountain" time, I suppose. There is always the Monday evening repeat. 6:30 pm is not such a late start time, and the $11.99 children's ticket price still applies. Although I'm not sure the kiddies should be watching Manon in any case. Teachers assure me that the innuendo in La Fille mal gardée goes right over kids' heads.

I adore it despite the camerawork.

Manon will be screened at Landmark Cinemas in Canada on Saturday, December 6 at 11 am local time, 10 am in British Columbia. The locations currently listed are: ON - Hamilton, Kanata, Kingston, Kitchener, London, Orleans, St. Catharines, Waterloo, Whitby MB - Winnipeg (Grant Park) AB - Calgary (Country Hills), Calgary (Shawnessy), Edmonton (City Centre), Spruce Grove BC - Campbell River, Courtenay, Cranbrook, Kamloops, Kelowna (Paramount), Nanaimo, New Westminster, North Vancouver, Penticton, Surrey, Victoria YT - Whitehorse (Qwanlin) At some locations there will be a repeat screening on Monday, January 26 at 6:30 pm. That will make for quite a ballet weekend: Alice's Adventures in Wonderland on the 24th, the Bolshoi's Swan Lake on the 25th and Manon on the 26th. http://www.landmarkcinemas.com/en.aspx In Trail, BC, Manon will be screened on Sunday, December 7 at 9:55 am. http://www.royaltheatretrail.com/dance

Flames of Paris seems to me as peculiar a choice for ABT (even in the Ratmansky version) as Bright Stream. Those ballets have a reason for being in Russian companies; much less so in an American one. The full-length Ratmansky that I thought might be imported by ABT was Lost Illusions. I don't think ABT would do Flames of Paris well. It would probably repeat the fate of The Bright Stream, which was declared a hit in its first season and played to half-empty houses the second time around. Lost Illusions would seem to be a better fit, but it is, I think, hampered by its amorphous music and dramaturgically: the hero and heroine don't intersect in the last act.

There should be no differences between the versions available. Initially the POB's Giselle was released by TDK. After TDK was bought by Arthaus Musik, it was issued a second time. Both versions seem to be a little hard to come by these days. If you can't afford the versions currently on sale, you can wait until it is re-issued yet again. For a number of years the Ferri Giselle was out of print and available only at high prices, but eventually it was re-issued, and now it can be acquired at a perfectly reasonable prince. There's just no telling how long a re-issue may take. The performances by Pujol (technically) and Le Riche (interpretively) are not perfect, but the film has a lot to recommend it, especially the corps, the peasant pas de deux from Ould-Braham and Thibault, and Gillot's Myrtha.

Starting on December 9 Lloyd Newson's John, a co-production of DV8 Physical Theatre and London's National Theatre will be screening in cinemas. In the United States it seems to be getting a limited release, and dates vary, but screenings can be found on the NTLive web site. In Canada it will be screened on December 10 at participating Cineplex venues. http://ntlive.nationaltheatre.org.uk/productions/47625-john http://www.nationaltheatre.org.uk/shows/john http://www.cineplex.com/Movie/john-national-theatre-live

This is casting for the webstream of Mayerling on December 7. Somehow it seems fitting to leave the German-language titles. Kronprinz Rudolf - Gregor Hatala Baronesse Mary Vetsera - Nina Poláková Kronprinzessin Stephanie - Natasche Mair Kaiserin Elisabeth - Dagmar Kronberger Marie Gräfin Larisch - Ketevan Papava Bratfisch - Richard Szabó Mizzi Caspar - Alice Firenze Katharina Schratt - Aura Twardowska http://www.wiener-staatsoper.at/Content.Node/home/spielplan/Spielplandetail.en.php?eventid=961874609&month=12&year=2014& http://www.staatsoperlive.com/en/live/127/mayerling-2014-12-07/

That is a nasty injury. I can only wish as swift as possible a recovery for this very fine dancer. Casting for Lescaut's Mistress has not yet been posted. The company has also not yet posted casting for the overlapping performances of Paquita, which Hecquet danced on tour in Montreal recently.

The Paris Opera Ballet has posted casting for the spring run of Manon. The trios of Laëtitia Pujol, Mathieu Ganio and Jérémie Bélingard; Ludmila Pagliero, Florian Magnenet and Audric Bezard; and Eleonora Abbagnato, Josua Hoffalt and Alessio Carbone will get two performances each. Dorothée Gilbert will dance the final performance with François Alu as Lescaut. (Des Grieux as yet unidentified.) But the biggest chunk of performances will be by Aurélie Dupont, Hervé Moreau and Stéphane Bullion on May 6, 8, 12, 14 and the live cinema broadcast on the 18th, her farewell performance, which is already sold out. https://www.operadeparis.fr/en/saison-2014-2015/ballet/l-histoire-de-manon-kenneth-macmillan